Are we too independent?

Are we too independent?

Recently I've been encountering folks on the dating scene and their first question is why are you single. My reply is " I'm single by choice". That is true for the most part but as Ispent some time really thinking on it, I realized most of my friends are single and workaholics.

For the most part we are too sure of ourselves, too eager to express our opinion (and dis yours), too unwilling to listen and be submissive? Are today's black women even capable of 'following' a strong black man? I'm not hating sisters I am in this group also.

I think, in many ways, we are too independent, but with good reason. To understand this dichotomy, you have to understand something about most single black women. Most of us single black women have a history of supporting ourselves, holding down a job (or two), possibly raising children, attending school, taking care of household bills (probably with a house of our own) and helping out with other family responsibilities involving parents, grandparents and siblings.

For many years we have handled these responsibilities without a strong or consistent male influence in our lives. Through miscommunication, death, neglect or abuse, many father-daughter, sister-brother, boyfriend-girlfriend relationships have gone astray, oftentimes leaving women to form a support network among ourselves in order to get things done, bring order to our lives and accomplish those tasks that were once upon a time more evenly split between the two genders.

We have learned that in order to get things done, we had to rely upon ourselves and began to do so with increasing success. As a result of this, we learned that we didn't really 'need' black men the way we thought we did - for companionship, for leadership or for money and support. We learned to work and earn money for ourselves, raise their children single-handedly, pay their bills, and get our own education, but these lessons came at a cost. And that cost was the sacrifice of a healthy relationship with their future spouses, boyfriends or lovers. So, yes, black women are sometimes too independent, but only because they had to be. In order to survive, in order for their children to survive and in order to make our lives work.


We want a relationship of equals. Equal respect, equal power and equal say. Because we are often so strong, it can often hinder the development and growth of a good relationship. Just as no man wants someone to tell him how to live his life, neither do most women. Strength plus strength should be a potent combination, but all too often the strength in women and the strength in men becomes a power struggle and then a wedge that drives us apart.


So, are single black women too independent? Sometimes yes and sometimes no - but relationships between men and black women can still work. With a little compromise on both sides, a clear understanding of what a Godly, bible-based relationship is, and with a love that lasts longer than who gets the last word, independence can become interdependence (being independent but dependent on one another and God) and the too-independent black woman will be no more