Woman:Know Your Worth

Where three or more women are gathered, the most probable topic of discussion is the men in their lives. They would often be airing their grievances on how they were not being treated how they should be by their other halves. ‘Chamas’ were created purposely for this reason; financial empowerment is just a side effect of the famous women’s groups. In these forums, women get the chance to whine about their husbands/boyfriends without being questioned.

The presumption is that a woman is always on the right and the man a heinous being who is on the wrong. Society has driven the notion that women are the weaker sex so deeply into the minds of these womenfolk that they automatically assume the role of the ‘victim’ whenever a disagreement in the relationship arises. The man is always to blame for all possible faults.

Sadly, this “victim” syndrome has been passed on to the current generation of young women. The average campus or college-going twenty-something year old girl has her bunch of groupie female friends that she runs to whenever she has a conflict with the boyfriend. These women will console their afflicted friend and bitch about how all men are dogs over cupfuls of yoghurt and ice-cream. They will comfort the broken hearted lass by telling her that the man is the one at a loss in the event of a break-up, never mind the fact that perhaps she may have been the one on the wrong.

 The groupies serve the sole purpose of ensuring that they provide emotional support for one of their members during such moments. Women have to stand up for each other. None of their own will suffer heart-break in isolation; they must support her in solidarity. These groupies will often collude with a bitter girlfriend to torch up the clothes or smash the windows belonging to an ex-lover. They will take it upon themselves to punish the young man on the receiving end for messing with one of their own.

One is left wondering why women opt for this path yet the preventive measures are way easier to handle. Why smoke a cigarette yet complain when you get diagnosed with lung cancer? You simply cannot play victim when a ploy that you were an accomplice to goes awfully wrong.

Relationships are one such thing. No one puts a gun to your head and tells you to date a certain guy or die. It is all a matter of choice; willing buyer and willing seller. You enter into a relationship knowing exactly what to expect. It is no longer the olden days of our grandmother’s when a woman would be taken straight from her father’s house into a marital home, with a husband she barely knew. Somehow, she was expected to not only start living with the stranger she now called husband but love him unconditionally. Only such a woman has the excuse of complaining about her partner because frankly speaking, they had no choice regarding the issue.

In this age, complaining about how a man treats you is a mere waste of time and tears for both you and the girls that are forced to sympathize with you. The manner in which you accept a man to treat you in the dawn of your relationship determines how he will handle matters for the rest of the relationship duration.

You cannot date a drunkard yet expect people to empathize with you when he starts coming home  during the wee hours of the morning. Why would you complain about his drinking habits and the fact that he spends more cash on the bottle than on you yet you knew exactly what you were diving into the moment you begun dating?

Same goes for women who date a guy that is hitched somehow expect him to miraculously leave his woman for her.

 It doesn’t work like that; you only receive the much you bargained for. Expecting more is a chasing after the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. If he was abusive in his past relationship, what makes you think that he won’t lay a hand on you; more so after forgiving him when he struck you at one point in time, what makes you think he will change? Men will treat you the way they envision you want to be treated, if you set a bar for him then he most definitely will work towards achieving it.

Set your boundaries and outline them out very clearly to him before you get entangled. If you are in for a serious commitment or a mere fling, make it known right at the beginning. That way, a man will know what is expected of him and no one will feel shortchanged or ‘used’ in the end.

I believe a woman wields the most power when it comes to relationships. It all depends on the standards you set. If you made him feel that he could just take you to the local food joint for dinner, then don’t come complaining about how unromantic your guy is when you realize that other women are being treated way better than you by their guys.

 You don’t call yourself a ‘bad bitch’ and expect him to treat you like a lady, neither do you post half-naked images of yourself on social media and expect respect from the men around you. It really is a simple as that. How you treat yourself determines how you will be treated. Input determines output. There is no other way about this issue.  Let your guy know exactly what you want and avoid the huge price of emotional turmoil that you will have to bear as a result of a failed relationship.

Remember that you are entering a partnership out of your own free will and no one should ever coerce you into one. Profits and liabilities derived from the partnership will be shared on a 50-50 basis, and so there is no excuse for you to play the ‘victim’ role. The mantle of selecting the right partner is in your hands so chose wisely.