Insecure

Last night, I was watching an episode of Insecure on HBO.  It is quickly becoming one of my favorite shows on television because it’s so relatable to its relatively young, educated, African-American audience.  On the show, there was a young lady named Tasha who was dealing with a guy that had just gotten out of a long term relationship.  Tasha was clearly the rebound, but she caught feelings.  As a result of these feelings, she ignored all of the signs that told her to steer clear of him. She went full steam ahead with this dude, screwing him on demand, being his cheerleader, and basically occupying a role that was never offered to her officially. No offer letter, no nothing.  Eventually, everything came to a head when the guy bailed on her family picnic that he agreed to attend, so that he could hang out with his work friends.  He left the picnic pretty early in the day to go handle a “work issue”, for what was to only be a short period of time.  Well, he never returned.  His “work issue” was basically a work mixer where tons of fellow IT professionals were on the prowl for ass.  He never returned to the picnic, so she called him to scold him for bailing on her. He then proceeded to tell her that he wasn’t looking for anything serious……over the phone!  Sigh.  So she proceeded to bless him out with a scathing reflection of his true self.  In laymen’s terms, she essentially called him a f*ck boy.  Those who have watched the show, know the guy’s name, but this post isn’t about him, so I’m not going to name him here.  I want to focus on Tasha’s character, because although she is a flawed character herself (i.e. going after him when she knew he was involved with someone else), in the end, she had enough self-respect to realize that she deserved better.  Even if other people think she does not.  Of course she didn’t come to this conclusion from the start.  If she was a perfect person, she would have never gotten involved with him to begin with.  But these people are in their mid to late twenties.  And when you like someone, sometimes you do dumb sh*t.  We’ve all been there at some point or another.  Don’t act like you haven’t. 

It got me to thinking about my own past relationships.  In the situation mentioned above, the guy was clearly not blameless.  But how many times have we allowed ourselves to be blamed for their actions?  I’ve never been a subscriber of people (man or woman) getting passes for ridiculous behavior just because they never verbally communicated a desire to commit.  To subscribe to this is to say that nonverbal communication means nothing, and we all know that’s just as important as verbal communication.  Just like your words without action mean nothing, your actions can’t send mix messages and then expect to get off blame-free.  That’s not real.  That’s not life.  People don’t fall for words.  Particularly empty words.  People fall for actions, the way they are treated and the way they are made to feel.  So although the guy was not telling her that he was committed to her, he was behaving as if they were.  He was doing the things he needed to do as if they were in a relationship so that she would continue to give him the things that she would typically give in a relationship.  So in his mind, he’s still a good guy because he never told her he wanted anything more, even though his actions suggested otherwise.  And she is left holding the bag with her feelings in her hand.  Listen.  I am not saying that Tasha is not culpable for her own feelings, because she is.  Ideally, she would have never gotten involved with him period.  But scratch all of the woulda, coulda, shoulda, because we don’t have a crystal ball and we all choose unwisely from time to time.  It doesn’t give the other person the right to abuse your heart.  This situation was extreme because Tasha was fully aware of the circumstances, but how many times have we been in situations with people who have taken advantage of your affection so that they could get what they wanted or needed from you at the time?  How do you deal with that?

I say to take a page from Tasha’s book.  Tasha was at least half responsible for her situation, but she still held dude accountable in the end.  She didn’t put the blame totally on herself. However, instead of begging him to change his ways, she cussed him out and moved on.  Because in the end, she alone is responsible for her own well being.  She didn’t expect him to make it right and she wasn’t going to accept his half ass proposal (which you know was coming in the form of future booty calls) to have a casual relationship either.  In her mind, she deserved better.  She knew full well what it was in the beginning and that it was messy AF from the start.  But in the end, she decided that she deserved to be treated better regardless of the circumstances.  So it got me to thinking about my own life.  Have EYE demanded better for myself in any and all circumstances? I can honestly say that I have never engaged in anything nearly as messy as that situation on the show.  But nevertheless, from time to time, I have still been caught in situations begging and pleading for people to treat me right instead of just walking way.  This is not just about romantic relationships.  This can be about a friendship, a job, or even a family member.  That episode reminded me that even an extremely flawed person deserves to be treated fairly and respectfully.  I am not perfect.  I am difficult a lot of the time.  I am a flawed individual.  But in the end, I deserve to be treated the way I desire to be treated.  So I better start TF to act like it.   Tasha went after a guy she knew was committed to someone else and when she finally got him, she decided that he wasn’t good enough for her.  Let that marinate for a second.  So if “I’m gonna steal your man Tasha” can demand more, how much more should we demand for ourselves? 

Let me know your thoughts in the comments.  If you watched the episode, what did you think about it?