After being captain of the field for nearly two decades, a guy I know announced that he was “ready to settle down and start looking for the one” via social media.
My first thought was, “It’s about doggone time.” I mean, honestly, I was torn between calling him the Ray Lewis or the Shaquille O’Neal of the … well, let’s just say casual dating scene.
But once I decided he was Shaq – mainly because there was no real scandal during his tenure and he’s hanging up his player hat with no grand eclipse – I found this statement especially striking. It sounded completely opposite to how we as women decide that we are going to dive into our relationship agendas.
I reached out to pick his brain about his tweet/status and see what his plan of attack was. Just like the short statement suggested – he’s going about it in a way that I thought would be of interest to single black females.
You see, he hasn’t been kicked in the heart and knocked upside the head by love and co-created a happily ever after with an unaware – and usually unwilling – participant.
He is totally single. I asked for his thoughts, and he was gracious enough to share.
“Women go about it all wrong. Y’all fall in love, decide that a man is for you and try to rationalize him into the man of your dreams – regardless of if the facts tell you otherwise,” he said.
“Y’all go into just about every serious relationship completely subjectively, when you need more objectivity when it comes to your husband than any other area in your life. But y’all are too in your feelings to even see that this man isn’t worth your time.”
All right then, Dr. Phil!
He then goes on to use that players’ proverb involving a woman of the night and a housewife, saying that he’s not even looking at his most faithful of “regulars” as he thinks about his future spouse. He says he found what he was looking for out of them, and it was an “okay, I will” and absolutely not “I do.”
“But that’s not fair, because EVERY woman is almost ALWAYS looking for a husband,” I said. “There are exceptions to every rule, but for the most part it’s the whole reason why we date.”
I told him I’m willing to bet that 95 percent of those women he used for casual encounters were hoping that it was going to pan out to something more.
“Women see you and they see an intellectually stimulating college-educated man with a good job,” I continued. “I’m not judging, but I know you use your credentials as an extremely eligible black man for a ‘bait and switch’ to get women in the bed.”
“Yes, I market myself as an ‘eligible BACHELOR,” he said – asking me to type it in all caps. “But I’ve never advertised as a potential husband the whole time I’ve been dating – because at the time I wasn’t looking to be anybody’s husband.”
Then he proceeded to blow my mind.
“Well, you dated these women, knowing full well that they wanted something more,” I said. “And more than one of them you made your girlfriend.”
“Yes, but if they had looked at it the same way they do EVERYTHING else I wouldn’t have stood a chance,” he said.
“I was NEVER looking for a wife. Just think about it. You wouldn’t go work in a position that is underpaying you, overworking you and beneath your qualifications just because you like a particular brand or product, right?”
Aha moment … to the max!
“Okay, this has gone in a totally different direction than I had expected,” I said. “I’m grateful for it – all of it – but I wanted to talk about what a man is looking for in a woman when he makes the conscious decision to settle down.”
“I can’t speak for everyone, but I know enough from my boys and the women they chose (or let choose them) that it depends on the man,” he said. “There’s no formula. I would suggest to any woman to work on being their best – whatever that means to them – and do it FOR THEM.”
“Well, what are you looking for?” I ask.
“None of the things I thought I was when I first started dating – which, oddly enough, are the standards women seem to hold themselves to their whole life,” he said.
“I’m looking for someone that I won’t get bored with – and someone that I know will hold me down, share my vision and support me as I propel into my destiny. That’s it.”
