A Diva State of Mind

I was watching “Love & Hip-Hop” last night (don’t ask me why), and Chrissy, Jim Jones’ girlfriend of six years, proposed to him in front of a group of family and friends. She knew that her future included Jim as her husband, so she took the next step in their relationship to try and make that a reality (of course we’ll have to wait until next week to find out if he says yes). While I understand why Chrissy proposed, she has been with Jim Jones for six years; if he hasn’t proposed after all that time, is he really interested in getting married? More importantly, does he want to be married to Chrissy?

If you knew your boyfriend was the man you wanted to spend the rest of your life with, would you be as bold as Chrissy and propose? I’m not talking about a casual “we should get married.” I mean a real proposal, ideally how you’d want him to propose to you. Society has taught us that the man should propose. But in the year 2011, when more women are courting men (asking them out on dates, paying for dates, etc) is it really a society faux pas to ask a man to be your husband?

I believe a man should ask for a women’s hand in marriage.  It’s an unspoken rule.  While the male/female dynamic in relationships have become so untraditional these days,  a man proposing to a woman is one tradition that should not change.  That is a moment in time when a man has decided he is ready to settle down and truly commit himself to one woman for the rest of his life. For men, that’s a big deal!!! Plus, who wouldn’t want a man to go through the entire proposal process from buying the ring, planning the proposal and seeking parents (especially the father’s) approval?

While I do believe in this gender role, I do understand why a woman may take it upon herself to propose. Ok maybe I don’t really understand, but here are some possible reasons: she may feel like a guy should not have to deal with the pressure of being the one responsible for taking the relationship to the next level. Or she may feel like she should not have to wait around for him to step up to the plate.  If he hasn’t stepped up in terms of moving the relationships forward, by proposing, a woman may actually be saving herself some time and energy because if he says no she will really know it is time to move on.

I can’t explain a woman’s frame of mind in terms of proposing to her man. What I do know is this: if a man wants to marry you, he will step up and act accordingly.  It’s really that simple.  If you’ve been in a relationship as long as Chrissy has with Jim Jones and he hasn’t made strides towards marriage, something you really want, it is probably not going to happen. He’s just not that into marrying you.

My friend sent me a message on gchat last week asking me to do a blog post about ladies moving in with their boyfriends.  I’m not exactly sure what she wanted me to specifically talk about so here are my thoughts!

I never really liked the idea of moving in with a boyfriend.  For me personally, the only person I’d ever move in with is my future fiancé or husband (no I’m not engaged; speaking hypothetically). Having a ring on my finger shows true commitment and seriousness about being together forever.  Believe me, I understand that those who are engaged and married break up and divorce too but there’s something about living with a boyfriend that just screams TOO SOON!

Now we all know boyfriends and girlfriends spend the night and give each other a spare drawer but that’s extremely different than moving in together. You can always go back home! When you live together, you don’t really have that option.  Now I know you won’t have that option either once you’re married, but that’s what you signed up for as husband and wife.

If you’re my boyfriend and we’re just dating, let’s miss each other a little bit.  Go a day or two without seeing each other. It not only makes reconnecting more exciting but helps keep the relationship fresh.  Not living together also gives you time to REALLY get to know each other; what you don’t want to do is move in with someone and then discover their true colors.

When you live together with a boyfriend, you also run the risk of being the milk he got for free (you know the saying “why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free”).  He may never want to pay for the cow!  There are women out there today who have lived with their significant others for YEARS and their man still hasn’t proposed. These women keep holding on and waiting and waiting and waiting.  But why should he get on one knee and ask that life changing question? By living together and not expecting anything more than your current situation, you are saying that it is ok to act like husband and wife without being the real deal.

Some will argue that moving in together is a great way to see if you really want to be together forever. That may be true for some, but hopefully by dating for a long period of time living in separate residencies, you can make that assessment.  Otherwise living together to only find out it wasn’t the best idea is an expensive reality no one wants to have to deal with.  So while the decision is ultimately yours, ladies may I suggest you wait until he has put a ring on it before moving in!

I’ve said it plenty of times, my friends are flirts. We all are! LOL So a group of us went out Saturday night to celebrate my best friend’s birthday and the drinks were definitely flowing.  Let’s just say, tequila told me it was ok to lock lips with a friend of mine.  Now at the time, I didn’t care; he’s single, I’m single and he likes to flirt so I didn’t think anything of it. UNTIL…..word on the street is that he has a girlfriend.

Now I love my friend to death and after doing some thinking, there is a possibility I would’ve even considered dating and seeing what would happen since he’s such a great guy (my girls LOVE HIM), but if he has a girlfriend, there is no reason he should be acting the way he’s been acting.  I don’t care what the situation with his girl is like; if he’s still calling her his girlfriend and taking the time to go see her every other weekend there is absolutely no reason he should be flirting with me.  And to make matters worse, he says in a joking manner “yea I just can’t hang out with you.” Uh yea you can, you just need to behave. I never really took him seriously so I guess it shouldn’t matter that it happened but if I was his girl, I wouldn’t want him saying and acting the way he was with me towards some other female.  I would be offended.  And I respect my boy too much to disrespect his relationship like that.

So my message to you ladies and gents is this:  If you have a girlfriend or boyfriend, regardless of the situation, it is NOT ok to flirt, grab, kiss, etc the opposite sex.  I don’t care if the relationship you are in is going through a rough patch, on the verge of breaking up or you’re unhappy. It doesn’t matter.  You are still in a relationship and as long as you are, you have signed up to be in  COMMITTEED, TRUSTING relationship and that means you shouldn’t say or do anything that your partner would feel is being unfaithful or questionable.  If the situation is that bad, BREAK UP and then you can do whatever you want as a SINGLE individual with other singles.  Yes, it’s that simple!