Women as Pretty Vessels of Convenience

Men:

There's a select men who view women, like Maya Angelou in 'A letter to my Daughter' would have said it, as conveniently pretty vessels.

Not all women though. Only those that they'd love to pick and use for their convenience.

They call them, text them, invest in them, sex them and make them believe that they are heading somewhere. Then at a time that is, once again, convenient for them, they distance themselves.

These are the ones that have made the female species such a bile-filled lot.

Women:

But, worse still is the troop of women who view themselves as these vessels of convenience. Women who allow themselves to be picked and used for a man's thrive at the expense of their value.

They show up and represent. They don't believe that they can amount to anything more than a man's love and attention, a believe that this man now borrows. If that love is lacking then she descends on herself as the problem.

Women who are beautiful, intelligent, strong and powerful have allowed themselves to be thrashed by the lack of a man's love. They have questioned God, their destiny and their worth because no man assured them of the same.

I gracefully call these the enemies of self.

Me:

You may say it's easy for me to speak of such confidently because I have a man, but it even weighs on me the more because I have him.

I must constantly ask myself who I am and who I am to him.

I must not allow myself to get comfortable in his love. I must continually desire more for myself where self-respect, self-discovery, achievement and progress is concerned. Not be a present pretty vessel of convenience for him.

It is easy to get comfortable when a man has grown intentional about showing you that you are a woman of value and that his view of you is not just about being a wife and mother to his children. But it is the exposure to such knowledge that should empower me to grow as a person. And growth is not about marriage; marriage compliments growth not vice versa.

That said,I'm still all about walking down the aisle but not at all about sidelining my value. Mine truly told me today that he sees marriage as a beginning(read blessing) and not the ultimate to one's journey of life. I couldn't agree more.

This in itself communicates that I need to hold myself with such timeless esteem...such deep and innate value...such power...such elegance....and such beauty.

I'm at a place where I have more time in my hands to discover and rediscover my being, embrace my wholeness and share who I am with humanity.

The more I share myself, the more aware I've become of those that see me as a friend and those that look at me as a pretty vessel of convenience.

I have grown more aware of acquaintances who reach out to me when it's convenient for them but make themselves unavailable when need be.

I've become more aware that I must love humanity but I MUST as well extend this love to myself. Matter of fact,  in this love, and in all grace I can supply, should there ever be a need to shut out toxic relations that undermine my value by looking at me as a pretty vessel of convenience, I should match up to the occasion as a matriarch orcas.

It is such discovery that compels me to write a note to my mother, sister and daughter who have build my perspectives withholding nothing.

Mother, Sister, Daughter:

Thank you for being the epitome of grace, courage, forgiveness and love.

Thank you for showing me that I am a woman, not because of a man, but because I am created to fulfill my purpose of creation with womanhood as the propeller.

Thank you for showing me that I can balance relationships, gain success, embrace failure and accept accolades humbly.

Thank you for showing me that my worth is not in the vanity of beauty, but in the courage to rise.

Thank you for wisdom that is timeless and love that is truly unconditional.

Thank you for friendship that is deep, severe and amusingly brutal.

Thank you for being a mother, a sister, a daughter.

I pray that there are many of your kind in the world. And that as I continually mother young ones, biologically and not, I shall measure up to your sky standards.

It is mothers like you that allow women like me to realize our worth and preach it.

It is sisters like you that encourage women like me through the roughest.

Daughters like you who give women like me strength to keep going.

Women like you that give women like me the strength to walk away from that which will only degrade our value.

And as we rise, high above people's ‘pretty vessels of convenience’, teach us to hold other women’s hands on our way up. Teach us to show them they no longer have to bend over at their expense.

That as they awake every morning and go to bed every night, they should be able to remind themselves of their dignity no matter how shredded, faded or hopelessly intangible it may seem.

Leopard Beach Hotel, Diani Beach