Demanding the Box

Back in the day, I dealt with codependency and people-pleasing, both of which were unattractive qualities except for one thing: it gave almost anyone else an edge over me that was difficult to calm. I volunteered for a number of different organizations, worked multiple jobs, and gave away much more money than I ever received, believing that I was doing the right thing by being “humble.” One day, I realized that this was unhealthy, and while I forgave myself for the mindset and the behavior, I also understood that a lot of people only maintained a relationship with me based on what they could get out of me. Most of the time, it was easy to avoid those people by staying off social media or by spending more time in solitude, rather than large groups. However, when I tried to reengage with some long-term “friends,” I finally understood that they wanted the me from my past, rather than the person I was becoming, and they would do whatever they thought necessary to keep me in their box.

Too many people demand that Black people stay in the “suffering, overlooked, and humble” box, not recognizing that such a mindset makes them as disrespectful as those they despise. I have spent years working myself sick, injured, and going broke to prove–what? Looking back on the time that I worked so much that I lied about my hours, I cannot understand a single thing that I gained from the process, other than fatigue. Consequently, I was passed over for promotions, failed to get different jobs even with more education, and spent a lot more money sustaining myself instead of investing, saving, or any other positive trait. Did I mention that I have lived in a city prized for its “liberal” politics? My story is not unique, and the facts that people are now asking Black nurses to pick crops and prison investment is on the rise lets me know that more people will be working to gaslight us all into believing that somehow, we deserve this treatment, and we should be “grateful.”

The most unhealthy aspect of most of my former friendships was that as they made more and more, they started offering less and less, as if I spent a great deal of time asking them for their resources. Some of them had improved their careers and/or housing situations, and I had thought when helping them, it would help both of us rise so that neither of us would need help in the future. On the contrary, they began to assert some dominance that they felt entitled to based on their having more resources, which I had not done, and was surprised to see. When I became completely vulnerable, they asserted that they had the right to control me and criticize me for my life choices, even though I had not done the same thing to them. Newsflash for people of means: if a power dynamic has to be part of a relationship, that says more about the dominator than the target. Trying to keep someone in a “less than” box leads to disengagement.

People all over the country are finally being slapped into the consciousness that no one wants to be stuck in the position that others demand of them. Human beings exist to be dynamic, and demanding that all of us stick into arbitrarily assigned boxes negates our humanity and ruins our possibilities. Those of us who were cultivated to be submissive are finally waking up to the reality that all the submission in the world will not sate the insatiable. It is simply not possible to command the whole of society to play roles assigned by those who refuse to accept that they lack the right to control people and/or resources.