Dear Dark Skinned Women: You are not Asking for too Much

On my personal level up journey I decided early on that I would join a few Facebook groups centered around women who are doing the same, in hopes of finding and learning from like-minded women. As of late, I am less active in the groups due to the negativity, off topic, regressive discussion, and caping.

However, it is also due to the disappointing amount of dark skinned women who feel like they only deserve the bare minimum. It unfortunately highlights where some dark skinned women still are mentally. Maybe they don’t have the support in their lives to feel like they can ask for more but they can and they should! In my opinion, we get what we THINK we deserve and some black women are still finding themselves and their standards.

Now maybe I'm biased but I truly believe that dark skinned black women are collectively the most beautiful women on earth, so it’s hard for me to watch them accept less than they deserve. No black woman should feel that they aren’t entitled to stellar treatment, being spoiled, and a carefree life like every other woman.

It is mostly upsetting because the things I saw some women ask about, or worry about asking for were generally, the bare minimum. One black woman spoke on her experience and journey on being able to feel worthy of gifts on holidays. Following, in the comment section, there were many dark skinned women asking for advice about how to feel worthy of receiving.

To be clear, I am not bashing these women, we all have some internalized stuff we have to work out and not every one of us is in the same head space. However, there is little public support for the idea that black woman, especially dark skinned women, are deserving of more than the basics. I think that some of the reason for these feelings, other than the obvious conditioning, is that we don’t spend enough time with ourselves.

Black women for much of our lives, even young black women, are conditioned to take on everyone else’s issues, and to look out for everyone before ourselves. Due to frequently putting our needs last, we can sometimes be unfamiliar with them and don’t always know how to respond if and when someone asks us what we want. Dark skinned black women are especially conditioned to be the mules and backbone of the community, which is also promoted to us through media depictions and tropes. It is important to be aware of this conditioning and to not understate its impact on black women’s psyche.

So with the media and sometimes even our families reinforcing that dark skinned women and our needs come last, I think it is important for every single one of us to carve out time to get to know ourselves. I also encourage black women to seek therapy if need be, and understand that once we collectively find our value I think we will turn a tide in what we allow into our life and what we allow in terms of what we truly deserve.