I am so tired of all this media attention around black women and the “lack” of marriage in our culture. If some news anchor isn’t focused on the number of black men unemployed or in jail, then it’s another focused on all the “poor” black women who are single with no one to marry. That’s just plain ‘ole nonsense.

As a young adult, I had my fair share of negative talk to overcome when it came to walking down the aisle.  One person said I was too independent to get married.  Another person thought I was too spiritual to get married.  Then a third person said I was too “plain” to attract a man.And I made sure that I invited them all to my wedding.

If I had listened to everyone and their opinions about me and my ability to get married, I would still be single today. But I didin’t listen.  I couldn’t.  Not that it was easy – but I knew what I wanted and I couldn’t let other’s feelings about the situation dictate my life. Likewise, we as women need to stop listening to people and start listening to our hearts and souls about what is best for our life. You see, it’s not so much that the media is saying their fair share of negative talk about Black women.  This is the problem – we believe the hype!  We’re basing our lives on the choice words of a broadcaster who’s more interested in ratings than the welfare of the people watching. And we’ve got to stop listening and start living.

It’s time out for believing everything we hear.  It’s time to start going out in the world and doing our own research. It’s time that we’re honest about what we want and open up to it “out there” instead of ignoring it. Ladies, we know how to get a degree and we know how to buy property.  We know how to be strong and we know how to love hard.Well, it’s it time that we learn how to go after what we want in our love lives! Whether it’s men in our race, out of our race, older, younger, wealthy or just embracing being single – it’s time that we define our love life regardless of the statistics. Statistics didn’t keep us for applying for jobs that weren’t previously employing minorities.  Statistics didn’t keep us from reaching for degrees that our parents didn’t have. Statistics didn’t keep us from building financial portfolios.  So why should we let statistics define whether or not we marry?

Let’s send a message to the media and say – your statistics won’t keep me from living the life I want! I say we turn off the televisions and start hanging out with people who define their own life.  Who’s with me?