Patience is a Virtue, Dahlings!

Daaaaaahhhhhhllllings!

What up, what up, what up? You've probably noticed that there has been a lack of new content over the past couple of months on this here page. It isn't because we don't love you anymore nor is it because we're lazy. We're in the process of doing some technical type steez to our blog, revampin' and stuff. In the mean time, in between time, feel free to follow us on Twitter, check out our Tumblr (new photos are up there!), and send us all of your positive vibes.

January 6th. =)

Russell Simmons Occupies Wall Street

Russell Simmons has shown an immense amount of respect and support for the protesters at Zuccotti Park, NYC. On November 6th, 2011, he made an appearance at the site to openly offer his opinions and personal views.

 
Photography: Dimitri SaintVil with Lauraberth Lima

We Gon' Make It

"The dream is the truth." - Zora Neale Hurston

Le Femme Flaneur started as a creative outlet for two best friends to share their perspectives with the world - one post at a time. With every conversation LB and I have had about LFF and the progression of the site, we realized that we were selling ourselves short by just focusing on a blog. There are so many different avenues with which we can create an open dialogue with so many people that it seems pointless to travel along just one. Furthermore, our aspirations and ambitions are bigger than what we even originally allowed ourselves to believe. However, we shall sell ourselves short no longer.

Over the past couple of months, we have been busy expanding Le Femme Flaneur into a creative collective, something like a movement. Next week, we will premiere our first short film/documentary. Our website is currently being revamped. We have another business venture in the works that we are beyond excited to share with you. We are awaking from our slumber and turning our dreams into reality - into truth.

I say all of that to say these 3 things:

1. Expect new, but absolutely amazing things from Le Femme Flaneur starting November 19th! 

2. You do a disservice to yourself when you settle for less than you desire. We are all capable of achieving great success and living the happiest and most fulfilling lives we possibly can. You do not have to believe anything I ever say except for this - Fear is limiting. Impossible is nothing. Okay, so I may have gotten that from a Nike commercial or something, but it's true!

 

3. Jadakiss and Styles P told us "We gon' make it." We believe them, so should you.

Join us as we enter into our next phase, dahlings!

Him

A young man of a certain complexion, a certain height, and a certain age is walking in your direction. Your heartbeat doubles, you hold your breath, and your entire body tenses up. The young man is now within a foot of you and you're sad. You're sad because you realize he wasn't "him".

He wasn't the man who won your heart four years ago.

He wasn't the man you spoke to on the phone from sunset to sunrise.

He wasn't the man you introduced to your parents because you honestly thought it would last.

He wasn't the man who made frequent surprise visits to your workplace because he could not wait to see you.

He wasn't the man who trusted you enough to tell you all of his dreams.

He wasn't the man who told you how sexy and beautiful you were every chance he had.

He wasn't the man who said you were the best thing to ever happen to him.

He wasn't the man with whom you picked out baby names.

He wasn't the man you thought was "The One".

He wasn't the man you thought was your future...

A young man of a certain complexion, a certain height, and a certain age walks in your direction. Your heartbeat doubles, you hold your breath, and your entire body tenses up. The young man is now within a foot of you and you relax. You relax because you realize he wasn't "him".

He wasn't the man who didn't call you for almost a week straight for no apparent reason.

He wasn't the man who briefly resurfaced out of the blue with a lame excuse as to why he left.

He wasn't the man who vanished for almost a year without ever contacting you.

He wasn't the man whom you worried about every single day. 

He wasn't the man who let you walk into the arms of another man - only to get hurt.

He wasn't the man who wasn't there for you when you needed him the most.

He wasn't the man whom you cried yourself to sleep over on many nights.

He wasn't the man who spoke to you after so much time had passed, but never apologized.

He wasn't the man who tried to manipulate you into thinking you were at fault for the disconnect.

He wasn't the man who caused you to lose faith in love...

A young man of a certain complexion, a certain height, and a certain age walks in your direction. Your heartbeat doubles, you hold your breath, and your entire body tenses up. The young man is now within a foot of you, and you repeat the cycle until you don't see "his" face in every man you see. 

Dear Soul Breaker

Dear Soul Breaker,

I started writing this as a regular post, with a tone that was partly removed from being too personal because that is the way I write. It did not work out that way because I started to drown in the words. Trying to decipher from what is valuable or not in this story. All while trying to disguise what I was truly feeling, which is what I am about to say. These are the thoughts I would have expressed if you would have given me the opportunity. I will not go out of my way to get these words to you because I have made the decision to rest my heart and put my emotions first for once when it comes to you.

I’ll start over

Dear Soul Breaker. You know who you are. You know who we are. Where we were going, in our minds. Perhaps that was all a fantasy. Well at least it was a sweet one that I enjoyed every minute of living in. That world we created and the ideas we incepted into each others’ minds left me feeling like there was no doubt I could not live the rest of my life with anyone else but you as an extension of me. We moved swiftly and quickly because it was real. I know it was real. There was no way that any other woman or living thing could catch your gaze the way it did for me. There was no other person but you that could give me chills by simply touching my hand. Your presence was a gift and my heart was your home. We talked like old souls who had been friends for decades. We read Toni Morrison to sleep. When we made love, I wanted to cry. These are the moments in which I felt most alive. To connect with another human being on every level.

All of that seemed so tangible yesterday. The present has contrasted that in a way that is akin to day and night, sand and water, my heart and yours. Ouch. The distance or polarization, if you will, is the kind of thing that drives people crazy. Knowing that you were the most important thing in my life, my focus and object of progression. Now I am forced to make you a distant memory. I will not allow myself to have any access to your psyche and nor will you have access to mine. This is not my choice. This is not my desire. This is not my will. Yet I have to protect myself. There is a fine line between weathered and insanity. I took my heart out so quickly and trustingly, knelt down and handed it to you. No questions. No walls. My ego wants to say “silly me, this is your mistake: trusting too soon” but I will not consent to destroy the beauty that once was us. I will leave it untouched as an example of human capability. As a stand in for the hope that I lose with each disappointment in love.

This disappointment was different. It is not so much the fact that you are not exactly who I thought you would be (shit, I understand emotional development and communication are not easily mastered). I am not disappointed that you left me, emotionally stranded and free falling with no support to hold on to for security. What hurts me the most is that at the root of what pulled us apart is something we can not escape. The human condition. The true culprits are insecurity, accumulated pain from our pasts, and fear. Fear that it was too authentic to be true. Fear that you could not maintain it. Fear that I might hurt you, like the others in the past. No matter how much I assured you I was not them and never gave up on us, you pushed me away. Why truly? I may never understand because that doing is a result of your past. And as a 21^st century lyricist once said it best “hurt people, hurt people.” You can not be anything but a culmination of the experiences you have had. Those experiences did not work in our favor. And as for me..I require too much stability. I need too much honesty. I want too much connection.

Soul breaker, I don’t blame you in the end. But damn did that hurt. I blame the universe for teasing us with a glimpse of heaven in the first place. Perhaps the future will greet us with more promise. As for now I will dream of you and replay our most precious memories in my idle mind like an infinite loop. Secretly, I hope that you will fight for us, but if I learned nothing else from this I learned to be wiser than an expectation.

Love Always,

Your Soulmate

The Fast

After some heartbreaking experiences at the beginning of this year, I realized that I am a love-aholic and decided that it was best for me to completely remove myself from the dating pool and go on a dating fast for 12 whole months. No "talkin'", no "cakin'", no "cuffin'", "cuddlin'" or "cuttin'".  I abstained from all things even slightly resembling romance. My fast was just a self-designed 10-step program that I took myself through in order to regain my sanity because these dudes can drive you crazy. 

We are supposed to discuss relationship maintenance, marriage and commitment now on LFF, but I will not deceive you or myself - what do I know about relationships? I'm single now, so I obviously know more about the "don'ts" than the "do's". I am just going to use this time as an opportunity to share what my fast entailed and how it has helped me. Sometimes we do not realize that being in a successful relationship with another person requires us to first have a healthy relationship with ourselves.

E's 10-Step Dating Fast

Note: I created this list for myself. When I speak to myself, I speak in "Ratchet", hence all of the "Yo's".

Carry on.

I. Isolate Yo'self: I stopped reaching out to old & prospective boos. Yes, I ignored phone calls and dodged texts. I didn't care if BBM was telling on me with that annoying "R" above the check on every read message. I needed to be completely alone and disconnected from those guys to ensure that I would not relapse.
II. Detoxify Yo' Mind: Getting over heartbreak is not the easiest thing to do. One of the reasons it is so difficult is because a lot of time is spent thinking about all of the terrible things that brought you to that point. So what did I do? I started to think about everything but the bad times. I replaced my thoughts of bad boyfriends with daydreams of Common rubbing my back and Jesse Boykins III singing me to sleep every night. That detox was pleasant.
III. Do Bad All By Yo'Self: When you're used to always having an "other half", it is easy to forget that you popped out of your Mama's cooch all by yourself. I learned that I can cause myself enough drama and bring myself enough happiness without the assistance of a boyfriend. This was a great revelation because I saved a lot of money & got more sleep because I wasn't caked up on the phone for hours on end.
IV. Tone Yo' Muscle: You can spend all the time you want lifting dumbbells to increase your muscle mass, but you're a real dummy if you aren't doing things to make your heart (in the emotional, spiritual sense) stronger. I continue to work on rebuilding my broken heart by doing things that make me happy. These things include but are not limited to: slaying hoes, red velvet everything, twerking when I'm all alone in my room, daydreaming about Common and JBIII, and remembering that I have excellent relationship karma, so Mr. Right should be arriving shortly. 
V. Create Yo' List: I figured out that the main reason my relationships have been unsuccessful was the fact that I let too many things slide. Dudes didn't even have to be slick to play me because I let them get away with everything. Well, that's not going to happen again, so I came up with a list of six "non-negotiables" - six things I need from a mate and will not be manipulated out of having. Trust, honesty, loyalty, communication, friendship, and appreciation. Can you believe that I used to compromise on those basics?
VI. Observe Yo' Surroundings: As a budding scientist, I have learned that one of the best ways to learn is by observation. When you are rockin' solo dolo and don't have a partner cramping your style or robbing you of your time, you have a great opportunity to check everybody else out and learn from their mistakes and/or accomplishments. 
VII. Appraise Yo'self: I find that many people who go through back-to-back heartbreaks do not know their own worth. You lose a lot of what you deserve when you do not realize how valuable you are. None of the guys who broke my heart even deserved to shake my hand, let alone have total access to every part of me. They did not value me because I did not value myself. During my fast, though, I figured out my value - priceless. Feel free to use me in your commercials, Mastercard.
VIII. Assume Yo' Place on the Throne: Once I figured out I was priceless, I had to go and warm the cushion on the seat of my throne. I am the creator of my queendom and once I place myself there, no one is allowed to dethrone me.
IX. Make Yo'self Visible: Now that I am actually on my throne, I've started rebuilding my heart, and I have my list of non-negotiables, I am ready to slowly re-enter the wonderful world of dating. This does not mean that the first guy to come around gets to be my boyfriend, but I've stopped dodging calls. Gotta start somewhere, right?
X. Yo! Don't Forget: Being exposed to so much man sexiness can cloud a lady's judgment. One of the most essential parts of my fast is making sure that I retain all of the knowledge I gained. No half-stepping or reneging on the promises I made to myself. I have to maintain my relationship intelligence. Mr. Right is not going to want a dummy for a booski.

Going on this dating fast was the best thing I have ever done for myself, so far. I was able to come into my womanhood without unworthy male influence, I learned what it is I need from my partner, I discovered that I deserve what I request, and above all things, I stopped myself from losing all hope in true love. 
I won't lie though, a little hope has been lost, but that's why I still have 2 more months on this fast before I officially lock it down.

Bond outside the Box: Friends First

Heaven and Hell knows that relationships are far from easy once we are fully immersed in them. What we once loved about our partner become the most annoying things. We grow impatient, comfortable and un-enchanted with each passing day, month.. year. The truth is Janet Jackson sang it best, “..you don’t know what you got til it’s gone.” When we have been with someone for enough time to allow them to seep into our routine and normal regiment, it is quite easy to take her/him for granted. Life ain’t short, but it is too precious to let relationship after relationship slip by the wayside because we are too lazy to keep up with our partner. Love is not enough. We develop and evolve as individuals. It is So So important to ensure that we are thriving with our partner as well.

Yes, relationships require much maintenance. People (and I am the worst culprit of this) often say “yeah yeah..I know that” but what do you actually do to keep this thing called love growing? I have found that the best method to keeping the union from regressing is to continuously enrich the bond between you and your partner. It is really convenient to just assume that the bond is there and go about your business without regard for your lover. But when we remember that at the root of any relationship lies Friendship (that’s right) then we love, live and appreciate in the present moment so much better. Friendship = Foundation.

So here’s to taking back the playful, innocent qualities of relationships and how doing so can aid in the maintenance of any romantic relationship.

Hang like Homies

I absolutely adore taking the time to do the things that I enjoy the most as well as the things that my partner enjoys the most. I may not be all that interested in playing Madden or deep sea diving, but if it brings out the joy in my partner then I am interested. He may not care about climbing a mountain with an hour session of yoga once atop, but I am sure he would love to see the internal ecstasy that I can reach. It seems to me that some of the best moments and memories are made up of the times when press pause to all the drama and stresses of life; the times when we plan to laugh and enjoy ourselves. It is just as important to make plans to laugh and just chill with no distractions as it is to plan anything else.

Suggestion: Pull out the old Sega and play a drinking game to who can get the most golden rings.

Hang with Homies

Do not polarize your partner from your life. Nothing makes a lover feel more distant, untrusting, and jealous than being excluded from the things that are important to their partner. I love it when a man invites me to hang with his homies or when he comes through when I invite him to hang with mine. Even better, when we pop bottles with all of our friends combined. In those moments I beam with energy and happiness to have so much love around me. Experiencing extremes (such as fear, or extreme love that is greater than ourselves) with a partner grows the bond and reaffirms the partnership. I call that the Bonnie and Clyde affect. Not only is hangin’ with the homies fun, but it is an expression of your love to the community.

Suggestion: Plan a day trip to Six Flags or Pic Nic with all of your friends.

Hang in Homer to Homer in the Home

Whether we are picking up a classic text or catching up on a new episode, it is important to spend diverse, intimate time at home that does not revolve around sex. Really stretch the limits of the relationship by asking new questions and playing up the curiosity that was so present in the beginning of the relationship. We can never really know a person fully no matter how many conversations we share. Take advantage of that and keep the relationship fresh by doing new things that focus on each others’ personality. By treating our partners as the vastly dynamic, multi dimensional creatures that they are that New feeling stays present.

Suggestion: Play truth or dare on a rainy or broke day.

Hang Homage

I can not forget many things about my childhood, but mostly the exciting feeling of getting a love letter or Valentine from the person I crushed on. I know all my hopeless romantics out there feel me on this. It was not about fulfilling the ego, it was about knowing that a person you adored reciprocated that feeling. We still need that as adults. We never stop being insecure emotional creatures. That is the human condition and we all need some reassurance now and again. People are more likely to give when they feel it is worth it. It is so necessary to remind our lovers that… hey, we are here and willing. Do creative things to express gratitude for the emotional rock that is your aficionado. Make sure that she/he never lays that head to rest without knowing that you are here. That is not asking too much. That is keeping the bond alive.

Suggestion: Write a handwritten love letter occasionally, just because.