Your Relationship Has Too Many Unpaid Consultants: The Uncomfortable Truth About Outside Influence and the Opinions We've Mistaken for Our Own.

Sometimes I wonder when we became so influenced by other people's opinions that we stopped examining our own.

I recently revisited a scene from the television series black-ish in which a family discussion turns to whether a woman should make her man a plate of food. What should have been an ordinary gesture of consideration becomes a debate about gender roles, independence, and submission.

Until Grandma offered another perspective.

She explains that when her husband, Clarence, went out into the world, he encountered people who treated him as though he wasn't a man. She couldn't control how the world treated him, but she could make sure that when he came home, he knew he was loved, respected, and valued. So she made him a plate. Not because he couldn't make one himself. Not because she was incapable of doing anything else. But because it was one way she chose to love him. And maybe, just maybe, in her own way, restore a modicum of the respect that the world had robbed him of. And suddenly, the plate wasn't just a plate. It was dignity. It was affirmation. It was refuge.

It Was Never Really About the Plate

The plate represents the countless ways we communicate love without necessarily saying a word. It's the cup of coffee waiting on the counter, the car that's been warmed on a cold morning, the meal prepared after a difficult day, or the phone call to make sure someone arrived home safely.

For some, these gestures are expressions of what we commonly call our love languages. For others, they're simply how they were raised to demonstrate kindness and consideration. And sometimes people just enjoy feeding people. It's not that damn deep. Different gestures, same underlying message: I see you. I care about you. You matter to me.

But somewhere along the way, we've become so preoccupied with what these gestures might symbolize that we've begun questioning what they actually mean to the people involved. When did we become so concerned with what an act of kindness might symbolize that we stopped appreciating the love it was intended to express?

When Did Kindness Become Submission?

A woman making her husband a plate doesn't automatically mean she's submissive. A man providing for his family doesn't automatically mean he's controlling. Sometimes people simply enjoy taking care of the people they love. Not every act of kindness is an act of submission, and not every expression of independence requires the rejection of consideration.

We can challenge inequality without abandoning courtesy. We can celebrate independence without rejecting interdependence. And we can recognize the value of our differences without assigning superiority to either gender. Equality was never supposed to mean that we stopped caring for one another. And the meaning of an act of kindness belongs first to the people giving and receiving it—not to strangers interpreting it from the outside.

The Influence We Don't Question

And then there's social media, a place where strangers who know nothing about our relationships have become remarkably comfortable telling us how those relationships should function. Don't make his plate. Don't pay for her dinner. Don't do this. Don't tolerate that. Everybody has an opinion. Everybody has a platform. And somehow, everybody has become an authority.

But here's an uncomfortable question: How much of what we believe about relationships comes from our own experiences, and how much have we adopted from people we've never met?

We've become so accustomed to consuming opinions that we sometimes mistake repetition for truth and popularity for wisdom. And here's where the psychology becomes particularly interesting. We are not simply being influenced in what to think. We are being influenced in how to interpret one another's behavior.

When outside voices convince us that an affectionate gesture represents weakness, submission, manipulation, or obligation, we may begin questioning behaviors that previously communicated love within our relationships. Not because the relationship changed, but because the meaning we've assigned to the behavior changed.

When Everybody Becomes a Psychologist

And while we're discussing social media, can we talk about the sudden explosion of self-appointed mental health experts? Apparently, all you need these days is a TikTok account, a microphone, a ring light, and enough confidence to explain everybody else's psychological problems.

Someone disagrees with you? You're triggered. Someone's mood changes? They're bipolar. Someone behaves strangely? They're schizophrenic. Someone is selfish? They're a narcissist. Someone remembers an argument differently? They're gaslighting you. Everybody's got a diagnosis, and nobody's had an evaluation.

Clinical terminology has become so casually incorporated into everyday disagreements that we're beginning to confuse psychological conditions with ordinary emotions, personality traits, and behaviors. Bipolar disorder is not ordinary moodiness. Schizophrenia is not synonymous with unpredictable behavior. And being triggered is not simply another way of saying someone disagreed with you. These terms have actual clinical meanings, and using them carelessly can trivialize serious conditions while giving uninformed opinions the appearance of professional expertise.

Now, as someone who invested time, money, and considerable intellectual energy earning a degree in psychology, I have one question: SO WHAT THE FUCK DID I GET THIS DEGREE FOR IF ALL I NEEDED WAS TIKTOK AND A MIC?! Apparently, I could've saved myself the tuition and bought a ring light.

But seriously, a psychology degree doesn't make someone infallible, and people without one can certainly offer valuable insight. However, there's a difference between sharing personal experiences and presenting yourself as an authority on human behavior. Confidence isn't competence. And an audience isn't a credential.

Consider the Source

We also need to become far more discerning about whose advice we allow to influence our relationships. Because here's something worth considering: Is the person offering the advice willing to take their own advice?

While Trina is in your ear, swearing before God and twelve responsible men that she would never do anything for Jay, does she meet that same man at the door with his slippers every evening? And while Jay is telling his boys that he'd never cook for Trina, is she coming home to find him in the kitchen preparing a three-course meal? We don't know, do we? And that's precisely the point.

Some people are remarkably comfortable dispensing advice they have absolutely no intention of following. There's a psychological concept called impression management, which describes how people attempt to influence the way others perceive them. Sometimes the loudest declarations about what someone would never tolerate have more to do with maintaining an image than describing how that person actually lives. And social media has provided an enormous stage for those performances.

It's easy to be uncompromising when you're speaking hypothetically. It's another matter entirely when you're navigating a relationship with someone you love. That doesn't mean someone's advice is automatically wrong because they don't follow it themselves. But it certainly gives us reason to question whether their perspective deserves the authority we've assigned to it.

Because while Trina is making Jay's plate and Jay is seasoning chicken, you might be sitting at home arguing with somebody you love over a gesture neither of you had a problem with yesterday. And all because somebody else told you that you should.

The Struggles Haven't Disappeared

What makes Grandma's explanation especially meaningful is the historical context. She was describing a time when Black men routinely faced indignities that challenged their humanity. Her home was one place where Clarence could experience the dignity and affection the outside world sometimes denied him.

And let's be clear. Racism has not disappeared. Discrimination has not disappeared. The need for love, dignity, and mutual support has not disappeared. Yet here we are, increasingly divided in conversations about what men and women should or shouldn't do for one another.

If the struggles that made mutual care and support so important still exist, why have we allowed ourselves to become so divided—and so influenced by outside voices—that we've begun questioning the very gestures that sustained us?

Perhaps it's time to reconsider what we've been taught, what we've absorbed, and what we've allowed to influence our thinking. Not every tradition deserves preservation. But neither does every tradition deserve rejection simply because it is traditional. And not every gesture requires a psychological diagnosis, a social media debate, or a committee meeting to determine whether somebody has surrendered their independence.

Sometimes a plate is simply a plate. And sometimes it's a whole lot of love.

The Uncomfortable Truth

We don't necessarily need to return to the way things were, but we might need to remember what was worth keeping. Before allowing someone else's advice to change how you treat somebody you love, consider whether that person would be willing to make the same sacrifice in their own relationship.

And perhaps that's where unfucking ourselves begins. Perhaps we should all—men and women alike—take a page out of Grandma's book: How I choose to love and care for my Clarence (or in Grandpa's case, Clara) is not up for negotiation. And I damn sure didn't hire any consultants.

Seven Threads Collective | The Uncomfortable Truth