Iman's Little Ego

An ego is a terrible thing to let get in your way.

Today I was driving back from yet another K-Pop Demon Hunters party. Thank God for the K-Pop Demon Hunters parties. I'm looking forward to inviting everyone to my housewarming. Thanks to the K-pop. Demon hunters parties. 

I was talking to the K-Pop Demon Hunters group for today. Daniela (not to be confused with Dani), Nina, and Yiran. We had a 53 minute drive back from the party and we were itching to fail the Bechtdal test. It started with conversation about Ariana Grande, which turned into conversation about Ethan Slater, which turned into conversation about Timothée, Chalamet and Kylie Jenner. I'm not pretty recent Timothée Chalamet fan… I only really fell in love with him after watching him in Dune 2, but I feel passionately about it. Especially after seeing him in Marty Supreme. If you've ever read my book or listened to me talk or met me long enough to know about my love life you already know that I am very attracted to men like Marty Supreme. I love weird, manic, overly ambitious, and eccentric men. So you have to understand I was feeling very passionate in this conversation about my opinion that he and Kylie have nothing in common. There was no one in the vehicle that was in disagreement, but I was particularly knowledgeable about the whole thing for several reasons; I know a lot of people that were around for his chlamydia days, I follow Club Chalamet, and I've dated a lot of men that act like him. So when given the opportunity to share what I know about why Timothée and Kylie are together, I shared. 

“Girls, I've dated a lot of men like this and here's what I know. Timothée used to date Lily Rose Depp, she was his last public girlfriend before Kylie. They dated for two years, but Lily Rose is equally yoked with Timothée and after they broke up, she got into a relationship with a woman-070 Shake.” I began. 

“He dated Lily Rose Depp?” Nina gasped.

“Yes, he dated Lily Rose Depp! Who has a famous actor, father, and a fancy French mother, and she's literally perfectly yoked with him. She probably challenged him a lot, she didn't need him, and he felt like she was probably calling him lazy or stupid. Then she gets with a woman. So, the next woman he got with, he needed to rebuild his ego. So, he chooses Kylie Jenner. He sees her as beneath him. She doesn't have fancy parents. She's a social climber. She's not respected in the talent community. So, unlike Lily-Rose, she's gonna look up to him and need him.” I continued. 

“Ugh ew!” Daniela exclaimed. 

“I know right. However, it's true. I've been with so many guys who I break up with, they get with somebody that they don't respect because it rebuilds their ego, then come back to me when they feel ready to try again.” I nodded. 

“What could they even be talking about though?” Nina pondered. “In order to be as good of an actor as he is, he has to have some depth to him. Like some intelligence.”

“He probably does, but he doesn't care if she does because he gets to talk about her about everything he cares about without ever being challenged because she doesn't understand what he's saying. He probably just likes to hear himself speak. He likes it when he says something stupid she doesn't clock it.” I explained. 

I wondered for a moment if our perception of Kylie Jenner was rooted in misogyny, but decided it wasn't because I think Kylie Jenner is still a good business woman despite being shallow. Like art is just not her talent. 

“That is so disgusting, but I believe it,” Daniela agreed with me. 

We got out of the car and Nina left, Daniela and I continued on to dinner.

Now I'm home and I'm thinking about ego. My ego, men's ego… if there's really a difference between my ego and the ego of the men I am thinking of? I don't really know if there's a difference. I think I see myself as better than all men, but that's because I'm a bit of a misandrist. I left out in the dialogue above that Yiran pointed out my own egocentric behavior in the interactions with men I described for the Demon Hunters.

My most recent ego trip was directed at Adnan. I didn't post the extent to which I was upset because I did beat out my ego enough to not want to put more space between us. A younger version of myself would have remorselessly carpet bombed him. I still aired out how I felt because I was on an ego trip, but I didn't go as far as to write an entire paragraph comparing him to Helen Keller like I did $@719… I didn't even focus on him, just how I felt about the situation. So, I would like my flowers for the upward motion. 

I think my ego differs, though, from those of the men that I discuss because it doesn't keep me from being with the kind of person that I should actually be with. Not like Timothée Chalamet. I have these tantrums when challenged. I get upset. I don't, however, decide to date someone I perceive as less difficult because they won't challenge me. My ego I believe exists in a need to be challenged. I need a partner that challenges me. I actually remember during one of the many times I asked Adnan for an honest opinion on my negative interactions with my business, he became worried that he'd upset me. He was often very brutal in his critique of my business communication style. I asked him because he was brutal  and nobody else has ever been. Interesting to me though was that he thought I would be upset. He accused me of liking him often. And don't get me wrong, I have always liked Adnan. I just began to resent him towards the end of last year because he’d become very phony with me. I found it strange that he didn't realize that the times I liked him most despite my building resentment were the times he was brutally honest with me. The times he was telling me the truth, and not trying to manage my feelings instead. I think my ego hated him for the management of me he was doing. It made me feel stolen from. My ego hated that instead of treating me like a peer, he was treating me like a pet. 

Perhaps that's the issue. Perhaps that's why I might never find a partner. Are there really any highly intelligent and talented men that can deal with somebody that wants to be challenged by them and to challenge them in return? Has anyone ever met a man that can do that? I certainly haven't.