My NATURAL HAIR taught me....

Tiresome, the word that best describes my hair journey as a young, black teenager. Growing up in a world where ‘long, slick hair that moved with the wind’ was the ‘in’ thing, I never understood why my hair blatantly REFUSED to comply with the norms of society. I mean why wouldn’t my hair have a pen run down smoothly without encountering a couple speed bumps called knots along the way. So I got tired, tired of waiting at the salon like a kid in the candy store, only to be pulled, burnt by the ear, blown and straightened for a couple of days of ‘long slick hair that moved with the wind’. It was in those couple of days that made the cold relaxer, burning scalp and painful patches bearable, but when the patches got too much because of my sensitive scalp, the slick hair got me sick and tired. So much so that I took the plunge and started afresh [after my sister of course, just to make sure my head wouldn’t make me look ET]
It wasn’t until my 4^th year, rocking my gold tinted ‘fro that I realized how a journey  of something as simple as hair could have such an impact on my life so much so that I thought I should invite you into my hair journey. My NATURAL hair taught me…..

LESSON 1: The BIG CUT CHANGES EVERYTHING!!!

Coco Chanel said it best when she said “when a woman cuts her hair, she is about to change her life”. I don’t think I understood this until I cut my hair for the second time. The first time, I cut my hair; it was more of an act of rebellion. I was tired of being forced to fit into a box not only a hair box but a societal box and being the typical 16 year old that never went with the flow but rather went with the beat of her own drum and always having to prove some point. It wasn’t until my second cut that I realized the magnitude of cutting my hair. I finally matriculated from high school and was about to start university in another province, away from family and friends. I realise now that the hair cut was more than just a BIG CHOP but the closing of a chapter (my high school career) and the beginning of a new one. To add to the change, I decided to dye my hair RED, just to stick it to the school rules. In all honesty, the BIG CHOP forces you to look within yourself, see beyond the strands of hair but rather bring out the beauty from within after all short hair says “sometimes there is beauty in vulnerability cause I am not my hair”. And so the journey to discovery began…..

LESSON 2: The PATIENCE in natural hair

A couple weeks into my natural hair & I felt on top of the world but when the red started to fade and the knots became a never ending battle which I always lost, the true test began. See the problem wasn’t that I cut my hair but rather that I expected my hair to grow at a pace I wanted and seeing people on campus rocking their Erykah Badu like hair didn’t make it any easier. So I began to loath my faded red cut and secretly envy my fellow ‘fro sistas, forgetting that everyone has their own journey, at a pace of their own. The point of short hair wasn’t only to change but to rid my hair of the chemicals that took a toll on my hair and the mentality that my hair was “just not good enough”. I had to unlearn ALL the things I had learnt over the years not only about my hair but mostly about myself and that in itself required A LOT of patience. Patience to simply trust the journey and to know that in time, I will reach that level of CONTENTMENT.

LESSON 3: The TLC in NATURAL HAIR

Biggest misconception I was yet to learn about natural hair was that natural hair is the easiest to maintain, just a wash and go. BOY WAS I WRONG! See once the chemicals are stripped and your hair is left in its naked glory, the hair needs to be properly maintained. I use to make fun of my friends who would take hours just to wash their hair until I realised that WASH DAYS was actually a SERIOUS THING. From cancelling ALL PLANS with friends ,setting out ALL your hair needs all the way to setting up the PERFECT play list cause YOU WILL need something to calm you down when the hair you BIRTHED decides to repay you in the WORST WAY aka SHRINKAGE . It was in this that I learnt that in the same way we take care of our hair, we should also take care of ourselves. Too many times we think people can fill us up forgetting that some days we need to SHUT THE WORLD OUT and give ourselves that TLC we so desperately crave. That’s why WASH DAYS have officially became HAIR DATES cause TRUST ME the amount of work you put into the hair for that little bit of bliss makes it a date worth taking.

LESSON 4: FUN IN NATURAL HAIR

The beautiful thing about this journey is that you can SWITCH IT UP anytime. You can go from curly to straight, long to short in an instant so allow me to take this time to SALUTE the creators of weaves, wigs and hair extensions. As much as we are meant to embrace our natural hair, let’s be real, the weather doesn’t always allow us to flourish and there is only so much coconut oil one can use to prevent damage, YES NATURAL HAIR ALSO GETS DAMAGED. This is why we salute the creators of protective styles. Ever heard the saying “I love my six pack so much, I have a layer of fat to protect it”, well same goes for hair. From the harsh sun rays to the blistering cold, the hair needs that “layer of FAT” from time to time after all who wouldn’t want to wake up with a different personality everyday.[ hair does that to you]

LESSON 5: Loving EVERY STEP of EVERY JOURNEY

Life has taught us a terrible lesson throughout our lives, life has taught us to ONLY celebrate the end result, to celebrate when our hair has reached that silky, wavy hair despite the torturous process. Natural hair teaches us otherwise, see I always thought that I was meant to celebrate my hair when it reached my desired length + texture but it wasn’t until a lady I admire taught me to LOVE MY HAIR on the GOOD DAYS and ESPECIALLY ON THE BAD DAYS. See life isn’t meant to be smooth sailing cause if that were the case, it would be predictable and we wouldn’t be able to appreciate the little victories wrapped in life’s blessings. So CELEBRATE YOUR HAIR when it is short with curls still trying to navigate its way around your beautiful crown but more so CELEBRATE YOUR HAIR when nothing seems to be going right and you want to hide behind a beanie but your hair won’t let you shrink but forces you to “expand. Be more you, not less you. EXPAND”

5 years into my natural hair and I couldn’t be more happier cause it is in my beautiful ombre blonde ‘fro turned dreads that I found the meaning in this crazy world. My hair taught me that life is about UNLEARNING EVERYTHING that tried to DIM YOUR LIGHT and instead “honouring your greatest authenticity only serves to make you [..] Precisely, accurately, breathtakingly. Yourself” after all like India Arie “I am not my hair but the soul that lives within”