I know this from personal experience; sometimes if we are not happy with our hair we will allow everything else in our normal grooming routine to go out the window. I am here to suggest, maybe a key in getting over the awkward or uncomfortable phases in our natural hair journey is fixing ourselves up. Perhaps a part of the reason that we don’t feel as attractive as we used to is because we aren’t getting as done up as we used to.
When I had a baby TWA it was no secret, I was not happy with it at all. I felt unattractive and even blogged about how ugly I felt with my TWA. But as I looked through the photos and videos of myself while I had the TWA I realized I was not putting in even half the effort to look good as I do now that I have my fade back. I mean, I wasn't dressed as nicely as normal. I wasn’t doing my makeup. I was just existing in a blah state and wondering why I was feeling so ugly. Duh! Maybe if I had even tried to make it work it would have.
Also during this most recent TWA experience, I failed to follow my own advice. I have written blogs on how to deal with a Baby TWA. An easy fix would have been to get my hair tapered so it looked more like a style. But I didn’t. I was too busy feeling ugly to actually do anything to overcome it. And I have seen plenty of “before and after I went natural” pictures that testify to the validity of what I am saying here. Many befores show a confident woman with a beautiful smile on her face. Make-up, earrings, the works!... and then the after is a bare faced, sad, not so confident woman. I always wonder if instead of immediately snapping a picture of a fresh big chop, we wouldn’t benefit from spending time figuring out how to make our look work, and then a week later have our big chop debut? I think we would have more success and more confidence in how we look.
After my first big chop, early on a Saturday morning at the barber shop, I went home, tied my hair down with a satin scarf and went back to sleep. I knew that for me the change was so emotional I needed time not looking at it.
Then when I awoke, I looked at myself in the mirror and asked myself, “If I didn’t know I was practically bald under this scarf, what would I find attractive about myself?”. Over the next week or so, I went through my clothes and make-up, mixing and matching to see what my new look was going to be. {I think we can all agree, certain hairstyles go with certain clothes and the same thing applies to makeup and accessories.}
When you go natural you will need to spend time figuring out, “What works now?’.
Don’t just rush out into the world unprepared to own it. The people in your world are going to call you out if before you were a glamour doll, or the professionally dressed trendsetter and now you’re bare faced, in pajamas, with a baby TWA. They won’t be responding to your hair either, they’ll be responding to the way you let your normal grooming standards go.
Bottom line, try to look like you went natural on purpose. Fix yourself up!
In today's video, I share how I am personally, completing my look!
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