It was the weekend before a work offsite trip, and I almost had a meltdown because my stylist canceled on me. What was I supposed to do with my hair?
As someone who never really mastered the skill of styling my natural hair, I relied on others to help make my hair look professional—or what I thought was “socially acceptable.” For years, I felt like I needed a flat iron, flat twists, or two-strand twists to feel polished enough to show up in the world. I stopped relaxing my hair a long time ago, but embracing my natural texture was a different journey altogether.
There are levels to this ish, and simply wearing our natural hair is only one part of the process.
The next level is embracing our ability to care for our own hair and not believing it has to be professionally styled to be beautiful, worthy, or acceptable. It’s learning to love the hair that grows naturally from our heads and trusting that it is enough exactly as it is.
When I wash my hair, the deep coils that greet me fill me with pride. Yet I can’t ignore the fact that there was a time when those same coils filled me with frustration. Instead of investing time into understanding my hair, I spent years trying to manage, conceal, or perfect it. Looking back, I feel sadness for the version of myself that believed her natural hair needed to be transformed before it could be presented to the world.
The truth is that many Black women carry a unique burden when it comes to our hair. For generations, we have been taught—directly and indirectly—that professionalism has a particular look, and more often than not, that look was never designed with us in mind. We learned that straight hair was polished, that textured hair needed to be “tamed,” and that acceptance often came with conditions.
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