"When I was a little girl, I prayed for long hair down my back. Something about long hair has always equated beauty to me. I've done everything from relaxers to peroxide. I let it grow long and natural. I've worn braids, afros, and natural curls. I've had a long deep body wave and a fade. Sew-ins to quick weaves. Blue, purple, blonde, brown, jet black, green (that one was an accident), and fire engine red.
To sit here now, a few months before my 33rd birthday, and after all that's happened not just this year, but throughout my life thus far... It's not enough to just chop it off and "start fresh." Where I am in my book, that's not realistic. A clean slate, as if nothing has happened up until this point. As if before right now, there was nothing. There has been soooo much that has happened to shape the woman I am right now, today. And I want to keep building on that in the years to come. It's okay if it doesn't start off "cute," let alone "pretty," or beautiful." By staying the course, treating my hair and my SELF with love, respect, and integrity, I will encourage growth and maturity. With steadfast love, their/my beauty will shine from inside, out regardless of how they look aesthetically. Today I am so full! So grateful for my journey. I am strong. I am beautiful. I am GOD."
This was my journal entry from April 12, 2020, the day I began my loc journey. Prior to that, I had done so much with my hair, usually trying to "reinvent" what had already been written in the stars. At age 6, I had my first relaxer, which I kept until my sophomore year in college (a sign of the times). Once I grew out my relaxer, my relationship with my hair (which I think goes hand in hand with my relationship with myself) was able to begin. I kept braids and sew-ins for the most part as protective styles, not knowing too many people in Kalamazoo that I trusted with my pride and joy. Then, in 2011 I cut it all off. My non-boyfriend-but-we-kickin-it-still-baby-daddy had just moved across the country with his OTHER girl and let me find out of Twitter 😒.... Needless to say, I felt like I needed a reset. "Cut off the dead weight and full steam ahead," is what I thought. But wasn't it Albert Einstein who said, "Energy cannot be created or destroyed; it can only be changed from one form to another"? So when that raggedy ass energy began to resurface and that same relationship began to crumble again I decided that instead of trying to cut the painful parts out of my story, I would transform that energy. I would take what I already had, love it, nurture it in its truest form, tend to it, apply some patience, and watch it grow.
I look back at all that has changed... and all that has stayed constant. I'm grateful today for the lessons I've learned and for the continuation of my journey. I'm grateful for the abundance of love, peace, and beauty I've found all around me, which is mine to claim each and every day. I'm grateful for a new standard of beauty that is attained only when I connect to Source, quiet my Ego, and stand still enough to listen.
"When I run after what I think I want, my days are a furnace of distress and anxiety. If I sit in my own place of patience, what I need flows to me, and without any pain. From this I understand that what I want also wants me, is looking for me and attracting me. There is a great secret in this for anyone who can grasp it."
-Rumi
Sitting here, a year later, I am grateful for my hair and the stories that it holds. It reminds me of my strength. It allows me to be nostalgic about the past, hopeful of the future, but always striving for an unrelenting presence right now.
In Michigan, we have the luxury of experiencing all 4 seasons in a year. Although I tend to complain all winter long, I do love the anticipation that the warmer weather brings. With winters that can get SO cold and SO brutal here, the subtle signs of Spring are like little whispers of hope. When the colorful sprouts start breaking through the recently frozen soil, the days stretch longer, and the birds sing a little louder, it reminds me that there was always life under the frozen ground. No amount of fussing, complaining, wishing, or hoping can ever speed up the process (try as we might). But when the time is right, you feel it. You see it. It runs all around and through you. It's Spring time! There is Life! What are you planting in this season? What do you want to see grow? Now is the time!
...AND we celebrate the New Moon in Aries tonight. How's that for Source 🖤
I am grateful.