It is the first time I have ever deliberately chosen to get a haircut that I knew would make me look less pretty.
It may seem like a small thing. But it reflects a complete change in the direction of my thinking.
My hair has always been a big piece of my identity, and a place where I focused a lot of effort on up-leveling my prettiness quotient.
Why? Because my worthiness was based on what other people, especially men, thought of me. So it makes sense, doesn’t it?
If my worth is based on getting positive attention from other people, then nice hair is a very important strategy for getting that sense of worthiness. And the constant, creeping anxiety that my hair may be–gasp!–not nice enough, would never go away. That means a lot of energy gets expended, trying to maintain that prettiest-you’ve-ever-seen hair.
So where did this radical action come from? Just a week beforehand, A stranger had popped her head out of her car window in traffic, so she could shout to me how much she loved my curly, asymmetrical ‘do.
I had enjoyed that shout of support, and I hadn’t thought of it then, but now I’m looking back and considering that moment to be my old haircut’s grand finale.
I chopped it all off.
Normally, I pay $45 for a detail-oriented, super talented hairstylist to spend up to 2 hours, trimming one curl at a time. Not this time. This time I picked the cheap, fast place on Main Street.
I walked in and asked the receptionist if they had room for a walk-in appointment. “Go on then,” she said, hastily waving toward the sinks: and I knew that this was the right place for me change my attitude toward my hair.
Alright, so what posessed me to chop off the locks that had gotten me shouts of admiration on the street, in favor of a look that that gets the response “…your hair…it’s…gone…”?
Renunciation.
Okay, before you start freaking out about that word, give me a chance to explain what I mean by it. Our culture generally fears and loathes the concept, and, I think, misunderstands it. First, I’ll say what renunciation is not, as far as I understand it:
-It’s not saying that having pretty hair is bad.
-It’s not saying I don’t deserve pretty hair.
-It’s not saying that paying a lot of money for a nice haircut is bad.
-It’s not about a sense of restriction.
Okay, what is it about then?
It’s about peace. It’s about freedom. It’s about relief.
It’s about not wanting to spend 20 minutes every morning on my hair (what else could I use those 20 minutes for?). It’s about not wanting to have my hair be the deciding factor of whether or not to pull on a sweatshirt, or to roll down the car window (it might mess it up!).
It’s about…maybe I don’t actually need or want to get so much attention from complete strangers on the street.
It’s about not having to follow the impulse to check my reflection in every mirror and shop window that I pass by, checking to see if my hair still looks okay.
It’s generally about not spending so much mental energy thinking about how I look, and therefore, freeing up my attention for enjoying the present moment.
It’s about untangling one piece of my identity, which revolves around the way I look, and the way other people react to that.
It’s about looking inward, instead of outward.
I think that most of the time I’ve spent looking in mirrors, I was unconsciously, anxiously, assessing my worthiness-through prettiness level: “How do I look now? Is it good enough?”
Now, when I look in the mirror, I think, “Yep. Not as pretty as before,” and I’m surprised to find that I feel okay with that.
Now, when I look in the mirror, I think I look–
Free.
Like most of the things that I’ve let go of in the past few years (sugar, gluten, factory-farm raised meat, etc.), it was something I would not have even considered doing a month prior to being struck by a sudden inspiration, and readiness. Almost like a little voice in the back of my head saying,
“Hey! Psst! Cut off your hair! It’ll be good!”
“What!? Really!? Well, I do feel a sense of lightness and openness when I think about that…but…are you sure?”
“Yeah. Do it. Trust me. It’ll be good.”
And I did. Because I’m learning to trust that little voice.
But what lead up to this seemingly sudden change of priorities?
Well, a lot of meditation, and studying the Buddha’s teachings, for one thing. But another big factor has been the inquiry I’ve been doing, using The Work of Byron Katie.
I’ve used this inquiry process to question some deep-seated, un-helpful beliefs about what matters, and those beliefs have been “letting go of me,” as they say.
Looking back at the thoughts I’ve questioned over the past few months, it makes a lot of sense that I would end up doing something like this.
It all started when I questioned the thought:
-“My life could never be complete without ‘The One’,”
And I began to feel the flutters of a real sense of freedom…a sense of roominess in my mind. Suddenly, my ideas about what the future might hold for me began to expand into previously-unforseen horizons.
I then questioned:
-“I’m gonna be saved! [by spending time with a guy].”
-“I want him to see this [what I’m doing, wearing, thinking].”
-“I need his love and praises.”
And underneath those:
-“The most valuable thing is to be desired by men.”
Whoah! Imagine the freedom I felt, letting go of those beliefs! A whole lot of energy that had been grasping anxiously outward came home to me, and settled down.
Then I questioned the nagging:
“People will think I’m crazy, selfish, rigid, fanatical, [if I make certain changes].”
And I discovered that I can do what I want. And people can think what they will about it.
I then uncovered:
-“I need male admiration in order to matter as a person”,
Which lead to:
“It’s not okay to take delight in myself”
—A real revelation!
And a few more beliefs about my worth:
“I need to be understood by someone.”
“So-and-so [a man]’s opinion of me makes me worthy or unworthy”
And finally:
-“I don’t deserve to be happy, because I am selfish and worthless.”
Wow.
It makes sense to me that an underlying sense of worthlessness would drive someone to an obsession with getting proof of their worth from some external source, in whatever way they could.
So, I got to the bottom of that.
And then, I suddenly found myself walking to the cheap barber shop on Main Street.
What can I say? It may look crazy. But it feels pretty darn sane.
I look forward to puzzling and frustrating the people around me, as I continue to follow my own inner voice.
Honest Wanderings 