There are times in our natural hair journey when things can start to come to a standstill. While having the ability to style our own hair can be rewarding, and presents the opportunity to learn more about hair care, there are times when we may feel tired, bored, and just drained in all things related to our hair. When you’re at that place in your journey where you are on the verge of calling it quits or feel stuck, here are a few options to consider to get you to the other side of the journey:
Protective Styling
Protective styling has so many benefits, from protecting the ends of the hair to locking in moisture. An added bonus of protective styling is that it can provide you with a much-needed break from the day-to-day styling of your hair, which just may be the necessary break that you so need. If you are new to protective styling, you may want to start off with a style that can be worn for only a few weeks at a time, such as a cornrow style or flat-twists. This way you will be able to test everything out, including how your scalp and hair does when in a protective style. One thing to remember when protective styling is to regularly moisturize your scalp and wrap your hair every night with a satin scarf, even when protective styling the hair still has to be cared for and moisturized regularly.
Getting Hair Professionally Styled
It is great to have the ability and the know-how to style your own hair, however, in an effort to give yourself a break, you may want to consider getting your hair styled by a licensed natural hair stylist, from time to time. A licensed natural hair stylist can be found through a quick google search, using the key words, “natural hair salon” or “braiding salon” in your city and from there you can do further research by reading the Google and Yelp reviews for the stylist or hair salon and visiting their websites and social media pages to get a better feel for the stylist.
Also, social media is another great way to find great natural hairstylists, for instance on Instagram, type in the search bar, #naturalhair and add your city, for example, #naturalhairdc, and quite a few posts should pop up. Click on the posts and learn more about the hair stylist who created the post, as well as any hair salons that may come up in the search results. Many stylists offer free consultations which present the perfect opportunity for you to meet the hair stylist, address any concerns you may have about your hair, as well as providing an opportunity for you to learn more about the services that the stylist provides.
Ask friends and family members for any natural hair stylist recommendations, oftentimes they may know of a stylist personally. If everything goes well after the first hair salon visit, you may want to consider adding a salon visit into your regular hair regimen, whereas it may not have to occur on a rolling basis of every two weeks, but you could schedule visits on a quarterly basis or when the need arises.
Re-evaluate Your Current Hair Regimen
I am a big fan of the saying, “if it ain’t broke, then don’t try to fix it”, however, there are some times when the techniques and manners for doing certain things have to be reexamined and this applies to the hair regimen, too. Over time some steps in the wash day routine for instance may have to be reduced, or even eliminated. Take some time to think about your regimen, and some of the obstacles you may be encountering, such as time concerns, energy concerns, concerns about the health of your hair. From there take inventory and decide the exact changes that may need to be made, for instance for time purposes, you may want to alter how often you shampoo your hair, shifting wash day from a weekly basis to every two weeks. Just be sure that whichever changes you choose to make that the health and well-being of your hair is not compromised.
Look For New Hairstyles On YouTube/Social Media
Especially in the case of boredom, testing out a new hairstyle may just be the trick. Take some time and visit YouTube and just type the words “natural hairstyles” in the search bar and in no time, so many results are going to come up. I tell you this has worked wonders for me– I visit YouTube every so often just in a quest to find new hairstyles and before long I am discovering five or more new hairstyles that I am so eager to test out and from there I just screenshot the videos in my phone to reference later. Also, just a visit on Instagram and you can come across a wide variety of hair pages, devoted to highlighting new and different hairstyles, some even feature a quick video tutorial, too. Just the discovery of new hairstyles can ignite a fire and an extra oomph to continue on in your hair journey.
Some times what initially may seem as just the need for a hair break, may actually be caused by a desire to try something different. If and when that feeling surfaces, consider testing out one of these aforementioned options to get you over the hump.
Cheers to a happy and healthy hair journey!
