I decided to withdraw myself from the “natural hair community” and let my subscription to a hair forum lapse. I realized I was spending way too much of my time logged on and I needed to take a break. Naturally, I decided to fill my new free time with blogs, lol. So, with my new subscription to Clutch Magazine, I got to work reading and procrastinating. One of the first articles I read was this one Making My Natural Hair Look “Acceptable” Takes Up An Obscene Amount of My Time. It’s basically about a woman who has been natural for 7 years. She has mastered her twist out, but it takes hours to style and she’s afraid to mess it up (she can’t swim, enjoy life, etc…). She fell asleep without twisting her hair at night, so she woke up at 5am to twist it and went back to sleep.

I’m a self professed lazy natural. If I style my hair one day, the minimum amount of days that will pass until I do it again is 3. I don’t rebraid, retwist, moisturize, seal, etc…until 3 full days have gone by. I just don’t have time for that and I like messy hair. If my hair looks crazy, I just put it in a high bun and go on about my day. In all, I spend 1 hour (at most) on my hair during the work week. My weekend shampoo, deep condition, and style process is probably 2 hours at the most. I find it crazy that some naturals spend 3 hours styling then redo the style every night. I don’t think it’s reasonable to sacrifice time that could be spent living/socializing  to something like hair styling.

One of my most asked questions is “how long does it take you to braid your hair?” If the answer is 7 hours or 10 hours or maybe 15 hours (all over 3-7 days, I never do my mini braids in one sitting) most people are automatically turned off and not interested because they “don’t have the patience” and they “could never do all that” to their hair. My answer is, I spend 10 hours over 3 days and I don’t have to worry about my hair for 5-8 weeks. But I find that that answer is usually not satisfactory. I do invest a lot of time in my hair, but I only do it when I know the style is going to give me weeks of labor-free haircare.

I’ve also noticed hair care regimens that include hours of detangling, pre-treating, washing, deep conditioning, steaming, protein treating, conditioning… You’ve probably seen this picture floating around the innanetz.

I think at some point, it all becomes too much. If you are missing out on doing the things you want to do- hanging out with friends or the significant other- or listing the steps in your regimen takes a 1/2 page, you have reached that point. Actually, you’re far past the point of doing too much.

Wash day aside, styling shouldn’t take a great deal of time. The author of the Clutch Magazine/XO Jane article said,

As a self-described overthinker, I cannot help but wonder why most people praised my hair only after I started wearing a style with elongated and defined curls; a style that mimics hair with looser curl patterns.

I think there’s a lot to that statement. If we work against our hair and work desperately to have it always appear a way it’s not meant to be, we trade valuable time and effort to accomplish those things. As a fine haired 4a natural with very kinky hair, I can definitely related to the struggle. However because I do have some sort of curl (although very tiny), I know there are some things I will not full get- especially the wash and go thing (in my opinion everyone can wash and go, no matter the texture). I think there is still a lot of stigma surrounding natural hair. Especially what is appropriate styling and what is not. I’m not big on having perfectly neat coiffed springs, waves, or crimps. I love messy hair. Day 2 on out are the best days. Natural hair is unpredictable with kinks and coils stretching or shrinking in every which way. I think that’s one of the best things about natural hair. Perhaps most naturals, and others, would not agree with that. There’s the need to have the hair look done (whatever that means). There is a place between re-twisting every night and free-form rasta. Natural hair acceptance has come a long way, but we need to widen what is acceptable styling. If you want one big natty dread, do it…if you want perfected curled locks do that too- but if you are foregoing other things just to keep up appearances, it’s time to let loose a little.

If you need a little inspiration to let your hair down figuratively/literally speaking, here are some pics from my tumblr page. (sources are embedded, click pic to see source that was listed on tumblr)