by Michelle Brooks | staff writer
All through the years, black women have been discouraged to wear their crowns of beauty: their natural hair. We’ve conformed to these eurocentric standards of society by putting in weaves, and even worse, straightening our hair everyday. But, if we are going to shout ‘Black Lives Matter’, we have to stop trying to conform to society’s standard and embrace our natural beauty.
Natural hair does come with a struggle, but it all pays off when you slay everyone’s existence. Here are a few reasons why going natural is the best and worst decision you can make as a black teenage girl.
Since there’s a variety of different textures of hair, there are hundreds of twistouts that black girls can use to result in different curls. You can search through millions of different twistouts on Youtube to find the perfect one. There are twistouts that can give you long and lengthy curls and twistouts that can give you kinky and short curls. If you choose the right one for your hair, you can wake up as flawless as Beyoncé’s sister.
The word natural may mislead you, but in order to keep those flawless curls, you must use the right hair products. The Walmart ethnic aisle is the perfect place to go for a wonderland of moisturizers, leave-in conditioners and other hair products. Although the products can be pricey, the only people who will regret it is your parents when you’re feeling yourself the next day or when you’re broke because payday hasn’t came in four weeks.
The most interesting thing when you first go natural after you’ve been wearing weaves or straightening your hair for a while, is people’s reactions when they see your natural curls. Your confidence is through the roof when people compliment you as you walk down the hallway. In those moments, you appreciate those 3 hours you spent twisting your hair last night.
Being in sports and going natural are two things that don’t get along, just like Solange and Jay-Z. Especially if you sweat heavy, you’re just about ready to cut all your hair off. After you get done crossing someone up, you’re going to look in the mirror and find your curls will drop faster than OJ Simpson dropped Marguerite Whitley for Nicole Simpson Brown. However, you can always fall back on pulling your hair back into a high ponytail, or I should say afro puff.
Your hair will not only look good but it will smell really good. It will smell better than the entrance to Bath & Body Works. Some leave-in conditioners have ingredients such as shea butter, coconut, and other tropical smells to make your hair smell like the oceans by the Hawaiian coast. These products that help your hair smell good also add repairing and strengthening nutrients to your hair.
Detangling. It’s probably your worst nightmare since childhood, especially to my tender-headed sisters. It’s made easier now because you can make a concoction of different hair products and water to make your stubborn hair more susceptible to the deathly prongs of the wide toothed comb. As your natural days add up, you can easily train your hair to be susceptible to your fingers. This way, detangling is much more softer on your hair by using your fingers.
Going natural is a lot of work, but at the same time, it’s not a lot of hard work.You just have to consistently take care of your hair and be patient with it. Some twistouts may not turn out the way you wanted it to, but you just have to find an alternative hairstyle for the day. You should try to do different twistouts so that you can find a twistout that you’re comfortable with and that turns out the way you want it majority of the time. You will ultimately feel like a black queen and be spewing black girl magic.
Keeping up with natural hair is easier than keeping up with Grey’s Anatomy. It all depends on how you manage it. I mean, you can decide to twist it up 3 days or 6 days out of the week. I only twist my hair the night before I feel like looking presentable. The other days, I put some leave-in conditioner and put it up in a high afro puff. And, occasionally, you can find those outfits that look good with your hair up or down.
The truth is natural hair is probably easier to take care of than weave, but weave is easier to maintain. That is probably why most black girls choose to wear weave. Even then, you’d have to pay good money to get the weave that doesn’t get tangled or frizzy. If you’re going to pay $200 for a bundle of straight hair that you have to maintain just like real hair, I think you can deal with the $5 hair products you have to pay for natural hair. Never mind that these hair products can last up to at least 2 months.
I’m not saying black girls who wear weaves and straighten their hair most of the time aren’t slaying. I’m just saying that most of these beauty standards that we compare ourselves to are eurocentric and we should appreciate our black features.
