P2P Entry one: Start a Loc

Today is January 3, 2010. I have decided to write about my passage to purpose. I am sure you are wondering what in the world I mean by “passage to purpose”. Well, allow me to explain. For me the passage to purpose is primarily a journey to reclaiming my life’s purpose. I am the type of individual that will start a million things and fumble my way through life. God has blessed me with idea after idea of how my life “should” be lived. And yet again, I find myself fumbling through life. If you don’t know me, I just completed a doctoral degree in Counseling Psychology. I am 34 years old, I have 3 degrees and a whopper of debt to show for it. I have been blessed with a career, a talent for professional communication, natural beauty (it took me 34 years to realize that I am attractive, so I say this with confidence not arrogance) and loads of friends, yet I find myself completely off focus. So what’s up??
This year, I want to chronicle my passage to purpose. It’s about returning to those goals I set many years ago that have somehow forgotten, abandoned or just plain given up on. I believe that many of these goals were valuable and will be instrumental in the pursuit of my life’s desires. Finally, at age 34, I’ve realized that I must live my life on purpose and that will require me to return to those goals, hopes and dreams I mentioned, treasure mapped, shared with friends and work to complete those goals.
I think I am starting with a simple one, but it might just whip my butt. I am starting with a goal I first vocalized in 2000. In 2000, I decided I wanted to wear my natural hair. Promptly, I cut off my relaxed hair and donned an afro. I did so for 4 years. I enjoyed the freedom of chemical free hair, embraced the appearance on my kinks, learned to maintain and style my fro. Unfortunately, I didn’t let go of my need for approval. I left my very accepting career at UWG for a promotion and new career at Georgia Southern. The disapproval and unnerving looks fed my insecurity and low self-esteem. I RAN to the hair salon and found solace in the chemical relaxer. For the next 5 years, I enjoyed my relaxer. God blessed me with good hair, with or without chemicals so, I rocked all kind of styles, bobs, layered looks, you name it, I tried it. But, I was off purpose. My purpose; my hair purpose, set forth in 2000 was to embrace the natural beauty of my hair, and my overall natural beauty; to free myself from the European standard of beauty and to stand as an example of a woman who accepts her African heritage with dignity, integrity and grace. In those 5 years, while I was completely off purpose, I did work to influence over 100 high school students to graduate and enroll in college, complete a doctoral degree and provide guidance and counseling to hundreds of adults and college students. So, it wasn’t a total waste.
But what about my self-confidence and conquering my insecurities; I had abandoned my personal goal of embracing my natural beauty. During the final year of my doctoral program, I worked at a university in Texas and I was mentored by a myriad of successful psychologists. One in particular was influential in reminding me of my abandoned hair journey. Dr. Esther Wright-Wilson, a sista psychologist with a natural hair style, invited me to an event on the campus of a HBCU near our institution. Mr. Dick Greggory was the speaker. During his humorous act, he discussed the Black woman’s use of relaxers and his general dislike of the chemical transformation of our hair. This reminded me of my goal, my purpose. It also spoke volumes to me that an elderly, Black man would prefer for me not to ruin my hair by processing it to death. At that moment, I decided I needed to get back on purpose. It is important to remember that this is the year that Barack Obama ran for President and WON. So, there was an energy around the power and goodness of the African-American that was new and highly intoxicating. I am positive that this energy helped fuel my desire to realign with my purpose. So on January 7, 2009, I received my last relaxer. Right before, I left Texas to attend the inauguration of the first African-American President of the United States of America. That trip requires a completely different blog.
Once I returned to Texas, I decided no more; I would no longer be a slave to the chemical. I recommitted to my purpose and vocalized the deeper aspect of my goal, which was to lock my hair. Now, only a sista truly confident in her beauty, her intellect, her worth and value can lock her hair. Because, while there is evidence that our society accepts locks, afros and other natural hair styles, there are many people within our society that still consider chemically free African hair as the symbol of ignorance and incivility. And believe me, these aren’t just people outside our community; there are plenty of brothas and sistas out there that believe locks are “dreadful”. And I would be confronted with them. I would also be confronted with my own inner “dread demons.”
The months went by quickly, I held on to my relaxed hair for 8 months. During those months, I rocked strawsets, twists, braids, and embraced the straightening comb. But in August, my birth month and the month I received my doctorate, I decided to release the relaxed hair. Just like a split mind cannot prosper, neither can “split hair”. It was time to fully commit to my hair journey and rock the fro again. And even at 33, I was still afraid of what people would think of my hair. I would say to myself: “I can’t go on job interviews with a fro.” or “Let me keep this hair until after my graduation because my mom and sisters won’t like the afro.” But was it that I was afraid of others or was I afraid of what I thought of myself; my inner “dread demons” were rearing their ugly heads.
Exactly 8 months after my last relaxer, I did the big chop! And began to be become acquainted with MY Hair. God did an amazing job when creating kinky coily hair. It has spunk and personality. If kinky coily hair represented an emotion it would be something in between exuberant, joyfulness and sensitivity. My kinky coily hair is a perfect representation of me; a deep sense of exuberance, sunshine, joy and love covered by such sensitivity that if not treated with sincere gentleness, damage is certain. I became obessesed with natural hair, hair care, locks and anything associated with locks. I watched you tube videos, stared at brothas and sistas with locks and fros and bought books about the locked lifestyle. I questioned my natural friends and I visited websites that were devoted to natural hair, like; honey fig, treasured locs, inspiredlocs, Motown girl, afro kinks, etc.
I encouraged one of my girlfriends to join me on my passage to purpose. My friend and sorority sister, Kristie Todd Boyd, agreed to start the journey with me in August. Her husband, Eric, a locked brotha, was ecstatic as he had been encouraging Kristie to join him on his locked journey. Kristie is bold and fearless. After 3 months, she BC’ed and locked. Now she is showing me the way!
Now, I am nearing a year since my last relaxer. January 7, 2010 is quickly approaching and my natural hair is flourishing. Now it is time for the next step in my passage. It is time to start the locks! I have decided to begin the locking process on January 9, 2010. I searched over and over for the right locitician to begin my locks. But, I live in a remote area of Georgia. I searched and searched and finally decided that a fellow locked sista in the town where I worked would be a suitable candidate to lock my hair. Her name is Gloria Morgan Goosby. She has donned a natural look for more than 5 years and she started her own locks. She is young, intelligent, spiritual and wise about the locking process. So, here I am 6 days prior to locking my hair. Most days I am obsessed, some days I am frightened and overall, I am realizing that I am making a deeper commitment to myself and honoring my word, my beliefs and the purpose I expressed nearly 10 years ago.
God, I pray that you continue to bless me on this journey and help me in this aspect of my passage to purpose.
And so it is.