"Fancy Naturally"

Oh you fancy, huh?

Thanks to Marsha J for being the inspiration behind this post!

During my early natural days, I would get really nervous when it was time for me to attend a formal event.  I had to deal with my own apprehension of whether I could wear a fancy hairstyle without straightening my hair and I had to deal with people asking me, "what are you going to do with your hair?" So I guess I felt I had to do something really special for my hair to be presentable for the evening.
I would practice different styles weeks in advance until I landed on this style and this became my formal hairstyle staple.

Then I got fancy and stuck a flower in it . . .

I got so good at working those little twists in the front, that I experimented with some other versions . . .

Although I love this style, it got to be too much trouble.  Since it took me a while to get those twists in the front the way I wanted them, I wanted the style to last for a while.  So I would tie a satin scarf around my head at night and try to sleep carefully on a satin pillow case since I knew my hair was laying too flat for the scarf to stay on. That style would look good for a few days and decent for another 2 or 3, but after dealing with my hair for 2+ years, I decided that I didn't need to do all of that.  I would wear that style only when I really wanted to, not because I felt like I had to.

So the next formal event I attended, I wore a puff.  I felt like I needed to do a little something "extra," so I added a twist on the right side and a rhinestone clip on the left. The twist may be difficult to see since I don't have a close-up of this style, but you can kind of see it dangling by my eye (LOL!)

This year, I kept it simple and I only wore a puff without all the "extras" and I felt great!

My lesson learned: There's nothing wrong with all the other styles and there's nothing wrong with doing something extra for a special occasion. However, it's a liberating feeling to know that you don't have to do those things.  

Sounds like I got it all together, right?   Well, no. I'm still learning a lot on this journey.  Since I wasn't spending so much time and energy on figuring out what to do with my hair, I diverted the attention to other areas.  I decided that I was going to get my nails done (which I almost never do - toes excluded) and I was going to splurge on some fancy mascara to make my eyes pop.  Well, my polish started to chip almost immediately and the fancy mascara extended and multiplied my eyelashes so they looked fake.  Needless to say, I posted my disgust on Facebook and I stated that I guess I was fine the way I was and that's what I get for trying to be fancy.  Marsha J replied: "Sweetie you are always fancy naturally."  What a beautiful message!!  I didn't need to get fancy with my hair AND I didn't need to get fancy with my nails and make-up.  Sometimes we're so busy looking for ways to improve what we already have that we don't take the time to appreciate what we already have.  Thanks Marsha for teaching me that.  And that's why I'm . . .

~Learning to Love Me Naturally