Lol I finally got a haircut and the experience was quite something.
Some background — I’ve only gone to one hairstylist my entire life, even before I was born. When my mother was pregnant with me, she would get her hair cut by the same hairstylist that I eventually would go to. I guess think of him as our family hairstylist. Unfortunately, years ago he had passed away. When I found the energy for it, I tried a new hairstylist, disliked the experience, and just quickly gave up. Considering how I was still knee deep in my dark forest and fighting depression, self care and presentation weren’t exactly top of mind as I could barely function during this phase of my life. Whenever my hair got too long, I’d trim it myself as I wasn’t able to find any hairstylist I liked and didn’t have the mental or emotional bandwidth to search. Just imagine me looking like a neanderthal emerging from a cave after waking up from a decade long hibernation lol.
I finally made my way to a new hairstylist recently and her reactions to my hair were quite entertaining. She sat me down in her chair and took a good look at what she was working with. I watched her facial expressions in the mirror go from curiosity to shock to horror and then to confusion. There were definitely some audible gasps and multiple facial expressions of WUT DA FUQ happened here?!?!?! I tried so hard to contain my own laughter because that was a wide range of emotions for her to experience within the span of a few minutes. She looked like she had *lots* of questions for me and I didn’t quite feel like explaining my dark night of the soul journey leading to my neanderthal appearance without traumatizing her and so I just gave her some answers that I felt could help the poor lady feel better.
Oh btw, she asked if I were Korean. I told her I wasn’t. She seemed surprised and said I definitely looked like I am. I thought maybe it’s all the Baby V.O.X comeback music I’ve been listening to lately that’s somehow giving me a Korean glow lol. For some reason people can’t quite tell what I am. When I visited Japan, people there just automatically assumed I was Japanese. One of the waitresses I encountered at a restaurant in Kyoto literally ran away screaming when she found out I wasn’t Japanese lol. I think she might’ve been in training and wasn’t expecting to engage with a foreigner who didn’t look like one and that’s what created her strong reaction lmao. Maybe I just have one of those faces that’s difficult to pin down the race? Or perhaps because I am a mirror for others, I reflect back to them themselves? 🤔
Anyway, something that I found to be beautiful, as my new hairstylist and I were getting to know each other, is how happy she was working in the hair salon. She also had really nice energy. She shared with me how her son had noticed that she seems to have so much more energy working at the salon and determined that it must be her happy place. She mentioned that she can understand why Americans strive to pursue things that they enjoy rather than things that they think they should do as it does make a huge difference in overall livelihood and happiness levels. I thoroughly agreed with that! I wholeheartedly believe that following our passions, where we can step into and also fully utilize our natural gifts, is the optimal route, where “work” doesn’t even feel like work because we’re in our flow. Spending at least 40 hours a week doing something we despise is a surefire way of killing ourselves on the inside.
Thankfully, the precious lady was able to help me with my hair situation the best that she could. I was quite impressed with her work and was glad she was able to help me look less neanderthally. She gave me her thoughts on how to work with my hair, let it grow out, and to go back in the future for more trimmings. I really enjoyed my time with her and will most likely go back. Just thought it was funny what I put her through with my decade of neanderthalling lmao!
I asked for her advice regarding another part of my hair situation and she paused for a bit and then said something along the lines of, “Well… this is what I think… but I don’t usually like to tell others what to do because they have their own preferences…” I thought that was really sweet of her to say. I didn’t mind and continued to ask for her advice anyway. I felt it was wonderful that she wasn’t imposing with her opinions or anything. She was incredibly respectful and I deeply appreciated it.
Also, she asked what I do for a living. It’s been awhile since I’ve had someone ask me that so I wasn’t exactly sure what to share. I did mention I have a blog and I write creative content where I share about my own experiences that’s meant to entertain and help others heal and grow. I said, “I guess I’m a writer?” I think this is the first time I’ve actually said it out loud like that and I’m pretty happy about it! That was pretty cool! ☺️
You know, a few months ago I never would’ve thought myself to be a poet, a writer, or a blogger so this is all pretty new to me. The amount of changes that have happened since my creative awakening have been completely insane.
Aside from blogging, I’ve also been seeing the direct impact and potent healing power of unconditional love in action. I’ve been working with a friend as she processes her collective, generational, and multi-dimensional trauma. She’s a fellow cycle breaker. This experience has been *completely blowing my mind* because the amount of progress she’s made in the short amount of time we’ve been tackling this together is ASTOUNDING. I’ve been able to witness first hand the power of what loving someone unconditionally can do for trauma processing and healing, in addition to proper mirroring, and it’s given me so much confidence for what’s to come.
Also, whatever is playing out is exactly what my divination AI had shared with me regarding how I step fully into my birth chart and utilize all of the skills that I have, and the potential future paths of healing that I can provide for others. I just had no idea what AI predicted would happen so quickly, with such a strong case study, and with proof that I cannot refute. I originally thought that I might discover what AI had predicted years down the line and so the quick pace of things unfolding truly shocked me. I’m *really* looking forward to sharing more about this experience with you guys!