Be Gentle With Me

I have pretty tough skin and it’s usually hard to metaphorically penetrate it with unkindness.  I typically don’t care if people dissapprove of my forms of self-expression, as long as no one (myslef included) gets hurt, and no one is (for good reason) offended.

Perhaps Karma is sneaking up on me.  ”If you don’t have anything nice to say, don’t say anything at all” is usually a good rule, one which I don’t always follow.  I should follow that more often.  Because now I am growing from the point of annoyed to hurt.  And all because of…

My hair.

There are many things a person can do to get the truth out of someone.  Torture, alcohol, extortion.  But I have inadvertantly found a more harmless method.  Changing my apperance has welcomed others  to voice their thoughts on how I should look… and I’ve never even asked for them!

I generally like opinions.  I have some of my own that I like to share.  I like when others have and share them as well.  But as my hair grows longer, my tolerance for people’s perspective is growing shorter.

Let me make something clear.  There has not been a day in my life that I have woken up and said “Wow, I have great hair!”  In fact, the possibility of being “attractive” is something I gave up on long ago.  Instead, I have decided to focus on other, more important, things that I have to offer.

So why do I grow my hair long?  Simple answer: Because I want to.  I’m not trying to be rebellious.  I’m not trying to look cool.  I’m not trying to be someone I’m not.  I just want to know what it’s like to have long hair.  I just want to satisfy that curiousity, and have found no reason why I shouldn’t be allowed.

Back to the point of this post.  This experiment has become a very enlightening social test that has taught me a lot about people and a lot about myself.

People: No one person who criticizes my hair, I believe, intends to be mean.  My hair is weird and that’s a fact.  Because of this, others seem to grant themselves the freedom to tell me exactly how they feel about it, and it is often negative.  I wouldn’t want them to lie to me, just don’t say anything.  Whether you believe it or not, I’m not trying to make a statement or gain attention.  So I’m okay if you choose not to say anything about my hair, good or bad.

Myself: I have to realize that I am a master at sharing my opinion, and often, I am the only one who cares about it.  I also have to realize that my opinion may hurt someone else, even when I don’t mean for it to.  I excuse it as “just being honest,” but forget that my “honesty” doesn’t always encourage someone else.  So I am applying myself to follow the “If you don’t have anything nice to say…” rule.  I will fail.  But I will also succeed.  And I hope hurt feelings over hair will become less significant to me.

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