Black Women Need the Natural Hair Movement to Succeed

This past weekend I had the pleasure of attending the Taliah Waajid World Natural Hair Show, and I met a lot of great women!  Among the thousands of women (and men) who were in attendance, there were so many variations of hair styles, types, and of course hair history.

Everyone has a history when it comes to their hair.  Our struggle and success stories are so intertwined into our looks that young women like Techturized.com have drawn in women from all over to what I like to call “The Facebook for Natural Hair”.   How we treat our hair; from design to maintenance, is directly related to how we feel, and how we want others to treat us.

For years, black women have adapted to so many other standards of beauty that we have lost an important part of us.  Pieces of our culture and history have been simply replaced due to the desire to fit in.   As many of the women we talked to strained to remember the last time they were natural before this, we realized many of us haven’t been natural since we begged our moms for our first bra.  Most, if not all of the insecurities that black women have about their hair dates back farther than we can remember.

But now is our time.

Call it what you want, but the love for natural hair is not only here, but growing into a lucrative platform.  By women getting in touch with their true self and their natural state of hair, many women have taken their lives and thoughts into a realm that many others are unaware of.  Women of color are building their own successful brands and businesses.  Our voices are now heard more than ever before.

At the World Natural Hair show, women opened up about their insecurities, their personal concerns, and their ultimate and continuing goals for their hair and life.  Natural hair is a platform where women of color aren’t afraid to experiment or ask questions, and that is exactly what we need today.

We need to find ourselves, be ourselves, and bring each other to a place where we are all confident and comfortable in our own skin, regardless of what anyone else looks like or deems appropriate.