A few weeks ago, I cut my hair.
It’s actually not as dramatic as all that. I usually have short hair, and prefer it that way. It’s always somewhere between the five and six month mark that I begin itching for a haircut before I just can’t take it any longer and chop it off. There’s just something about chin length hair that feels so good. It’s so light and bouncy I almost don’t even notice it’s there, unlike the coarse, heavy strands that stick to my neck and creep along my shoulders when it’s long.
And that’s not to say there’s anything wrong with long hair. Oftentimes, after I cut it, I’ll see someone on TV or Instagram with long curls of hair cascading down their shoulders and back, falling in all the right places, and I’ll suddenly miss my long hair. At least until I remember how I always put it up with a claw clip after frustratingly trying to style it for 20 minutes before getting too sweaty and tired to care.
Long hair just isn’t for me—and by long, I mean just barely past my shoulders ‘cause that’s about as long as I’ve been able to tolerate—but whenever I get the urge to cut my hair again, it’s also accompanied by the desire to obsessively scan Pinterest for hair inspo and imagine the life I think I’ll have when it’s cut.
For most people, this impulse to suddenly change their hairstyle usually coincides with tumultuous moments in their lives when a haircut means a lot more than just a haircut. In Sara Radin’s article “We asked a psychologist and hairdresser why haircuts are so emotional” from Dazed, psychotherapist Rebecca Newman explains it best when she says
“‘When we’re going through a period of transition that is particularly painful, we tend to make decisions that provide immediate relief.’”
These periods can take shape in many different forms, but often they make us feel this overwhelming lack of agency that drives us to exert control over our lives in the quickest and easiest way possible: a change of style.
While changing one’s style doesn’t always have to do with maintaining control and can actually be a great way of exploring one’s self-expression, impulsive and drastic changes are often a result of something more serious. From Britney Spears’ shaved head to Miley Cyrus’ bleach blonde pixie cut, we often see people—especially women—using the act of cutting their hair as a way of dealing with external stressors.
I’ve personally done this at least twice. As I’ve talked about in a previous post, I once got bangs and dyed the underside of my hair purple in an attempt to deal with a breakup. I thought, as most of us do, that in making this physical change, I would finally move into the “healing stage”. Like the many people before me and the many that will come after, I believed that in the act of cutting my hair, I was also severing myself from the person I used to be the person I no longer wanted to be. As if a haircut and some purple hair dye were all it took to get over the heartache of losing someone I’d known and loved for years.
But the “post-breakup” haircut is nothing new. All we have to do is flip through a magazine from the last decade or so to refresh our memory of all the celebrities that have trimmed, chopped, and dyed their hair as a result of a breakup. Our hair is one of the most versatile aspects of ourselves that, when changing it, provides an immediate sense of satisfaction, especially in times when we need it the most. However, these band-aid-like fixes rarely make us feel better in the long run. They’re simply a temporary fix for a much deeper, time-consuming problem.
And yet, we can’t seem to keep ourselves from partaking in these impulsive acts of immediate satisfaction. We’re constantly drawn in by that hit of dopamine still lingering in our system from the last time we cut our hair, got that tattoo, bought all those clothes, or watched that show. This inability to resist immediate satisfaction in favor of delayed-gratification is often referred to as a lack of self-control, and was even the center of a study in 1972 called The Marshmallow Experiment.
In the Medium article, “Delayed-Gratification: The Science of Making Hard Choices” Rafael Eliassen explains that, in the experiment, a group of children were given the choice between receiving one marshmallow right away or two if they waited 15 minutes. After, the researchers in charge then tracked each of the children and concluded that the ones that waited for the two marshmallows achieved greater success compared to the others.
Of course, it makes sense that possessing the ability of self-control might allow someone to, technically, be more successful, but success is subjective. What one person classifies as a successful life may look like a nightmare to another. But, most often, when describing their hopes and dreams in life—whatever that may look like—there’s one term that’s almost always used: happiness.
In the end, we all want to be happy; a word that fluctuates, bends, and twists depending on who’s using it. And because we all have different ideas of what will make us happy, the path to obtaining it looks different for everyone. But at some point, we all implement some self-control in way one or another in order to achieve our supposed happiness. Whether that means saving up to buy a house, spending years in school, or working on one’s writing every day.
But, for most of us, the benefits of self-control have been explained throughout our lives ad nauseam. Before we could even talk, our parents would withhold certain treats and snacks to teach us not to spoil our dinner or that we must eat our vegetables if we want dessert. We must endure the bad or slightly less pleasing in order to receive the good. And the Marshmallow Experiment simply proves the larger scale benefits of this lesson. But Eliassen explains that it actually shows us more than that. That in choosing to eat the marshmallow right away, these kids
“…are not only motivated by pleasure but also by something equally strong. That background motivator is pain… When someone gives in to their urges, it’s the inability to bear a certain type of pain that is shunned. Most of the pleasure you indulge in is nothing but ‘pain avoidance’.”
While I don’t think I believe that most pleasing things we indulge in are an attempt to avoid pain, I’m sure a certain degree of them are. When we choose to sleep in instead of working out in the morning, we’re avoiding the pain of prying ourselves from our warm, comfy bed to work our body into a sore, sweaty mess. Every time we choose short term comfort/happiness, we are also choosing to avoid short term pain—although it’s more like slight discomfort. And that’s often what influencers and brands on social media prescribe.
The concept of self-care has turned into an all encompassing term used as an excuse to partake in indulgent and impulsive behavior. As if buying lip glosses, Starbucks drinks, and a new pair of Lululemon leggings will cure all.
Of course, it also isn’t realistic to say we must implement pain into our daily lives. That by depriving ourselves of pleasure every single day and never giving in to our impulses, we will be become better, happier people.
I’m a firm believer in wearing the nice dress, using the special plates, and drinking the fancy wine. I don’t think you always have to wait for a special occasion to enjoy things—unless there’s a specific, upcoming occasion you want to wait for, of course. Everyone should be allowed to live fully and freely. But when we get in the habit of doing things to avoid feeling bad, even for just a second, we forget that the things that take longer and require more work don’t just feel better, the happiness also lasts longer.
However, making impulsive decisions like getting a haircut also makes it feel like we’re doing something. Like we’re taking a step in the right direction, and it can be confusing. It’s just the right amount of change to make it feel as though the life we’re seeking is now within our grasp; that if we reach just a little farther, we might be able to grab it without taking any real, potentially painful risks that come with making real change. And then we’re upset when the intoxicating, but temporary spell wears off and we’re still not happy.
***
There’s this part in Dolly Alderton’s book Everything I Know About Love that I’ve been thinking about a lot recently. I know I’ve talked about this book before, but I really do think about it often.
In the chapter, “Tottenham Court Road and Amazon” Alderton describes a point in her life when she felt utterly and overwhelmingly sad, stuck, and alone. She decides to take a holiday and go to New York for a friend’s wedding, but finds that everything she felt at home simply followed her there. Eventually, she meets a guy named Adam and develops a deep connection with him and just before she’s about to leave he asks her stay, but Alderton refuses. When he asks why she says
“‘Because I’m the problem,” I replied. “Not the city. Not any of the circumstances are the problem. I’m the thing that needs changing.”
After I came home, things got easier for a while. The heavy coat of sadness I had been wearing for so long began to lift. I made a proper plan for what I wanted to do next. I fell back in love with my city, wildly. I read Bill Bryson books about England and ate Toffee Crisps. I remembered how lucky I was to live in a place I had grown up in, a place filled with my friends.
Two months into my return I left my job and went freelance. A month after that, I was given a column in The Sunday Times… We left the dilapidated palace of Camden and moved two miles north into a flat with no mice, a working loo, and central heating.”
Just about every five to six months, I start to feel stuck. I scour Pinterest for a new haircut, a new outfit, a new style. I imagine myself with bangs and a nearly pixie haircut, walking down a street somewhere like New York or Chicago to get tea, to go to work, to relax in my cool, new apartment, and it all feels so real. Like I could just grab it if I really wanted to. But then I get that haircut or that outfit and I feel confident and happy for a good few weeks before it suddenly fades away. It evaporates in my grasp and I forget to continue working for all the things I want, and instead, settle back into my routine.
But then, when I remember, I’m suddenly no longer ready. I need another haircut, my clothes are too old, I need to write more. I make more and more excuses for why can’t take that risk and I start all over again.
It’s hard to know when is the right time to jump, to plunge into the cool depths of the pool, and not simply because you’re afraid of dealing with the pain of the sun on your back and the sweat on your forehead. But, I guess there’s only so many steps you can take before there’s no where else to go. At least not without going backwards.
All comments, thoughts, and feelings are welcome <3
Hi Summer, this was a nice read. Pretty well written. You’re probably right that making physical changes are possibly an easy way to change ourselves without really changing much. But be careful also to not be too hard on yourself. It’s ok to explore yourself and your hair is part of your exploration. Especially when you are in your 20s. Enjoy your body and hair. :)
Heard! This was such a fun/elegant read. I'm sharing this with my partner because he's always teasing me about how OCD I am about haircuts. I just found a new stylist who talked me out of cutting my hair every four weeks and waiting for eight, and it's been excruciating. She's blunt to the point of being rude, but I apprecaite that — it's productive in the hair department. : ) She gave me two haircuts before we even talked about color, and she ordered me to put together a Pinterest page and she's cutting my hair again before we even set an appt for color. I think she knows sometimes people go into psychic shock after making impulsive hair decisions. I feel like tarot readers and stylists are affordable therapists with extra perks. And good ones will guide you thorugh extreme hair therapy during life transitions, right?