The courage to do what works for you
There are so many other options. (NSW State Archives)
I feel sorry for men who wear toupees.
At what point in their progression toward baldness did they make the shift toward a hairpiece? Do they try to keep it a secret from the people they date — or even their life partners? How do they deal with rain, sports...haircuts?
It seems exhausting — not just the maintenance, but the fear that someone will find out. It seems like a happier prospect to just wake up in the morning and go through the day being bald. There’s nothing wrong with it.
That’s not to suggest that low-maintenance always has to be the way to go. Ironically, during the pandemic, I’ve been having fun with makeup now that there’s nowhere to be. It is a little slice of normalcy that I’m enjoying. But is makeup better than no makeup? Is having a full head of hair better than male pattern baldness? There are no truths here, only beliefs. And when we can separate the truths from the beliefs, we can choose the life we want to live.
Let’s poke at an example that comes up a lot for business owners: “I hate social media, but I have to be on it for my business.” Who says? It wasn’t very long ago — 2008? -— when social media wasn’t a part of our lives. Small businesses did just fine. If you don’t enjoy social media — perhaps you object to the way it is painstakingly designed to manipulate your neurochemistry, hijack your attention and intentions, and inflame your sense of outrage -- then you don’t have to participate. You can find your customers another way. The better way is the one that works for you.
So many of us waste so much energy conforming to how we think the world (or a specific person in the world) wants us to be. Following the rules becomes a habit in itself until we stop and question it. When we do, we might realize that we don’t care anymore what others think. Alternatively, we might discover that, even though we do still kind of care, we are willing to deal with the consequences of going against what is expected of us. We see that the freedom will be worth it.
By having the courage to do what works for us, we can live a life that gives us what we want, measured by what we value most. But even if that change makes our life simpler in the long term, getting there can be complicated. For me, it often means going against what I perceive that people want from me and saying no to things that I feel uncomfortable saying no to. It can be really hard.
It’s scary to change, especially when that change is visible to those around you. Your drinking friends don’t want you to stop drinking. Your running friends will forget you if you stop running. Your city friends won’t visit you in the country. The customers who liked your old thing won’t like your new thing. Being true to yourself is not always a great way to keep friends -- in the short term, anyway. However, over time, there are deeper connections to be made with people who may be more aligned with who you want to be.
It can be painful to transition from the way you’ve always done it to the way you want to do it. But you might discover that no one cares as much as you think. Time and time again, when I made changes to my business, there was, like, the one lady who gave me crap for it. Everyone else was indifferent or even supportive. It just wasn’t as big a deal as I had thought. The main obstacle to changing, unsurprisingly, was me.
Bald is beautiful. There is life after Facebook. And you get to live your life however you want.
What metaphorical toupee do you have yet to liberate yourself from? What’s still holding you back from being fully yourself?
