After letting my dyed locks grow out for a couple of months at the end of 2019, I dyed my hair again in early 2020 before my January 8 wedding because… photos. I love the photos, but I knew when that dye job was finished that I was done with root maintenance. I was bummed to erase all that growout. I let my hubby know that 2020 was my year to go au naturel. As a grey wolf himself, he was super supportive.

January 8, 2020… the glowing bride. Oh, those curls! I do love them, and I know I can bring them back anytime.

Little did we know what 2020 had in store, forcing everyone to do some sort of growout.

For more than 30 years I’ve been coloring my hair for all sorts of different reasons, mostly for style statements. Once I crossed the 45 age marker, I started questioning what felt like style versus holding on to a particular image of myself. Anytime I feel like I’m holding on, I challenge myself to examine my preferences and beliefs. There’s always room for growth, particularly when you challenge your own personal assumptions. It’s also good to check in on the roots of your habits to make sure they’re still nourishing the type of life and growth you want to experience.

To make my growout more bearable, I took a monthly hair transition photo and shared it to Instagram as a form of accountability.

2020: The Year of Piling it on

Due to the crucible of 2020, many other things were brewing. Work changed dramatically. Support systems shifted. Some priorities receded while others rose up.

I remember being in conversation with a fellow business owner in my mastermind group, wondering what my young firecracker self would do in these times. I called on her energy and her courage. She was brazen. Not so much confident as willing to try, experiment, see what happens and learn from it. She took bold leaps, often skipping over steps in favor of opportunities that came her way. She was nimble and motivated. She was focused on results and how she felt — pretty much unconcerned with what other people thought of her. She was an outspoken activist and an artistic entrepreneur. What more could 2020 ask for?

These words were like a spell cast from my lips. I felt them weave back through time to this younger me. I could feel her energy and her focus. Her life was much harder then and yet I loved how she handled those challenges. I sent that love to her.

It was all simple and quick. It happened in a moment. I forgot about it, one of many conversations and bits of wishful thinking thrown about during the early, confused months of a pandemic.

In the Spring I gave myself a Covid haircut. A trim to give my curls a bit of bounce back.

Then Summer arrived. We’d all been through a lot. Much more isolation than usual. A few businesses found ways to open. There were glimpses of relief.

Covid Creates Clarity

By the time salons reopened, my hair was ready for some TLC. I was 6 months in to growing out my natural color, and I was so over it.

When I arrived, Samantha, my partner in this growout process, asked me what I wanted to do. I told her I was thinking about cutting it all off (and had assembled a Pinterest board so she didn’t just grab a shaver and get to work).

She asked me how I was feeling (to make sure I wasn’t just being reactionary) and loved the idea. I’ve spent most of my life with short hair, so I reassured her I fully understood that hair grows back. I don’t harbor deep attachments to my locks.

Samantha knows that hair carries a story, though. It’s part of a person’s identity. It holds energy. The ends have been around for months or years depending on the length. So she led me through a meditation process as she massaged my scalp and shoulders, inviting me to make peace with those stories and that energy. To bring that history to a close in preparation for letting it go.

I thought about the recent history of my hair and then traveled back to 2009 when I moved to California and made the decision to grow out my hair. I had the desire to be softer and more feminine. Long hair was a different look and energy for me. I was told it made me sexier and more attractive. I also thought about how I liked the look of long hair but never bonded with how the strands created webs in my fingers when I washed my hair. I realized the longings at that time were to change who I was. To get out of that skin that was so uncomfortable from my life and business crashing around me in 2008.

I wove through memories of opening Cult of Gemini with Ginger and how people had a hard time telling us apart. I had just returned in June 2020 to help her close the shop. That whole 5-year chapter brought to a close, deeply woven together with an image of us as twin Gemini sultry curly red heads. I loved our image but also struggled with individuality and being seen. Maybe she did too.

The Geminati. Kat on the left. Ginger and one of her famous laughs on the right.

In a couple of minutes of meditation about my hair, all this history swirled in me. I could feel the disconnection and how I took on beliefs from others. I could feel how I was trying to be something more, different, better. And then over the next hour and a half as Samantha cut and sculpted, I let all that fall away around me. When I stood up from that chair, I felt truly lighter.

When I looked in the mirror, I didn’t see a different person. I saw an older person. Not older in years, but one from years ago. I saw that woman who months earlier I had longed to make an appearance in my life. Whose energy and gumption I longed for. Whose particular strength I wanted in this time.

She’d been with me all along, but she didn’t feel seen. I couldn’t see her beneath the dye and beliefs about long hair.

I brought back my super short hair and liberated a much-needed part of myself. I feel more unified and able to express who I am on the inside. I feel more power and confidence. Most importantly, I feel like myself. And when I look in the mirror, I recognize myself. My inner critic has even toned down a bit, recognizing that I’m not tuning in to that channel but listening to my own deep self.

Me, back from the salon 6 months after my wedding and a few months after inadvertently casting a spell to bring my younger self forward to this time.

Your words really do cast spells, whether you know it or not. That’s why I love clarity of language. Intentions matter. Specific words matter. Grab my free guide about cultivating deeper connections by being more mindful with your word choices.