The Paradox of Natural Choices

A few days ago I was looking for natural hair care blogs. I found a few but I found more locked hair blogs than blogs of natural wearers whose hair is not locked. I started thinking about this. Why is it that locking seems to be such a huge thing now, even more so than when I was locked six years ago? I settled on two reasons.

Reason number one: more and more black women are deciding that going natural is much better than subjecting their hair to chemical processes. They feel that locking is a proven way of going natural, especially since you can start some locks with relaxed ends.

Reason number two: having locks gives consistency, normalcy, and provides community in a some what larger degree than having plain natural hair.

Now, I have plain, unlocked natural hair. I like my plain unlocked natural hair. But I will admit that sometime figuring out what to do with it can be overwhelming, even for a person who knows how to do almost any natural style with and without extensions.

The beauty of natural hair is that it gives us lots of choices. The trouble with natural hair is that it gives us lots of choices. That is the problem; sometimes I feel that I have too many choices. I believe that the draw of locks is that you make a decision. For the most part there is no turning back so you are free to enjoy the decision that you have made. Whereas when you wear your hair natural you are always having to figure out what to do with your hair next. There are so many options out there. This is especially hard when it comes to special occasions or working in jobs where creative hairstyles are not the norm.

But with locks you know how your hair is going to behave. You know what to expect. You can get a list of a few styles that you know will look good on you. The choices are more like the choices that you have to make when you have relaxed hair. Natural hair gives you options but I believe that a lot of natural wearers get over whelmed by all of their options.

I decide to research this “paradox of choice” and found that there was actually a book written on this subject. It is called The Paradox of Choices: Why Less is More by Barry Schwartz. He is writing about choices as it comes to commerce but what he says can apply to our day to day choices as well. You can read excerpts of it on Google books . I found an interview that he did and found that may of his observations about choice shed light on why many natural hair wearers either give up or get locks.

Here are a few excerpts from that interview you can read the whole thing here.

Q - What is the “paradox of choice”?

Everyone agrees that having choice is better than not having choice. It seems evident that if choice is good, then more choice is better. The paradox is that this “obvious” truth isn’t true. It turns out that a point can be reached where, with more choice, people are worse off.People can’t ignore options - they have to pay attention to them. If they make a choice, is there another choice would have been better? There’s more effort put into making decisions, and less in enjoying them. What’s nagging is the possibility that, if they had chosen differently, they could have gotten something better.

Q - What about outside consumer goods?

Some social science research says that one consequence of leaving your options open is that people are less satisfied with their decisions; if a decision is non-reversible, you’ll make yourself feel better about the choice you made. If it’s a reversible choice, you don’t do that. You don’t bring your romantic partner “back to the store,” but because you might, you don’t convince yourself that she’s the love of your life. If people know they can undo their choices, they get less satisfaction out of them. People want to keep their options open. And that’s not the road to happiness.

Now you are probably wonder if I am say that everyone should go out and get locks. No I like locks but that is not what I think. I think that if you are feeling frustrated or overwhelmed with your hair you should try to narrow your choices. Instead of wearing natural braids a few days, twists a few more and then a puff, why not pick one type of natural style and experiment with variations on it?

Have you ever felt overwhelmed by the natural styling options? What did you do? If you are natural have you considered locks to narrow your options and broaden your style possibilities? If you are locked, have you found yourself more liberated by your decision?