True
The Story
When I was in grade school, I cared a lot about my hair. I used LA Looks to spike it up. I don’t know why I started wearing my hair like that. I don’t think I was purposely trying to emulate anyone. As the years wore on, I got into grunge music and grew my hair long. I think it made it past my ears at one point; but never to my shoulders. As strange as it sounds, I took pride in my hair.
I don’t know when I realized my hair was starting to thin (and not come back). I think it must’ve been the summer after high school graduation, because I have long hair in my senior pictures. I cut my hair shorter for the summer, and definitely saw some thinning on top — right in the typical male pattern baldness spots.
I didn’t really stand much hope of keeping my hair. My dad’s hair is thin (but there), and maternal grandfather’s hair was thin.
I went through a period where I tried to stop the thinning. I used Rogaine for probably about a year. It was messy and smelled, and didn’t really seem to work very well. I think I was expecting Chia-Pet hair growth. What I got was maybe a few strands. At some point during my freshman year of college, I think I gave up and went with a buzz cut. It suited me much better.
I kept my hair short after that. For the last ten years, I’ve actually let it grow out for seven months at a time, so that I can shave it off to raise money for pediatric cancer research. But apart from those months, my skull is shaved.
Bald is how I now identify. It took a while, but I’m at peace with it.
The Lesson
Change is the realization that something new has come to be true. This is why so many of us respond to change with immediate rejection. Change says to us, “this thing you once believed is no longer true.” And we often say, “oh yeah? I think you’re wrong.” We deny that something new is true.
We often respond to change with denial because we feel grief. Denial is the first of the five stages of grief. When something changes, we grieve that the thing we once held true is no longer.
Spandau Ballet - “True”
Love the article and this thread. What this bring to mind is how excited I get with change, but how many people dread or grieve it. Change presents growth, and the realization that core understanding and beliefs we held were misinformed or wrong. In its simplest form change is growth and rebirth. I'd be worried more the other way when all we do is look for confirmation bias.