new thread
Many posters on this board are growing or thinking of growing out their hair, but are uncertain about whether to commit because they are not really sure why they want to grow their hair long. This brings up a good subject for discussion. Why do you wear your hair long? When people ask me this, I always answer “Why wear it short?”
It’s just as valid to wear hair long as short. There are advantages both to wearing hair short and wearing hair long. Short hair is easy to keep out of your face. You don’t have to style it or arrange it much. Our society makes it easy to comfortably blend with the crowd if you wear short hair.
Long hair, on the other hand has its advantages, too- some wonderful advantages. What I love most about long hair is the feeling. Long hair feels great! It feels good on my shoulders and back. When it waves in the wind, there is a wonderful sensation in my scalp as it moves.
I like the way I look with long hair. My hair falls about 6 inches below my shoulders and is brown, fine, and fairly straight. Every cell has been carefully conditioned since it sprouted.
I can wear it in different ways based on occasion or mood (why should women dominate this particular type of joy?). Out and at work, I usually wear a low ponytail tied with a soft knit band. How sad it is that most guys go through life and never know what it feels like to wear a ponytail. If I’m painting or working on the car, I stuff it under a hat. Sometimes I braid it (though I’ve never gotten very good at this). I have even set it in curlers, mostly to turn the ends under when it was shorter, but I can’t deny getting a kinky kick out of doing something guys don’t normally get to do. My favorite way to wear it is just down and swinging, and parted a bit off center.
And I like the fact that other people enjoy my long hair, too. True, I get my share of disapproving stares, but I love running into people who like it (and do so often). Young guys ask me if I play the guitar. Now and then I get “m'amed”. This usually makes for some fun moments. I have great respect for womanhood and see no shame in being mistaken for one now and then.
And not all women like men with long hair- just the most sensual ones, I think. My girlfriend loves for me to run my hair down her body and even poke it into interesting places. She does the same with hers.
It’s not for everybody, but for me, long hair is just fun. If I’m only going to live once, it’s defiantly going to be with long hair. I believe most people- men or women- would benefit from wearing their hair long, even if only for a few years. It’s worth the trouble.
Why do you wear your hair long?
For the same reason I've had a fairly large, natural-form beard all of my independent adult life (since early 1984): because it is naturally correct, and certain basic parts of my extremely independent personality demand that my physical identity be naturally correct (and that I do much of what I do, especially as regards my body, as simply and naturally as possible). I've also wanted a naturally-functional mane for a long time, but various concerns about what it would look like while developing, and even subtle unspoken pressures in the business community in which I function, kept me getting haircuts for twenty years more even after a few abortive attempts to break out of the cycle since my late teens. But no more: I finally came to the conclusion last May that I was by now in a secure enough position that those with whom I deal in business (I'm a vice president in charge of the technical affairs of a small [30 employees] manufacturing corporation and one of its two owners) no longer care too much how I look (and as I suddenly realized never really cared that much anyway) and also have come to understand and accept my unusual life philosophies. I also realized that as I was approaching 40 I had better get the project going soon if I was to enjoy a reasonable length of time with my hair in a more natural state and still in good condition. I will cut my hair no more and will bravely ride through the times (which I am in now, and may well be to some degree for another year or so) when some of the hair is long enough to look unruly but not long enough to tie back neatly or fit neatly entrained into the rest of my mane.
My young mane, part of the sides of which will now come down to my chin, the front of which can now get into my eyes (though it seems the very front grows much more slowly than the rest), and the back of which can extend below shoulder level (but no part away from the lower back can quite touch my shoulders yet), already gives me very fulfilling feelings as the hair mass shifts on my head as I move around. Though it currently winds up looking incredibly messy after this happens, having it blown around by the wind is also a strangely satisfying feeling. I can hardly wait for it to develop more fully over the next five years or so, and have my naturally correct mane flow down my back. I expect thereafter to maintain my mane, just as I have my beard, to its best natural potential as it ages as an inseparable part of me.
I haven't had expressions of disapproval yet. However, a friend and coworker, on learning that I was growing my hair, suggested in fun that I was "going to look like an old hippie" with a reference to my graying beard. Even if I don't identify very much with real "old hippies" and even resent a bit being equated with them, I still saw enough humor in it to adopt it as my on-line handle. Like a fellow traveler on this board, Bill, if it really came down to it I too probably would prefer to be thought of as an "old hippie" than as an "old yuppie."
amen...rather an old hippie as an old yuppie any day !
Hello,
I think to have long hair is an essential need for me, maybe a part of my personality itself. It always came back, short hair was only an intermediate step and never caused by my wishes. And I always had a great favor for the woman's long hair. Hair gives me sensitive feelings and long hair sightings often a great inner joy.
wolfgang
why do i wear my hair long? because i like it. because it's (hair length) an aspect of my life that i have power over. because too many people have told me i should get it cut. just because. pick a reason.
I've always hated getting haircuts every few weeks...haven't had a hair cut now in almost 1.5 years, and it feels great!!! Should have done this 10 years ago.
I agree with you there! I stopped cutting my hair because I hated the hassle and expense of getting it cut every couple of months. I figured I would cut it after six months, but it has been almost two years for me with no haircut, and I love it. I've now realized it's a part of my identity, and THAT is the reason I continue to have long hair, not merely because of my disdain for haircuts.
I think a lot of people can't find a reason to prefer long hair. They just like long hair or don't like short hair, regardless of a reason other than personal taste or preference being the reason.
Because I don't like my hair being short, I let it get long. I always wanted it long, especially when it was short. I didn't understand why others complement me on the haircuts I never wanted to get. I always wanted it to grow back as soon as possible.
In my opinion, men with short hair look incomplete as if part of the body was removed.
One reason I keep my hair long enough to tie back is because it is easier to manage. Hair can be kept out of the eyes when it's long enough to tie back into a ponytail. Long hair doesn't have to be cut as often as short hair. Short hair (anyhair to short to tie back I consider short) falls in the eyes and needs to be combed often. Many people with short hair probably have to get a haircut every 6 weeks or so, which costs time and hundreds of dollars per year.
I was the same way, even when I was only 6-7 years old.
Agreed!
Exactly, or if you're using the Biotin supplement, you'd have to cut it every week or two, which would stink.
-J (still growing...)