It bothers me massively that the work of the Beauty Industry is consistently devalued by our society. It is brushed off as vain, trivial, and I know so many people who have been asked “So are you in school to get a ‘real job’?” while they are LITERALLY cutting the inquirer’s hair.
That’s patriarchy for you though - whatever is deemed as “women’s work” is often marginalized and shoved under the rug of importance, or can’t possibly be the end-goal.
The time has come for a shift in perception. We need to acknowledge the power that the beauty industry holds- and the real services that it often renders to society, beyond the external transformations.
It has come to my attention that the professional beauty industry is the space of the most normalized vulnerability in our society.
Let’s pretend you don’t believe this bold claim. Let’s chat.
The utterly fantastic Brené Brown defines “vulnerability” as “uncertainty, risk and emotional exposure.”
So here’s a little scenario to test this idea.
You decide that you want to change something about your physical appearance - and the way you look in the mirror has an undeniable weight in the ways that we way we feel about ourselves - for some people it is a significant heft, others more marginal - but it is there.
You choose to ask a professional for support - in essence you are asking a stranger (or perhaps someone who has come recommended by a friend or family member, or someone you follow on social media) to use various tools to alter your appearance. These tools are sharp, hot, wet and fluffy. They have the potential to hurt you, make you bleed, or burn. On occasion even the “naturally” derived chemicals can cause allergic reactions. We put ourselves in a vulnerable position as we risk physical injury. Or if the color doesn’t come out right, the cut too short, the wrong hairs tweezed - it could cause an incongruency with the way we’d like to see ourselves, and it would be a blow to our psyche with significant emotional repercussions.
The ‘trivialists’ argue “Yeah, but hair grows back!” True, most of the time. But the two weeks (minimum) that we wait for nature to take it’s course can cause a lot of emotional distress - we may change our social habits, we might feel a blow to our confidence and make different choices. I know this all sounds very doomsday-ish, but we’ve seen the teen rom-com trope where the teen wears a hat to school and reluctantly removes it at the threat of suspension - their crush sees the new ‘do and they are forever mortified, at least until lunch period.
Plus I can’t count how many times I’ve heard
“Who needs therapy when you have a hair stylist?”
There’s something to be said about a person who has your personal attention for a period of time, and when they are working in close proximity to the body, the sense of closeness allows your brain to feel connection and trust - so the words and feelings flow. In this space, profound things are disclosed - it is not uncommon to see a patron crying (from raw emotion, rather than a service mishap) and studies show that beauty professionals are often the first to learn about situations of domestic violence.
That shit is vulnerable. And it is so “normal.” If you can’t make it to a luncheon because of an appointment with your hairstylist, that will raise fewer eyebrows than sharing you have an appointment with a psychologist - although it is likely that similar topics would be discussed and both would have a positive impact on your mental health (given that your visual-joy expectations are met with your hair)
So let’s face it - the beauty industry is a locus of vulnerability on a massive scale in our society - but nobody has acknowledged the gravity of this until now.
By no means am I saying that a cosmetologist is an adequate stop-gap for the lack of cultural acceptance or accessibility of mental-health services in our society. Yikes, no. The majority of licensed professionals, at the current stage, have no real sense of the position they are in nor do they have the tools to adequately empathize and hold space for the mental and emotional needs of their clients - let alone offer the healing and growth tools to provide a therapeutic psychological service.
But there is something that we can ask of the professionals who realize the importance of this position - that they own it with grace and honor. Lean into the people who cry, share their joy, listen intently to their words, move gently around the bruises you may see, pause and simply say “I hear you, I see you.”
To be fully seen without judgement, to be affirmed in your choices of visual joy, to be empathized with in a tumultuous world, is so incredibly powerful and has the potential to interrupt a lot of stress and chaos. And the world could definitely use a lot less stress and chaos. I am willing to bet that if we even had 10 more people who were less-stressed, and didn’t throw fits in line at the coffee shop, it would cause ripples that would help the world be a better place.
So do you see? Beauty professionals hold a lot of vulnerability in their highly skilled hands. This realization may terrify some of us who would rather brush off our work as “a super fun hobby I get paid for” - but I’m hoping this energetic elevation of our work actually helps to fortify a deeper knowing within so many of us - the work we do matters. A whole heck of a lot. It matters for our clients, their families, and our communities.
