Confidence No Matter What

By: NewNaturalista

Mae is a 23 year old full time PhD student studying Materials Engineering.  That alone deserves a standing ovation – but in her spare time she manages a natural hair blog AND a YouTube channel. Talk about an over achiever!

Natural Chica Mae

NewNaturalista: Tell us a little about your journey to becoming natural?

Mae: My journey to becoming natural was inspired by my two younger sisters who started the journey several years before I began. Seeing how healthy their hair was as they let loose of the relaxers definitely confirmed and encouraged my decision to do the same. It wasn’t an easy process for me though as it took me two tries to actually fully make the transition to natural hair. The only reason why I wasn’t successful the first time around was because I wasn’t fully informed on how I needed to treat my hair during the transition stage and so I became frustrated. This became one of the reasons why I decided to start to blog/vlog about my transition to natural the second time around…to help others avoid the frustration that can sometimes accompany the journey to natural hair if you’re not equipped with the right information on how to care for your hair during the transitional stage.

NewNaturalista: What have you learned about yourself during this journey?

Mae: To be honest, I really didn’t expect to learn so much about myself with a change in how I wore my hair…but I most certainly did! One of the most important lessons I learned as a result of my natural hair journey is that sometimes you have to live with decisions that you’ve made for your own personal reasons and be confident in that no matter what those around you may have to say. This was an important lesson for me because it definitely had implications on other areas of my life besides my hair. It’s interesting, because as a result of going natural, I have definitely started paying more attention to what I put on and in my body. I am constantly reading ingredient lists on the back of beauty products, as well as food items. Overall, it has motivated me to take pride in living a healthy lifestyle and promoting a healthy image. In fact, I recently started a Nike+ challenge called”Fit and Fly Naturalistas” to encourage myself and others to run more.

NewNaturalista: Based on the success of your blog and others, how would you describe this moment in time for natural hair in the black community?

Mae: I believe it is definitely an exciting time for natural hair in the black community! You’d be surprised at how many messages I get per day from people who tell me that they have started the transition to natural hair or have done the big chop and have completely embraced their natural hair! On numerous other blogs, there are literally hundreds of other women sharing their transitioning stories, with most of them saying that their only regret is that didn’t transition to natural hair earlier! I believe black women are slowly but surely starting to let go of the perpetuated stigma associated with wearing their hair in it’s natural, non-chemically processed state. Natural hair is God-given and beautiful and its wonderful to see many others starting to accept the beauty of natural hair.

Blog: www.naturalchica.com