A beautiful Sunday summer’s morning in Australia… blue skies, cool breezes and the sounds of cicadas and kookaburras fill the air. My partner and I discuss how to spend our day and feel that it is time for our sixteen-month-old to have his first haircut.
Our son came into this world with the finest of short blonde hair and over the months it grew slowly. Today the hair on his crown is thin, straight and requires little attention as it takes its flow in the same direction each day, circling his crown and following suit are those hairs that lead to the front. However, the rear strands of hair and those around his ears grew quickly; they would curl when wet and fly sideways in the breeze and regardless of how absolutely adorable and cute they were, they began to get in the way and we felt they’d be causing some discomfort when they’d get caught in his neck fold during the hot summer nights and days.
So we gathered the highchair and hair clippers, my partner sharing with him how he cuts his own hair whilst our son spent the time ever so gently brushing mine. It was really simple.
We both felt the immediate change as his little locks hit the floor like feathers from the sky above. What we noticed was that there was no time to be sad or miss them because we could so visibly see and tangibly feel that the change was due; most importantly our son was ready and so we couldn’t let any emotions get in the way of what he needed at the time.
Afterwards I realised just how exquisite it is to see and allow our beautiful boy to grow into the handsome and independent young man that I already know him to be. For months now I have felt deep within me that he is not at all a baby anymore and that I would be disrespecting him to treat him as one. Of course, he requires us as adults to support and care for him in every way and I don’t ever dismiss this importance.
But in our son’s short life he has already taught me more about myself than I’d been aware of before, proving that he is just an equal teacher and parent for me as I am to him.
If I were to hold onto his locks as a symbol of his baby days or fill my own needs as a woman with his needs towards me, I would be missing out on the great opportunity that it is to raise a young man, a young gentleman and a gorgeous little boy for the potential that he holds in this life.
His locks could literally be symbolic of locking us into an emotional relationship together for a long time, where neither of us would take the next steps in our own potential or take seriously the responsibility we have to continue to evolve and show the world the essence and truth of who we are.
Supporting our son to cut his hair for the first time has been healing for all of us; a sign of the next transitional period of life that we are indeed all ready for and offering us a moment to let go of the ways we have all been with each other in our family unit, that are now finalised and complete. Our son is walking and talking these days and with his beautiful ‘new do’ to boot, he is revolutionising a path forward for all people to have the trust in themselves to know what is next, what is true, and to choose it for themselves without hesitation.
Published with permission of my partner.
By Cherise Holt, 34, Nurse and Mother, Brisbane Australia
Further Reading:
True Relationship with Self
Staying Vulnerable
What is we gave children the space to develop at their own pace?
335 Comments
To me children are such a great reflection reminding us always how knowing they are naturally so and this support adults to remember we also have the same knowing if we listened to our bodies and not to our minds.
Letting go of any attachment we have around family with the ensuing ownership of any aspect of life that caps us and the child deepens our connection thus being connected acknowledges that as parents the communicatively raising of any child allows a child to re-connect with their Soul, Essence, Inner-most-heart / Esoteric as long as Truly-loving-boundaries are set consistently by all from day one.
Gorgeous to hear how your son is teaching you and you are becoming aware of other things you were unaware of. What an awesome gift these bundles of magic are.
My mother held onto my locks from my first haircut for ever and how disempowering that would have been for her and the relationship that I was held in, so thank you Cherise for opening up this for discussion as it lays the platform for so many truths.
Beautiful appreciation of the wisdom that comes through children.
What a joy it is to feel the power of your words and how much appreciation you have for the empowerment of being in our essences, thank you Cherise.
Love the appreciation you share here, the love you have with your son is inspiring, to often mothers get caught in over emotional love very refreshing when you can see and feel a mum who is aware of the bigger picture and willing to learn from her son.
I love how little children just know and can read energy, today I was at the swimming pool when I said hello to the swim instructor, she was with a little child probably around 2, I waved at him and gave him a big smile, the little boy turned round and said to his instructor ” I love her” and yet I never had met him before!
So lovely how young children can feel the intention of others, you can also see this when children play with each other their natural openness is very cute and very inspiring.
This is beautiful to read, and yes we can learn so much from our children, ‘in our son’s short life he has already taught me more about myself than I’d been aware of before, proving that he is just an equal teacher and parent for me as I am to him.’
Your blog has reminded me of a haircut my son had when he was about three, 15 years ago. We had been to this hairdresser before, but this time she roughly sat him in the chair and pushed (shoved) the towel down into the neck of his t-shirt. My son grimmaced while she was doing this – it was a red flag but I dismissed my concerns and let her carry on. She continued to be rough with him as she cut his hair and he started squirming in the seat. She then told me to come over and hold his head so that she could finish. I spoke to my son in soothing words, saying it was almost over and it was, however the incident left us both so traumatised that I told him he didn’t have to have his haircut again until he was ready to. It was during the winter about a year and a half later that he came home one day with his hat on, having been out with his father. He walked right up to me with a beaming smile on his face and took his hat off – he had had his hair cut! I gathered him up and we danced around the room laughing in celebration – it was a most magical moment that instantly healed the traumatic memory.
‘But in our son’s short life he has already taught me more about myself than I’d been aware of before, proving that he is just an equal teacher and parent for me as I am to him.’ I wonder how many parents are ever encouraged to consider this when there is often so much critique of parents needing to get it right all the time. As soon as we fear we’re doing something wrong in relation to an outside measure then we’ve lost our connection to our inner knowing because we’re focusing on the outer. Without this connection it’s difficult to see and appreciate the lessons on hand for us in every aspect of our day. I do not have children but have other areas of life where, if I go in assuming I’m the one who’s got to deliver and it’s a one way street, I could be missing out on so much. This is great to acknowledge and review how I am, my whole attitude, and be totally open to being a student together with another.
‘If I were to hold onto his locks as a symbol of his baby days or fill my own needs as a woman with his needs towards me, I would be missing out on the great opportunity that it is to raise a young man, a young gentleman and a gorgeous little boy for the potential that he holds in this life.’ Beautifully said Cherise – super important to embrace.
As you say Cherise, we can login, as parents, into emotional pictures and patterns that inhibit and restrict everyone concerned
It is uncanny how whenever I am disconnected to the bigger picture and cut off from a sense of the expansiveness which each moment offers, I try to re-create a sense of purpose by holding to what has already passed.
Now this is very interesting. What once was purposeful may have been completed and now another purpose is there which, if I have disconnected, I will not know. Today I was walking along a seafront and feeling sad, I was letting go of a lot of hopes for my future I once created in my past and have never fulfilled. I welcomed seeing and feeling it knowing it was all an illusion and the more I allowed myself to see the more I could let go of.
I’ve often felt a sense of sad nostalgia in my life and this too crept in, especially around hopes attached to unlived potentials in relationships and life. Again I was like, great, feel all that too because once the hurts have healed I return to the beauty of life in simplicity.
Raising kids is a constant unfolding in letting go and as I allow myself to become aware and feel every step of the way to the best of my ability, I let go of the attachment for I know holding my children back in any way, shape or form will bring about unforeseen consequences coming my way.
I love this; ‘he is revolutionising a path forward for all people to have the trust in themselves to know what is next, what is true, and to choose it for themselves without hesitation.’ It makes me realise that it is important to develop and evolve and not stay stuck in old ways and patterns.
Cherise, I find this article really supportive for letting go of attachment for our children to be a certain way and especially for wanting them to stay young and treating them as a baby. It feels great to support them to grow and develop when they are ready.
In our openness to the ‘more’ that is always on offer for us to embrace and allow we support, encourage and inspire each other to grow and evolve to live more of who we are in essence.
It is amazing the hooks and images we have to pull us into a particular type of response and relationship with things. For example when I see the photo of a gorgeously tender child and read the caption “baby’s first haircut” I seem o automatically go into that gooey kind of state of ‘cute’, ‘baby’, ‘ahhh’. But when I reflect on this blog I realise how this automatic response can be patronising and so very lacking of honouring of the small person in front of me.
Love the call for stopping and sensing what is actually required to honour and empower everyone in that moment.
There is a lot of attachment to when the children are small and a looking back as if those days were more important. Personally, I’ve never been a one for having photos all over the place and did not want to hold my children in the past of how they used to look. I preferred to enjoy and embrace whatever age they were at any given stage of their life, so the baby pictures had to go.
It’s so lovely for us to not have any pictures or attachments. Apparently a first haircut is a big deal and you need to save hair and all sorts – but it’s just hair at the end of the day – and if an ‘Ignacio haircut’ helps support the child to see properly then I am all for it – letting go of pictures
To evolve brings with it no images or beliefs of family life and all that live together rather a realness that supports one another and the space to do so.
I agree Cherise, if we remain open to children we learn so much from them, the wisdom and love they share is a precious thing.
Each time we get our haircut is like the beginning of a new cycle. Out with the old and in with the new on as many levels as we can allow, accept and appreciate.
At times we make baby’s first hair cut an emotional event, but in truth it is just the next step in humans life and when considered as such we only can celebrate such an event for the blessing that it brings.
A wise way to relate to any change in life, celebrate it for the opportunity for growth, expansion and deepening which is offered.
I like what you share above Golnaz, about a wise way to relate to any change in life is for us to, ‘celebrate it for the opportunity for growth, expansion and deepening which is offered.’
Our children are not emotional on their first hair cut, it can be his or her parent or relatives that make this the case. So who is the most intelligent in this case?