Women's Hair, Self-Image & Hijab

The length, style, volume and color of a women hair can reveal her personality traits. Hairstyle can be one of the easiest types of nonverbal communication to decipher. Reading body language involves being sensitive to gestures, facial expressions, eye contact – and even hairstyles. Both women’s and men’s hairstyles can reveal personality traits. “Hair is often an excellent predictor of someone’s self-image and lifestyle,” says Jo-Ellan Dimitrius in Reading People: How to Understand People and Predict Their Behavior – Anyplace, Anytime. Here’s what your hair says about you. Short hair that is carefully cut and styled may reveal an artistic personality. Most high-maintenance hairstyles indicate financial well-being; short hair that requires regular cuts and dyes may reveal that the woman cares about her appearance, and is willing to spend a significant amount of money to look good. “Spending a significant percentage of one’s income on hair – or any other aspect of personal appearance – suggests vanity, a need for acceptance, concern about others’ perceptions, and possibly insecurity,” writes Dimitrius in Reading People. Women who are over 40 years old and wear their hair long may not resist growing up. Dimitrius writes, “Sometimes women with this trait are caught in a time warp and still think of themselves as teenagers or college students rather than as grown-ups. Such women may be fairly unrealistic in their outlook on life as well as in their perception of themselves.” The other way to put this in a more positive way, is that long hair can help women feel "young". Women who have long hair may believe it makes them more sexually appealing. Long hair could also reveal a bohemian spirit or freedom from conventional expectations. From an Islamic Perspective, since hair is a big part of a female's self image, to an idea of how much one only needs to see the self image damage that is caused at times by hair loss in women. Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) said, "Whoever has hair should take care of it"; that includes being thankful for it. When a women cover her hair from this perspective she is doing a mental exercise to to detach her self image from her physical body. This is important to do because we live in a culture that puts much emphasis on physical appearance. Developing and nurturing a positive body image and a healthy mental attitude is crucial to our happiness and wellness, as we move through the different stages of our lives. The teachings of the Prophet regarding not having short hair should make the reasons and wisdom behind it clear; the benefit of having women keep long hair should also be clear since helps women with a positive self-image of youthfulness. I encourage some Muslim sister (or brother) to do more research on this topic. For anyone interested in knowing more about the subject here is a book to start the studies with http://www.amazon.com/dp/0374240825?tag=webcameras&link_code=as2&creativeASIN=0374240825&creative=374929&camp=211189