Haircut Failure

Have you ever known you were making a mistake while you were doing it, and kept at it anyway? I think that pretty much sums up my daughter’s recent, unplanned haircut, for both of us. *SIGH*

Being a mother challenges the worrier in all of us. I’ve struggled with worry. I’m learning to take my worry to God and doing better at leaving it with Him. I hate the scary things in this world, but am learning to seek wisdom and understanding what things I can actually control, and to know when to pray and let it just be on my radar instead of blocking my entire path. And I think I can really see some growth in my heart.

Which is why my failure to keep perspective this weekend really threw me for a loop. A vain and silly worry, for sure, but I’ve always been afraid my daughter would cut her own hair. (Let’s just say many women have childhood trauma relating to this issue.) It took 3 1/2 years for her to have enough hair to even get her first “trim”. She only plays with scissors in supervised situations for this very reason. She is my only little girl and selfishly, I wanted her to have pretty hair for me to style.

When she came home from the neighbor’s house on Sunday, something wasn’t quite right. Then, I saw it, several chunks of her hair were missing. The more I looked the more pieces became evident. Someone had made several snips on both sides of her face. My instant emotion was not pretty.

I even heard God whisper, “How you react is important” and I barely paused. My reaction could have been worse, but it certainly did not reflect the grace and love of God, at least not at first. I cried and got loud. I knew it was wrong.

She immediately claimed the neighbor did it. And she isn’t a good liar, but, man, she had commitment, took us 30 minutes to get her to admit she did it.

While she was in time out for lying to us, my husband convicted me of losing control. He was kind and gracious, and acknowledged that I handled it much better than he would have expected from a couple of years ago, but that I still needed to calm down before saying anything more to her. God whispered to me again, “How you react is important.”

I didn’t want him to be right, but he was. And I told him so. We talked and processed, then called the kiddo back into the room. We set punishments for 1) cutting anything other than craft paper, 2) breaking the rules at a friend’s house, 3) lying about what happened, 4) trying to get her friend in trouble. Then she apologized to me and her dad. I apologized for being too upset about her hair when it really isn’t important. Then we prayed. She apologized to God, and so did I. We talked nose-to-nose, our tears mingling as we prayed. Then I scooped her up and wrapped her in love and forgiveness.

But I stayed sad inside. Her hair! I can’t fix it. She cut it in such a way that I don’t think anything but time can mend. And then I felt like even more of a failure for letting vanity be more important than setting a Godly example.

Proverbs 31:30 ESV  “Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.”

If teaching her to be Godly is the goal, then demonstrating true beauty and obedience to God needs to be my default reaction. How can I go into a tailspin over something that really doesn’t matter? Especially when I know His truth.

Matthew 6:25 ESV  “Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you will eat or what you will drink, nor about your body, what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?”

I’ve been told my value is in my appearance by every magazine, movie, and billboard. And now that I’ve kind of gotten control over most of my self-esteem/vanity monster, I realize that maybe I’ve just put energy into making her cute and adorable instead of myself. Looks like some time for more growth. God says not to be anxious over any of it, that what we really need, He will provide.

So I’ve spent a few days asking for God to help me grow in this area.

Psalm 119:37 ESV “Turn my eyes from looking at worthless things; and give me life in your ways.”

And then I felt like a failure for not obeying God, for throwing away a chance to witness to my husband over a few (albeit importantly placed) locks of hair.

But then I was doing my Bible study, A Confident Heart by Renee Swope, this morning and came across this verse.

Revelation 12:10 ESV  “And I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying, “Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of his Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers has been thrown down, who accuses them day and night before our God.”

The accuser lies to us day and night, whispering to us things like, “You’re a failure.”

Well, I failed, I sinned, but I accepted correction. I prayed in front of my family for forgiveness. I am doing my best to change my heart about this issue and learn some new funky hair styles to hide the mismatched strands.

What did Jesus say to the adulteress (caught in the act) that people wanted to stone?

(vs. 10) “Has no one condemned you?”     John 8:11 ESV  She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.”

That is the truth. I have to trust that I’m forgiven because He says I am. I have to learn and do better. Her hair will grow back very, very slowly. And side braids are cute, right?