Peeling the Layers of my looks

Hello my name is Haley Robertson and I am a PsychoSynthesis Life Coach and Sound Healer. I share my story of shaving my head because it has been a huge part of my journey of dis-identifying from the parts of me that need validation from the outside world. This journey is about validating myself and the love that I have the ability to give myself. True inner beauty and seeing it for myself.

PsychoSynthesis is a Spiritual Psychology framework that I use in my coaching sessions and programs. It is movement toward spiritual maturation through psychological integration to bring about healing, transformation and personal growth. To me is a framework that could transform the world. It is a process to free yourself from yourself. Freedom from the conflict within, blame, judgement, the seeking of outside validation and pressures from the outside world taken on as your own. Its a way to see ourselves, our needs and offer the love we need to ourselves.

Two years ago, I pulled my hair in a bun and an overwhelmingly delicious feeling of freedom filled my being, and a thought entered my mind… 

What if I shaved my head? Woah, WTF where did that come from?

The next day… the same thing happened..except this time I followed that thought… what would it mean to shave my head? 

The answer that came to me was: The ultimate heart opener. A true act of peeling away the layers to reveal my heart and authentic soul expression to the world. 

I thought about my attachment to my hair. I thought about how I identify with it as source of my beauty and a way to receive love and validation from others. 

I thought about how it’s a way to hide my authentic Self, to hide behind the layers of identity that the way I look or am perceived hold. It’s a means for protection from the intimacy of sharing my heart and who I truly am. It’s a layer of protection from being SEEN..

I continued to think about this change and 2 months later, decided just half would be fine at first, unsure if I was emotionally equip to hold that drastic of a change.

Roberto Assagioli the creator of PsychoSynthesis said, “We are dominated and controlled by which we are unconsciously identified. We can direct and regulate everything from which we become dis-identified.” 

Shaving my head would be one way to see the ways I was unconsciously identified to my external beauty. I saw the thoughts rise to the surface when deciding to make this change to my hair. How often do we as a society allow the way we look rule the way we feel inside? Don’t get my wrong, we do need validation, acceptance, belonging but not at the cost of our authentic self.

Peeling the layers means becoming aware of what might be limiting us to live our life in its fullest expression of Self & Love. The layers are ways that the personality/ego was built and someways molded to receive love and safety. Layers can serve as thoughts, conditioning, identities, emotional wounds, patterns and behaviors. There is nothing wrong or bad about this.

I became aware of many layers when I acknowledged the thought of shaving my entire head. I knew the layers were just one step to letting go of fears I had around not being accepted or loved. Sometimes these fears are unconscious.

Most of it was around whether or not my partner at the time would still love me? Would I still be pretty or beautiful? What does that say about my reputation? I even thought about how I would look to my parents and my parents friends…let’s not forget what everyone said about Brittney Spears. These thoughts and feelings are valid. 

I look back now and realize the ways I identified with my hair, and ultimately how my looks are perceived in the outside world. This has often been a source of where I’ve reached outside of myself to receive love. This can happen when those are the types of compliments we get. I remember the first time someone ever called me pretty, and it was then I believed I was. External validation from others can often keep us in a rat race to keep up and limit us from loving ourselves for how we are in the moment. It’s not that I don’t care about how I look. I do, I like to be put together, look cute and express myself through outfits. What I’ve learned is that it’s a matter of not identifying so heavily on needing the outside validation from others because in the long run we lose ourself in the process of that, completely forgetting who we are.

This is a matter of Self-Discovery and journeying back to who I really am, which is love.

This quote continues to come up to truly exemplify what journeying back to who I really am means…“if you ever lose love, don’t go out searching for it, reach inside of you and recreate what you think you lost. You are love, you can’t lose you.”

Through PsychoSynthesis, I’ve watched this quote continue to expand and unfold into my reality. I’ve learned what it means by embodying the experience.

In the last two years, a lot has changed but the calling, desire and thought to shave my entire head were still present.  

But when would be the right time? Ultimately, I wanted to wait until warmer weather. CUZ dang, having no hair is actually cold. I now realize why we have it, biologically.

My partner and I had just finished a vocal immersion retreat weekend and he wanted the sides of his head shaved. Once I finished shaving his head for him, he looked at me and said, “okay your turn.”

He admits that he didn’t think I would actually follow through this time, because I’ve said it so many times in the past and haven’t. AND thats totally true. I thought about it after a retreat last September when I felt and saw my personality/ego spiraling out of my third eye. I saw all the things that my human has created for my life and I loved her for it. She’s got WILL to do cool stuff, have adventures and to be of service. I thought I would shave my head as a symbol to embody that energy into this reality. TRUE SELF-LOVE. But it didn’t happen and I waited even longer.

Lately, I have been feeling the changing seasons and tuning in to how they are representative of our own inner worlds. With the feelings of a new beginnings as Spring approaching, I thought this could be the perfect time. (Plus, the clippers were already out and I wanted to have this experience with my man.)

I felt nervous yet, so much excitement. I was ready!

So we did it. I sat in front of the mirror and said goodbye to my old self, turned my favorite medicine songs on, took a deep breath and surrendered to the decision.

I looked at myself again in the mirror and I couldn’t believe it. I gazed into my eyes and felt my spirit looking back at me and began to cry.

People have asked, how do you feel?!

I feel feminine! I feel free! I feel like my Spirit, in human form. 

I feel exposed and seen. Naked and like a new born baby. 

I see the beauty and love inside of me.  

I continue to peel back the layers to remember Love & Authenticity! 

You see, it’s human nature to forget that we are the source of love that we need. 

We forget that we are already Whole. 

Healing is the process of becoming Whole. It takes peeling away the layers to recognize our parts, the way we’ve reached outside of ourselves for love, validation and molded to a certain standard. Its noticing our protective and coping mechanisms that keep us from Love.

So when my family asks, why I would do such a thing? I tell them it’s because I am The Cosmic Artichoke and also I am committed to the journey of healing and spiritual growth. To be on a journey of spiritual growth to me means to learn who that is and through the process of shaving my head, I’ve grown in deeper contact to the Divinity within me, my heart, my spirit and God.

I’ve learned to embrace my parts, see them, and practice giving them what they need, so that I can integrate into wholeness. 

It’s been a process of coming back to the safety in my body to express myself freely without the pressures I’ve adopted as my layers. 

I help women integrate the their parts, attune to their hearts true desires and choose a life in alignment with that truth. I help them infuse their soul into the everyday life and act as a guide to find their own answers within. This creates more ease and flow to express yourself authentically. 

I’d love to set up a call to see how I can support you on your journey!