Simplify Your Natural Hair Regimen 7 Ways: Fine Natural Hair Care & Faith-Based Wellness

One thing being in the hospital with my son for over a month has taught me is, when going through trials and tribulations it’s of great benefit to one’s mental health to simplify your natural hair regimen.

Life sometimes throws us curve balls. When that happens we don’t want to have to worry about our hair. Below you’ll find 5 tips to help you simplify your natural hair regimen so that it supports the health of your hair but cuts down on the need for you to spend too much time on it.

Use a minimal number of products

The less products you have at your disposal helps you cut down on decision overwhelm. When you only have 1 or 2 cleansers, conditioners etc. you will grab for them to simply get whatever step you are working on in your regimen…COMPLETE.

Further reading: How to Marie Kondo Your Hair Products

Use products from the same line

Another way to keep your hair regimen simple is to use hair products from the same line. This tip is closely related to the first one. Products from the same line are formulated to work together so you won’t need to figure out if a product from one line works well with a product from another.

Further reading: Taking Inventory of Your Hair Products

Keep your hair in a protective style 90% of the time

Protective styling is and will always be an effective way to simplify your natural hair regimen. That’s because you won’t have to fuss with your hair throughout the week. You’ll also retain more length.

It’s almost like “set it and forget it” but not quite. You’ll still need to make sure you keep your hair moisturized (sprays work well). However, you won’t have to do nearly as much to your hair if you had to restyle it daily.

A word of caution: Don’t go too long with a protective style in. The longer you keep a style, the more shed hair you’ll need to deal with. The lifespan of my protective styles are about 10 days.

Further reading: Protective Styling Fine Natural Hair

Keep your natural hair stretched

Simplify your natural hair regimen, try keeping your hair stretched. Doing so helps keep tangles at bay. If your hair tangles badly, you can’t just leave them. It takes so much time to remove tangles

If you keep your hair stretched, you’ll avoid a lot of stress and can focus on other things.

Further reading: Step by Step RevAir Routine

Have a set day to “reset” your hair

Regimens are built on solid hair routines. One of those routines is to have a set wash day. Try not to stray from it.

Schedule the time with yourself to give your hair some love at least once a week. You don’t want to just set it and forget it. Having a set wash day will help you toward doing your hair on auto pilot, making the process much faster.

Further reading: Free Wash Day Checklist

Detangle only on wash day

When you detangle your hair only on wash day, it helps you to keep your natural hair regimen simple. In order to do this, you have to make sure you protect your hair from over tangling throughout the week. Hence, the tip above about keeping your hair stretched.

In order to detangle on wash day only means you’ll need to protect your hair when sleeping.

This also means not going too long between wash days. The longer you wait to wash your hair, the more complicated it will be because you will have to spend more time detangling.

Don’t mimic someone else’s regimen

Watching videos of what others do to their hair is great for inspiration but if you want to keep your natural hair regimen simple, don’t follow what they are doing to the letter. It may not work for you.

I’ve learned this the hard way. Sometimes you do need to go through a bit of trial and error when you first learn how to care for your hair. However, once you discover what your hair likes, why mess with it?

You’ve heard the saying, “If it aint broke, don’t fix it.” Stick with your own tried and true hair routines and leave all the extras to those who have more time or just like things more complicated.

A basic hair regimen can include:

Cleanse
Deep condition
Detangle
Style
Moisturize throughout the week

Notice, the pre-poo isn’t there. Neither are things like tea rinses and DIY hair masks. There’s nothing wrong with those things but those are totally optional. You don’t have to do them as a means of healthy hair care.

I like doing these things and the pre-poo is a part of my regular routine but if I happen to skip it because I’m overwhelmed, my hair is still OK. I also tend to be a little extra with my routine when I have the time.

Notice the key to simplifying your natural hair regimen is cutting back on decisions and establishing set routines.