I started my beard growth journey around February 2018. My wife had always wanted me to have beards, chiefly because I looked younger than I am.
Her argument was that well-groomed beards look respectable.
She found an ally when one of my colleagues at work made the same remark after I went clean shaven one weekend. In her words, my face looked naked and raw. I decided to give beard grooming a try then.
After I started grooming my beards, challenges came in form of bumps and, itching, but after the first days, the bump and itch went away.
Do I think beards is fashion or style?
Neither fashion nor style. Just expediency. The image is good for my career role
Beard care routine?
Bead Discrimination?
I think it’s a funny thing really. People without beards thinking bearded people are ruffians. People with beards thinking beardless men are effeminate.
Most people are influenced by three key factors when it comes to beards – doctrine, fashion and trends (or in some cases, bandwagon behavior). There are some faiths that prescribe beards – fervent followers of those faiths practically enshrine their facial hair.
The second group is those who genuinely feel beards make them look good – the proof of that concept is seen in men who proudly nurture and groom their beards; as statements of their manliness, as complements to their baldness and as living fashion accessories.
The third – my least favorite – group is, unfortunately, the ones that made the #beardgang revolution popular: the bandwagoners. These are the ones who jump on every trending thing whether it looks good on them,
…from the agbada style made popular by Ebuka to iPhones to weed and shaku shaku.
Those ones give the real proponents a bad name with the way they rock beards. It’s an alarming sight to see someone looking unkempt with a full bushy beard.
Why do ladies love beards?
The ladies that love beards do so because to them it creates an impression of manliness. Some ladies don’t, I assume they hate body hair of any kind.
Handling beard discrimination
I’d say there’s no sure way to handle beard discrimination from these two areas. If we really think of it, a man’s beard is his property, the decision to keep or eschew is his alone.
Religion and society have no place in prescribing what you do with your facial hair. If we are to go by the underlying tenets of Abrahamic and Oriental faiths alike, it is the contents of your heart and how you interact with your fellow humans that’s important.
Having beards that are longer than Aaron, whose beards were reportedly longer than his skirts, will not get you into heaven. Lacking them will not bar you from being saved as well. I think God has more important things to worry about than how clean shaven we are.
Benefits of beards grooming
Benefits? Apart from keeping the chin warm, and having something to pull gently at in moments of introspection, I can’t say there are. I think beard models would reap many more benefits.
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