How to Trim Your Own Split Ends

If you go to a licensed hair stylist regularly, he or she is probably going to tell you no, you shouldn’t trim or cut your own hair. That’s often because they want to keep you coming back to the salon, but in fairness, they are trained with the right tools and techniques to trim your hair appropriately. 

But life has changed for all of us with presence of COVID-19 and many salons were closed for a long time. They’ve begun reopening with limitations, but folks are rightfully concerned about heading back to the shop. But just as you may go out to eat, it’s really helpful to know how to cook to feed yourself. Same with trimming your hair; it’s a helpful skill to have.

When I can’t make it to the salon, I trim my hair myself. Here’s how I go about it:

1. After using Naturalicious Step 2 to help prepare my hair as a heat protectant, I blow dry my hair out.
   
   
2. I then use a flat-iron set to a medium setting to straighten my hair, so that I can truly see which ends are split and how high it goes. Unless you’re skilled in cutting curly hair (and most people aren’t) you’ll end up cutting off “good” hair thinking that it’s split, when really it’s just curled up at the ends.
   
   
3. I use good hair shears, not regular scissors that you can get from any old store; if you’re going to trim your hair, invest in a nice pair of shears to ensure sharp clean cuts.
   
   
4. In front of the mirror, I section my hair into medium-sized manageable sections; taking one section at a time and being honest about where those split ends are, I do my best to cut each section in as few snips as possible to try to maintain consistent length removal.

• If you’ve been caring for your hair by washing, conditioning, moisturizing and doing your hair treatments regularly, your split ends shouldn’t be crazy and you shouldn’t have to cut a ton
  
  
• The fronts and sides of the hair are pretty easy, but the back-middle part is more challenging. I usually bring a section of hair straight up above the top of my head so that I can clearly see the ends in the mirror, and I clip any damage off.

Because I wear my hair curly most days, I’m not a stickler when it comes to making sure that my hair is completely even everywhere although I do my best to make sure it doesn’t look crazy.

Trimming your hair, is in the same boat as straightening your hair. We’re learning how to do both in the Repair Your Hair Challenge. So, if you haven’t joined the challenge and you’re not comfortable with the process, it’s probably best to let a professional take care of it. 

But for my natural curlfriends who like to live out loud on the wild side, you should feel empowered to take full control of your hair care and snip those ends. We all know that the look of a beautiful style can be ruined by raggedy split ends. So, go ahead and freshen up that do and don’t be afraid to let that damaged hair go. The longer you hang on to those frayed inches, the more inches you’re going to lose when it’s time to trim. Do yourself a favor and Cut. It. Out.