Today we’d like to introduce you to La Shané Jones.
Thanks for sharing your story with us La Shané. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
So, this is an interesting question! When it comes to Natural Nae LA, there is my Instagram page, and then my blog. When it comes to my IG page, I initially started it just to track my transitioning progress and tap into the knowledge of others who had already transitioned (went from heat/ chemical damage and back to natural hair). In fact, my original IG handle was omgimnaturall!
As a child, my hair was braided nine times out of ten, every once in a while my mom would give me two curly puffs! I think I started pressing my hair in middle school and I did it every two weeks like clockwork! At some point though, I really got bored with it. It was always the same-pressed and I couldn’t really do anything other than that. In January of 2018 (wow that’s like two years now), after a long time of thinking about it, I decided that Christmas 2017 was the last time I would press my hair for a while, and I started my natural hair journey, on January 5, 2018.
Eventually, I was spending more time on my “hair blog” than my personal page and I guess it turned into a passion of mine. I LOVE planning content, writing copy, and interacting with people. I’ve met some lifelong friends (and some who I consider family) via that page. Plus, I’m learning so much about my hair and Black culture, and the issues we still face due to our hair. As some of us in the natural hair community like to say, “it’s so much more than hair!” And it truly is. On that page I’ve been in conversations about colorism, hair-type discrimination, corporate America, you name it. Because Black hair sparks many conversations about the state of Black people. Because I talk about more than just hair, on my page, I’m changing gears a bit and making it a natural hair and lifestyle page. That is more fitting for where I am right now.
As for my written online blog, naturalnaela.com, that is a place for me to talk about anything I personally want to. It has truly become an outlet for me. Many people see me on IG and think I’m this outgoing person and that talking to people just comes naturally to me, but I actually have pretty bad social anxiety. I use my blog and IG to discuss that and how that journey has been for me, what that anxiety looked like when I was a child and how it looks now.
Not to get too off-topic, but mental health is often a taboo topic in the Black Community and I LOVE that we are changing that because I can feel comfortable discussing it and if my story can help someone then that makes me happy! I want my pages to be a place where people feel safe to open up.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
So, I really thought about this question and I wanted to say it has been easy, I mean it’s just an IG page and a website, not rocket science! Transitioning my hair and learning to do my hair, on my own has had, and continues to have a learning curve. That being said, I do not think that is the toughest part.
Learning to love my hair and not compare my curls to others has been the toughest and most rewarding part of all of this. Those of us in the Black community know all about the saying “good hair.” Growing up, I always heard this, and let me tell you, I was never told I was someone with “good hair.” So what did I do? I started pressing it, to make it appear “good,” to show I had length because long hair is good hair. In the end, I walked away with damaged hair, and damaged self-esteem. Rebuilding that has been the roughest part of this and I continue to do that every day! It’s been great, learning to love myself and my hair.
Please tell us more about your work, what you are currently focused on and most proud of.
As I mentioned, my brand, Natural Nae LA really has two main pieces, my IG page, and then my blog. Both feature natural hair & lifestyle content. I’m 100% new at this blogging thing. There is so much to learn and I’m just focusing on being authentic and creating the type of content that I want to create, writing blog posts that I want to write. I specialize in staying in my own lane! I’m proud that I have been able to grow a lot of skills over the past year, such as video editing. I’m also extremely proud of the confidence that I have gained.
I don’t ever want to be a made-up IG version of myself. I talk about my experience with starting therapy and being a Black woman in corporate America, with natural hair and an ethnic-sounding name… I specialize in being La Shané and can’t nobody else to that!
What were you like growing up?
Growing up…hmmm. My early life was amazing! Things definitely got tough around middle school but that’s a story for another time!
As a child, I remember spending many weekends at my great-grandparent’s house. They had a house, somewhere on Gramercy. I definitely grew up a true LA kid. George Henry was my Great Grandpa, we just called him “Dad,” and Abey Henry was my Great Grandmother, we called her, ‘Dear Dear.” I remember when I would be on breaks from school, or maybe this is even before I started school, my mom would pack me a week’s worth of clothes and bring me to my great grandparent’s house so that she could go to work. I absolutely adored them. I am not being extra when I say that I was Dear Dear’s favorite Grandchild. I’ve actually had my cousins tell me this lol. Sorry, y’all! Maybe it’s because she named me!
I remember going to their house and they had a backyard that had an endless (or what felt like endless, to a four-year-old) amount of dandelions. I would play in those flowers for hours, blowing them while Dear Dear hung her clothes on the line. She would make me oatmeal, every morning and Dad would make me toast with butter and sugar- probably not the best snack for a kid lol but I can still taste it to this day!
Some of my best memories are spending time with them. They had this grapevine in their yard that had THE SWEETEST purple grapes I have ever had in my life. Not like the grapes you buy at the store. These were fresh grapes and Dad would pick them for me and give them to me. When I think about my future and how I want my children to remember their early life, this is it. Dear died when I was 13 and because that was the first major loss I had experienced, it definitely set the tone for who I became, later in life. Her death is one of the major events that pushed me to seek therapy as an adult. It was way too soon but I am so blessed to have spent the time that I did, with her.
When I got older, I guess I was a lot like I am now. Sometimes introverted (although now I attribute that to social anxiety) but I always had my core group of people who I could be myself with. I grew up an only child so I always played with my cousins and my best friend who lived right across the street from me.
I had a “take your butt outside and play!” mom, lol! So I was always outside, riding my bike, planning scavenger hunts with my cousins. I both had, and went to sleep-overs, and spent Summer days at the beach. My childhood was definitely one of the better ones.
I was also a pretty creative kid, I mean as far as imagination goes. I mentioned the scavenger hunts, but me and my best friend played with baby/ barbie dolls (always the Black ones, my mom only bought me the Black ones) for probably longer than most kids, at least through 5th grade, maybe longer. We had full-on lives, ok! I had two kids and mortgage lmao! We also had this “amusement park” that we called Fun Land. Now don’t ask me what the rides were but I damn sure know we had tickets and wristbands. Kinda lit now that I think about it! I also had something called the La Shané Club. I have no idea what it consisted of but I remember it existing. My other “only children” out there can probably relate. You have to have an imagination or you’ll be bored.
I was also a compassionate, empathetic person as a child. I remember back as early as 4th grade, so that’s about 10 years old, wanting to start a homeless shelter. I even wrote a song called “Help the Homeless” I don’t know if it had any other words besides those lol. But I have always had the drive to help people, I was never taught to hate anyone.
All of that is why I’m a huge advocate for not shutting kids down when they are expressing their feelings and showing imagination. I don’t plan to make my children color within the lines (literally or figuratively), or force them to see things the way my adult eyes see things because my mom didn’t do that to me. I wasn’t forced to do that until society told me I had to. Through my IG page and my blog, I hope to be more open and maybe start to see life a little bit more, like younger La Shané saw it.
Contact Info:
- Website: naturalnaela.com
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: Naturalnae_LA
Image Credit:
Photos of me wearing green pants and other photo with purple shirt, were shot by Basia Bowens @basiabowens on IG
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