Question

I learned a long time ago that hair has meanings—plenty of meanings. Growing up in the 1960s, my friends and I struggled without parents’ control over the length and style of our hair.

At the time, hair represented our need to break free from adults in our lives. Long hair represented our freed inner selves.

My clients are often surprised when I asked them questions about their hairstyle—why they choose it, how else they’ve worn their hair, how they feel about it, and so on. However, while it may seem to be a simple topic, even today our hairstyles still have many psychological and emotional meanings. Understanding some of those meanings can lead to understanding of many different aspects of a person’s mind. How we view our hair, for example, can show something about how we view ourselves.

Our hair can show physical and emotional wellbeing, desirability, and even social and financial status. When it becomes dull or fragile, it can communicate emotional and physical diseases. But hair can also show unrecognized and often unspoken daydreams about oneself and one’s world. One woman—a successful professional—wore her long hair in a thick bun(發(fā)髻).

But one day she showed me that tangled(纏結(jié)的) hair was kept in the bun. She said that she never brushed out the tangles because the hair showed her secret image of herself as a helpless, disturbed woman, like Ophelia in the play Hamlet.

Another woman came to therapy in a huge shirt and huge pants that she believed they could hide the weight she had put on since the birth of her child. She talked about how much she hated her body and how helpless she felt about doing anything about it. But her hair was always beautifully coloured and decorated. When I pointed out that she seemed to have a different relationship with her hair from she did with her body, she said that her hair had been thinning and that she was trying to make it look as good as she could. I pointed out that what she was doing with her hair and her body was kind of contradictory, and wondered if she had any thoughts about that.

She was surprised. But as we talked about her contradictory attitudes towards different parts of her physical self, we began to open up all sorts of other thoughts and ideas about her inner self.

And interestingly, as we continued opening those internal doors, changes started to happen. She started eating differently and exercising regularly. One day some months later, she appeared in my office in skinny jeans and a tight sweater, and her hair was pulled back in a ponytail. “I decided to see what would happen if I stopped trying to hide myself, ” she said with a big smile.

“And…? ” I asked. “People keep smiling at me in the street. My husband hugged me this morning for the first time in ages. And I feel good! ”

Besides, selfrespect in both men and women can be damaged by thinning hair；they may feel alone even though they are really not. Given our cultural focus on physical appearance, youth, and health, hair loss can be unpleasant for both men and women. The market is filled with hairenhancing treatments, but there are those who have decided to be against the system and change to the “bald is beautiful” position. But it is much harder for women to take the “bald is beautiful” approach to hair loss. We tend to try to hide it in one way or another.

But no matter what approach you use, it is important to remember that the thickness of your hair has nothing to do with your value in the world. Remember that you have nothing to be ashamed of if you have thinning hair. Thinning hair may not be something you can change, but it doesn’t have to control how you represent the person who lives underneath it.

1.In the 1960s, long hair represented___________.

A. fashion B. honesty C. peace D. freedom

2.Why does the author ask clients questions about their hairstyle?

A. Because this topic can reduce clients’ pain.

B. Because the hairstyle can reflect one’s inner self.

C. Because it’s a simple topic to start a conversation.

D. Because this is a topic most people are interested in.

3.The author mentioned stories of two women in order to___________.

A. prove her idea

B. introduce the topic

C. make comparisons

D. stress the importance of good hair

4.What can we know about the woman wearing her long hair in a thick bun?

A. She had long but thinning hair.

B. She was helpless and disturbed.

C. She was too busy to brush her hair.

D. She loved the play Hamlet very much.

5.What does the author advise us to do in the last two paragraphs?

A. Not to be affected by thinning hair.

B. To take the “bald is beautiful” position.

C. To find suitable treatments for thinning hair.

D. Not to pay too much attention to our physical appearance.

Answer 1