Banning Bonnets & Du-rags On campus
Now, I'm gonna just keep it basic with you. I don't care what y'all do. Really truly don't care what you do. But what I will tell you is this: A lot of y'all not prepared for the real world. Y'all living in this little fantasy world of what you wish the world was versus what it is, and you're gonna get a rude awakening. When I first started my career, I had an eyebrow ring in my eye. I ain't talk about this before. And a lady came to me, and she was kind of like a mentor to me. At that time, I wasn't aware of it all. I thought I knew it all. I thought nobody could tell me nothing but my parents. And she came to me and she said, Dana, I ain't trying to be funny. But I would take the eyebrow ring out. I think it would look a lot more professional if you took the eyebrow ring out. And as soon as she said that, I was like, you know, nobody listen to you, girl. Like, why you worried about my eyebrow ring? My eyebrow ring ain't hurting nobody. I can do my job with the eyebrow ring in. Because I hear a lot of y'all say, me having on a durag, me wearing a bonnet, that don't stop my grades being good. No, it don't stop that. But it stops other things. Make a long story short, I took her advice and I took the eyebrow ring out. And guess what? I saw a lot of progress after I took that eyebrow ring out. Simply taking that eyebrow ring out maybe people take me a lot more seriously. Taking that eyebrow ring out opened a lot of doors for me. Taking that eyebrow ring out did a lot more good than did harm. But a lot of y'all, you so set in your ways, you think you know everything. And the truth of the matter is, people judge you based off how you look, how you present yourself. When you start getting into dealing with people, money, real business, your presentation means a lot. It means a whole lot. When I go in and I conduct business, I absolutely look at the person who handling my money, who handling my business, because if I don't take you seriously, you don't take me seriously. I'm so strict. If you do too many um, uh, filler words, you gonna have to get somebody else. You gonna have to get somebody else. I don't play when it comes to conducting business. Once you try to tell these people better, and they don't want to listen, don't waste your time no more. Because life gonna show them better than you could ever tell them. When they see how stunning they are, and they progress in life, and they got to watch everybody else around them, you know, do better than me. They listen. They took constructive criticism. They actually cared about how they presented theyself. They actually took their life seriously. This also speaks to the mentality. It's more important to you to prove a point and be rebellious than it is for you to comply and see progress. The same time it take you to grab a pair of pajamas and the same amount of time it take you to grab a durag or a bonnet, you could grab a hat, right? So you intentionally going out your way to look homely and unkept. So again, it speaks to the mentality. They listen. They took constructive criticism. They actually cared about how they presented theyself. They actually took their life seriously.
