How Mona's Journey from Burnout to Wellness Inspired a Conscious Hairdresser Movement

Hi, I'm Mona Lueng. I'm known as the conscious hairdresser. But I was not always the conscious hairdresser. I was a very driven workaholic. And as a passionate salon owner, I work 10 to 16 hours a day seven days a week in high heels. There are more days without a moment to eat, or even go to the bathroom. I'm scheduled and booked solid two months in advance and I had everything I thought I always wanted. As far as hair stylists Lent, I thought I had reached the pinnacle of success. At this point my body gave out and I simply could not continue the pace I'd set up for myself at over, but loving hairdressers illnesses such as eczema, ulcers, and adrenal fatigue. This is one of the main reasons why I'm starting this podcast because I want all of you hairdressers to know how important you are and how crucial it is for you to take care of yourself so that you can continue doing this impactful work. At the point where my body rebelled against the high heels and the 16 hours a day, I took some time off to have my first child and being a mom or we can the strong compassion in me. I also began to explore a number of healing modalities, such as Reiki, quantum touch, and sound healing, just to name a few. I'll be talking in more depth about the variety of healing modalities that can benefit hairdressers, and clients in the future podcasts. I realized the opportunities that I had to make an impact on how I could be more supportive. So I started ceremonies. A hair ceremony is a private ritual in which I help my clients to get more clarity about their lives and more alignment with their inner and outer beings. I offer my clients a choice of three different ceremonies, the nourishing adventure, where there's less talk and more relaxation, the health adventure, where I share tips on how to have a healthy mindset, diet and body and lastly, the soul adventure. To guide clients to connect with their souls. I use special tools such as oracle cards, pendulums and sound therapy. In my quest to learn all I could I wanted to meet holistic hairdressers who were doing amazing things in other parts of the world. So I searched for them for the last 10 years and I decided to make a documentary movie called Beyond vanity. And I had the opportunity to go to Nepal, Hong Kong and journey up the West Coast of the United States. I was on a quest to find a community, a huge community of hairdressers who are stepping into their power that were pioneers and who are taking hairdressing to a whole new level. I call it alternative hairdressing. One of the hairdressers who inspired me is Anthony, Morocco, the hair shaman, he believe that he created his own natural line of products and is thriving. And that my friend is another reason why I'm making this podcast to tell you that you can be an alternative hairdresser, use clean products and still make an abundant living. I'm not just a conscious hairdresser. I'm a fun hairdresser. And I'm a hairdresser that believes in miracles that dreams are possible. We are going to learn a lot, lack a lot and come together to create a movement that I'm calling the conscious hairdressers movement. I want to share a client story with you. About eight years ago, I had a client who I haven't seen for a long time, who came to see me one day for a hair appointment. And as I cut his hair, I asked him a series of questions including what he was ready to let go of, and what he truly desired in his life. Just by being present, and pathetic and actively listening, something magical happened in the chair. And as I cut his hair, we took the time to have a deep conversation. And at the end, he thanked me. He actually confided in me and had the plan to take his own life that week. And during that conversation that we had, you realize that you wanted to live and he wants to live for his family and wanted to start a new life. I am not a therapist, and I realized that I don't need those academic skills to be with another human and to listen and to meet their human needs to be seen, to be heard, to be listened to. To be touched, to be understood and to be loved. I will always remember that day that one hairdresser can make an impact on one person's life. Can you imagine if hairdressers around the world took the time to deeply listen to the clients and be with them and be with them?

Well, I create a process called RISE and this is a set harmoni that I am with my clients, and I'm just present with my clients. It's called rise because I want to rise with everybody R is for release to release, all that's bothering them. I is to invite everything that they want to bring, in essence to synthesize in silence, which just happened. And E is invite people to just feel excited about life, and enlivened, and perhaps a little bit more enlightened, through my pregnancy, and motherhood, learning to be present with children and learning how to listen to their nonverbal cues and body language. beyond words, being present is so important. So bringing that back to the salon, in the mother mode, I call it, I was grounded, I had to slow down, I had less clients that I worked with. And I began watching everything that my clients were doing in their body without seeing a word, they want to change, so that their life could change. That's really it has worked in many ceremonies throughout the world, even in Ayahuasca ceremony, they follow the right structure, we want to let go of things before we can move forward. And this is one way to let go of a hair ceremony. And what I feel is missing for other hairdressers that I know and that I get to meet is that some some of us think that is a job. And that, yes, money does make it flow in the world. But I think it's important to make our work meaningful, because it is very impactful. And it's, I feel like the ceremonial aspect is missing. And it creates a significant change in honoring ourselves, the client, and the acknowledgement that we are making an impact. When people started to share their stories with me, I realized that I could make a huge impact right now, by saying the right thing or the wrong thing. I needed to learn how to be more mindful of what I'm saying to people. So what I learned is, when I say something wrong to my clients, that it can be very damaging, like I can actually create hair trauma. Can you believe that there is such a thing, and it really is the ego. And it's time to let that go. I feel like sometimes I feel like I need to save my client's life. Well, I'm not here to do that. And I feel like it's time for us to just be there and meet our clients humans needs. That's really it.

I think it's important for us to meet each other. A few hairdressers have asked me, I'm not spiritual. I'm not academically smart. How can I be a conscious hairdresser. And I tell them that the most important is that we evoke that inner truth, and find the guests that you have, and utilize and focus on what you have, rather than what you don't have. You don't need to be academic, to be a conscious hairdresser. You don't need to be woowoo or anything. It's all about really understanding that we are spirits in the human body. And that that's what's most important is so that we can just be and in that guidance program that I have, it is so essential that we are open. I had one client that came to me for the one on one guidance, and she was afraid that she wouldn't know all of that the ceremonial work and everything that she needs to know. And the number one thing that really helps is that she was open. And what I reached out to her was finding that inner intuition that is so important for her to just be present to what was happening and to feel what was being said to her. And that's the number one thing is just really connecting to your intuition. Another hairdresser that came to me was afraid that there was so many hairdressers around her, she couldn't do her work. And so eventually she did go to another salon where she had her own space. And so I think a lot of people are afraid that the work that we do is so sacred and so private that they can't do it in the salon space. Well,

I work in the salon sometimes and I work at home sometimes I have a beautiful sacred space at home and I also have a beautiful space at the salon. So when I'm not a salon, I create my own space. I just imagine the space that is is safe for us to do everything. So no matter matter where you're at whether you're working in a salon, or do you have your own sacred space, I think that it would be important for you to understand that we can do hair ceremonies anywhere and everywhere. A lot of hairdressers think that they're not spiritual enough. They're not dynamically understanding this whole, all encompassing ceremonial work. And it's not just like a woowoo thing. It's more like understanding, first of all, your own personality, who are you? How do you want to show up to yourself and to your clients. So creating a characteristic and a persona, that's how you're expressing yourself. Another thing is that understanding your gifts and your positive attributes and focusing on what you have rather than what you don't have. So the third thing is that when you're working with a client, one on one, start off with small little increments of things like maybe an intention of what you want to do with them. And what maybe you want to release. Anything like that would create more meaning in what it is that we do. If you're interested in the conscious hairdressers movement and you want to join me in the one on one guidance or a retreat. Find me on my website, the conscious hairdresser.com May your day be better than you imagined it to be?