@GREYSONHAIR TKOVR

KLAY:

Greyson was introduced to me via Instagram. I have been following his page for a while. I am inspired by his edgy look, know - how, and courage to be himself. It was a no brainer for me to ask him to collaborate with Apollo. Greyson happens to be the first ever guest writer on this blog. I told him to just have fun with his entree and to be true to himself. I must say, he did an incredible job. Find him on instagram at @greysonhair, and see what he has to say after the jump!

GREYSON:

The most fascinating and remarkable aspect of mankind is the fact that there will only every be one of you for the entirety of human existence. This is my story and how I came to eventually understand that being different is not something to be ashamed of, but something to be celebrated.

My life as a began when I was born on May 28th, 1997 in Sacramento, CA to the most loving and supportive set of parents I could have ever asked for. Little did they know that this little Gemini would keep them on their toes still to this day. Growing up I was a very social kid and always wanted to be in good company partaking in intense Pokemon battle or cinematic-level lightsaber duels with my neighborhood friends. In fact I hated being alone and a day without some sort of excitement seemed like my own personal purgatory.

Around 6th grade is when I started to really struggle. With puberty and hormones running rampant through middle schoolers, everyone just wanted to feel like they fit in because being different was unacceptable. All I wanted was to be one of the cool kids. The only problem was that for some reason, I did not fit in and was not accepted by my peers. I spent a lot of my time throughout middle school alone and was I bullied constantly for being short, wearing glasses, and to add insult to injury I have a scar above my eyebrow. During a time when the Harry Potter franchise was thriving I think you can understand how this was not ideal to a kid who was quite literally the schools punching bag.

Aside from the bullying around the way I looked, I was relentlessly called every gay slur that exists. As someone who was not yet aware of his own sexuality let alone having hardly any idea what sexuality is, you can imagine how confusing this was to a child. But the summer between 8th and 9th grade everything changed. I remember sitting with my best friend at the time and coming out of the closet to her and honestly not really understanding what I was feeling, just that I had a feeling. Once high school began and talk of my now public sexuality spread throughout the school I would hit my lowest point and spend the better half of my high school career battling severe depression. A fight that I almost lost.

One of the ways I found positive self expression through was my hair. I would spend hours on YouTube watching people bleach their hair and dye it vibrant colors and I was always in awe. I began to frequent Sally Beauty Supply and loved to walk up and down the aisles obsessing over the swatches of all the hair colors. Let’s be honest, is there a hair stylist out there who didn’t begin their cosmetology career as an angsty teenager in the aisles of Sally’s doing crazy shit to their hair? You can bet I tried every single one of those vibrant swatches on myself and a couple of very brave friends in addition to discovering on multiple occasions what fried hair feels like, thankfully just on myself.

Flash forward to the middle of senior year: I’m borderline failing 2 classes, have no idea what I want to do with my life, and my family is set to move to Houston, TX the same week I would (hopefully) graduate high school and turn 18. My parents never forced college on me, but they made it very clear I would do SOMETHING with my life but I had no idea what that looked like. This is when they suggested beauty school. They said I was always doing my own hair as well as a couple of my friends’ hair, so why not look into it?

Well, I looked into it and with time running out, I made the decision that cosmetology school would be my next chapter. I managed to graduate high school finding out only a few hours before my ceremony that I would actually be attending my own graduation. 2 days later I turned 18, got my first tattoo, and a few days after that my family headed off to the airport to permanently move to Houston.

My world changed the day I walked into beauty school. My entire life up until that moment I felt like a total outcast but when I looked around and I was suddenly surrounded by people covered in tattoos rocking crazy colored hair and I knew I was with my kinds of people and for the first time in my life I finally felt like I belonged.

Beauty school flew by and shortly after graduating and passing my state board exam I landed my first job as an assistant at a beautiful salon in downtown Sacramento. I learned so much in my time as an assistant there and a little over a year later I would make the jump to my own chair. I was so hungry and determined that nothing could stop me. I marketed myself on Instagram, Facebook, Craigslist, and even walked the streets of downtown putting my business card on the windshield of every single car and door that I could find.

I did a lot of beautiful hair that I was so proud of but I definitely messed up some hair too. I’ll never forget the first time I was rinsing my client’s highlights and suddenly the memory of my own melted hair became oddly familiar. Luckily most of my mess-ups ranged from chunky orange striped highlights to coloring someone’s roots way too dark. Of course neither is ideal, but at least they didn’t lose half of their hair to the bottom of the sink. When you’re a hairstylist, you have to learn very quickly that mistakes happen, nothing is permanent, and failures are just lessons. Every single successful hair stylist in the world has absolutely destroyed at least one person’s hair but they didn’t let it destroy their career. You cry about it in the back, wipe the tears, and know what not to do next time. There’s nothing like reading your first bad Yelp review but one bad review does not define you and believe it or not every hair stylist has at least one.

I have been in the industry for almost 7 years now and in that time I have worked in over 9 different salon, 3 different cities in 2 different states, spent time teaching independent education classes, and I now run my own hair extension studio called Salon 737 in Los Angeles, California. 737 is a number that I see constantly and I like to think of it as my lucky number. It’s a reminder that I am exactly where I am supposed to be, that everything happens for a reason, and no matter how many times life knocks me down I will get back up.

A question that I get a lot is “how did you know you were ready to open your own salon studio?” and to be completely honest I didn’t know I was ready but I didn’t have a choice. In March of this year I was fired from the salon I was working at with no warning and believe me when I say it felt like my entire world had been pulled out from under me. I was just barely starting to make a name for myself as a hair extension specialist in LA and being fired put me in the lowest possible point in my career. But I had 2 choices: give up or go all in. In a matter of 8 days I had the keys to my studio and I was so excited but my excitement was almost immediately followed by so much fear. I was fucking terrified. I remember sitting in my empty studio thinking “how the fuck am I going to afford this”. But after what feels like a miracle my business took off, the client requests were flying in, my instagram following doubled, and I made over $20,000 in my first 30 days of being open. 5 months later and I am only a couple thousand dollars away from hitting 6 figures.

From the kid who never fit in, who always felt like an outcast and at one point didn’t think he’d make it to 18 years old:

You WILL find your people.

You WILL find your place.

You WILL find purpose.

I promise.