Switching to Natural Personal Care - My personal journey

I learnt about why I should use natural personal care in a workshop I attended called "Rethinking Development" which was about environment sustainability, It is through this workshop that my passion for environmental sustainability sprouted and I began my journey of exploring natural personal care.
I began using many alternatives but a complete switch did not happen, there were still days I would go back to my regular shampoo or other cosmetics.
The convenience and comfort that I had with my regular products were preventing me from completely switching. In terms of time and convenience using a regular shampoo was much easier than hair wash powder. My mind blocks were stopping me from completely letting go of the toxic products in the bathroom.

The following year, I was part of the facilitating team of the same workshop. I happen to be taking the session "Toxins behind our cosmetics". For this session I did a lot of research, this really moved me. A spark of motivation hit me, and my New year resolution for 2016 was that I will only use natural and safe personal products. I am proud to say that it happened, I went through with my resolution and I never turned back since then.
Making and using natural products for personal use flowed into Dhanak - selling and sharing them with others. Through my journey in Dhanak, My understanding of making and using natural products really widened and deepened.

Personally, for me the easiest switch when it comes to leading a natural and sustainable lifestyle was menstrual hygiene products, I was very smoothly and comfortably able to switch from sanitary napkins to cloth pads.
I feel taking small steps is a good way to transit into a natural lifestyle, especially natural personal care.

I began with an easy switch, replacing my lip balm from vaseline to natural beeswax lip balm.
Then I switched from toothpaste to toothpowder and from soap to bath powder.
I was lucky to live in a place where I had access to good toothpowder and plenty of trees for datun(tree twigs to brush like neem)

and so on went on switching products.

The most difficult switch was shampoo, Hair wash powder requires your time and patience. To have a good and efficient wash one needs to apply the paste and leave for 15-20 minutes before washing off while the shampoo is an instant wash.
I had to change my mindset for this switch, Work an attitude of natural living within and stop telling myself that is time-consuming. Now I look at it as a self-care time and have no difficulty using hair wash powder even when I am travelling!

Initially, when I would travel I did not use natural. I would convince myself, that during travel it's tough to use natural products like oil for moisturizer or hair wash powder so let's carry shampoo and cream.
However, once I got comfortable with natural personal care at home, I was able to challenge myself to do it on travel too.

A big change for me in this journey has also been embracing my natural beauty. Loving my self for who I am. Now bathing, washing my hair and caring for my body has become a self-care ritual and  I developed a loving relationship with my body.

I was never really fond of makeup, though I enjoyed putting nail polish and occasionally makeup. Once I understood how toxic this is for my physical health, emotional health and the planet. I cannot use any commercial cosmetic or personal care product.