pressed,relaxed,natural...?what is really the deal with all this?????

Well,ladies i just really have this question on my mind.we have been talking about getting our hair permed,pressed or just stay natural?my mom used to just perm my hair when i was younger.she just permed,washed it,dried it(rollers),smashed some natural things in it like blue magic or something like that and gave me a cute curly hairstyle.and yes,it grew nicely.but when i was a little older i decided to do my hair by myself.i wanted straight hair(like the stars on tv)and ppl told me that pressing my hair would be one of the best solution.so i tried it....horrible!!it was freaking hot,i burned my ears and i was just sooooo fed up with it!! lol!my hair got short and i was dying. i had a hair cut then and wanted to let it grow out once again.i could not deal with the frizzy,hard-to-comb hair,just did not know what to do.so i permed it,had roller-set my hair,wrapped it and had some kind of nice flow in it which last for like a week or two.now ppl are teling me that getting my hair permed is bad and wearing braids is bad,too.i wish i could just leave it natural and long without letting it look f***ed up like some crazy freak.but it is not easy for me to achieve this without anything that can get it straight so i can at least comb it or something... So please...i am begging for help.if you know how to achieve a long natural easy-to-deal-with hair then help me out!!!!! thanxxxx alot!!!!!