Beauty Buzz: Top Tips For Super Glowing Skin
Your skin tells a story, so it’s about time you treat it to the fairy tail it deserves. From fine lines, to dullness and dryness, it will show quickly just how much attention you pay to your health, skin care, and wellness. So before you rush over to your local pharmacy to buy the hottest exfoliant or face mask, check out these tips on ways to improve your skin without the giant price tag:
Drink More Water
It may seem too simple to be true, but consuming more water can help significantly with dull, dry, red skin. Not only does water hydrate (DUH) but it helps with everything from inflammation and redness, to clearing toxins and chemicals, and delivering nutrients to all areas of your body. So when you’re feeling dry and flaky or red and rashy, try upping your water intake daily.
Get Your Nutrition in Check
Skin out of whack in all sorts of ways? Take a look into the foods, nutrients, and vitamins you’ve been consuming. The two most skin-affecting foods to avoid and cut out when your skin is feeling rough, are sugars and dairy. These two simple things have been proven to cause breakouts, aging, and uneven skin tones, by stimulating an enzyme in your body that breaks down the collagen and elastin in your skin. No thank you! The best things to incorporate into your diet are foods packed with antioxidants. Think blueberries, raspberries, spinach, kale, etc. These types of foods and their antioxidants help to increase circulation and blood flow, delivering nutrients in the form of collagen and elastin (which gives your skin strength and elasticity) and generates new cells.
Apply SPF Daily
No, not the oily, beach kind of sunscreen, but the ones designed to keep your face properly protected on a daily basis. As much as 90% (YIKES) of wrinkles, aging, and discoloration are from sun exposure. With a number as large are that, you can’t go wrong with finding a good broad-spectrum protection formula for any skin type meant for everyday wear. And yes, even if you work in an office or think it’s fine to slack off during the winter months, the sun can STILL affect your skin. So find something you can use all year around and wear it on the regular.
Keep Your Get Ready Station Clean
I CANNOT stress enough how important it is to keep things clean. Your bathroom/makeup counters, your face towels, your makeup brushes. All these areas collect dirt and bacteria that is just waiting to cause you redness, inflammation, and breakouts - Not what you want when you are trying to keep your skin glowing and beautiful! So do your best to replace your face clothes and towels at least once, if not twice a week, disinfect your counters as often as possible, and make sure your brushes and sponges are thoroughly cleaned once a week.
Reduce Chemicals
Your skin is your biggest organ, and it soaks up everything it can, so think twice before buying a new exfoliant, mask, or foundation that is probably laced with chemicals. These are often products that can contribute to redness, uneven tones, rashes, and dryness. We’re lucky enough to live in a time where non-toxic, chemical free products are an abundance & our kitchens are stocked full of enriching, skin friendly products, so take advantage of them! Who knows, after reading this, you may realize you do not need as many products as you used to.
DIY It
Everyone loves a good DIY project! So next time you are thinking about an expensive face peel or charcoal mask, take a look through pinterest or a good beauty blog to find great DIY homemade skin masks that will not just benefit your skin but probably cost a mere quarter of the price of those store bought ones. You’d be surprised just how many household foods can benefit your skin on the outside - Things like coconut oil for your skin, teeth, and hair, ground coffee or sugar as an exfoliant, or avocado for your hair and face. Here are my favourite masks for some skin transformation: https://www.coquette.ca/blog/skin-transforming-face-masks.
When In Doubt, Sleep It Out
Um hello, it’s called “beauty rest” for a reason. Not getting enough sleep can lead to lower circulation, which will explain why you look pale and washed out if you don’t get enough. Sleep is the perfect time to let your skin rejuvenate. Your body’s cellular renewal crew works the night shift, so this is when the face masks, good skin products, water consumption, and nutrition come into play. Equip your skin with the tips above so while you’re sleeping, your body can work to reduce redness and inflammation, hydrate and rebuild, and give you the glowing skin you dream about.
One final thing to remember, hormones. Those bad boys play a massive roll in how our skin looks. And while some of the above tips (nutrition, water, sleep) can aid in hormone balancing, sometimes you’ve just got to roll with the punches and work around how hormones are affecting your skin (i.e. up your water intake and dial in the nutrition around your period, or have a good acne blasting mask ready just before your break out schedule). With all the things to consider, always remember to treat your body like the beautiful temple it is, embrace it, and love it! The more we do that, the better it will respond, and hopefully, by implementing some or all of the above tips, you too will have glowing skin in no time!