Morning Habits for Your Skin

The morning begins the second you’re awake. You rub your eyes, stretch your body and roll around before finally deciding to inch your foot off of the bed. Some of us love this process and some of us dread it, but the habits you create in the morning can really dictate the kind of feeling you get from it. For me, I LOVE my morning skincare routine. Anyone who knows me, knows that healthy skin and skin care is something I am truly passionate about and if you let me, I will talk your ear off about face wash. It wakes me up, it makes me feel fresh and it, mentally, prepares me for the day. But, as much as an extensive skin care routine can make you feel like you have your life together, your actual skin health goes way beyond what moisturizer you’re putting on. In this post, I’m going to suggest a couple of things you can think about and incorporate in to your morning to encourage healthy skin… emphasis on the word healthy… without telling you what you already know, which is WASH YOUR FACE AND MOISTURIZE.

Did you know your brain directly affects your gut health which subsequently affects your skin? When you’re stressed and negative, your gut and your body are out of balance, which can then cause inflammation in your skin. Beauty Within put out a great youtube video talking all about this topic with Mandi Nyambi, the author of Fresh Face, a book all about skin care, face masks, etc. Nyambi also studied restorative biology and nutrition and talked about her personal struggles and journey towards better skin health. I highly suggest watching the video and learning a few things you might not have thought about before.

I brought this up because my first tip is to 1. sit with yourself and start your day with words of self love and affirmation. I am a huge advocate for morning meditation and I firmly believe that everyone should practice it to get in touch with parts of themselves they may not have addressed. Even if you don’t want to think of it as meditation, I suggest setting a side a few minutes, before you get out of bed, to take a couple of deep breaths and tell yourself that you are strong, capable, and are exactly where you need to be in life. I mentioned your brain affecting your body and your skin because starting your day with stress will show in your face. It raises your cortisol levels and can cause inflammation in your skin. So, if you can, say a couple of nice things to yourself. You deserve it. The thing about this step is that, you won’t do it for a week and then see radiant results. This is something you have to actively work at and practice because when a person is calm and happy, it shines through their eyes and skin.

My second tip is to 2. drink water before consuming anything else. Whether you’re a person who eats breakfast or not, I think the first thing you have should be water. By allowing water to work its way through your system, you gently get your body functioning and flush out some of the toxins. I like to have a glass of water next to the bed to sip on before I go to sleep. Then I drink the rest of it in the morning because, by that point, the water is room temperature and therefore, easier to drink and softer on my digestion. Drinking coffee first in the morning makes my skin feel and look tired. Caffeine is a diuretic, which means that it causes your kidneys to release an excess amount of water from your body. So, drink some water before and after your wonderful cup of morning coffee (yes, that is a not-so-subtle name plug). At the very least, drinking water first thing in the morning can’t be a bad thing and makes me feel good while I clear the sleep fog from my brain. The purpose of my first and second tip is to bring your body to as much of a calm and neutral state as possible. They decreases the risk of inflammation in your face first thing in the morning.

My third, and final tip, is to 3. simplify your skincare routine in the morning. I struggled with this in the beginning because I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was skipping steps. I felt like I was depriving myself of some important aspects of my skincare routine and wanted to put everything on my face that I did in the evening. But, I have combination skin and putting too much on in the morning can cause my t-zone to develop some serious oily shine. And, not putting enough on, causes my cheeks to eventually lose its moisture and yell at me because they’re so dehydrated. So, I had to find a balance that made my combination skin chill out. I know that this step may not be news to a lot of you, but it’s only something I’ve perfected, for myself, recently. I’ve narrowed my morning skincare routine down to: facewash, toner, a light serum, moisturizer with a few drops of squalane oil (my preferred brand is Biossance Squalane Oil), eye cream and SPF for your face.

I could go on about why I love Biossance as much as I do, but I’ll save that for another post. I do suggest looking into the brand if you’re curious about clean skincare and don’t know where to start. To some, this looks like a lot, but cutting my morning skin care routine down to just these 6 steps has helped a significant amount. My forehead is less shiny and the rest of my face feels soft and hydrated for the rest of the day. You don’t want to pile on an overload of products before you step out of your house because then they feel like they’re just sitting on the surface of your face and that is never a nice feeling.

See? I told you I could go on forever about skincare. But for the purpose of time, I’ll leave these three tips here for now. Speak kindly to yourself/meditate in the morning to set your tone, drink water before consuming anything else, and simplify your morning skincare routine! Three incredibly easy things to add to your morning and work into your habits. I hope this helped you in any small way and let me know if you want me to do a more extensive piece on anything involving skincare… because you guys know I’m just looking for an excuse to write an excessively lengthy post about it. There will definitely be things I add to this list, so a part two won’t be too far behind. Thank you so much for reading and I hope you have a great morning!

All my love,

Sy.