How’s your everyday morning scenario like? You wake up, head to the bathroom, and look into the mirror and what do you see?
First off, maybe its your dark circles from all the lack of sleep you’ve been getting. Then you scan your face to find another freckle. After which you scrutinize it further and perhaps you find blemishes popping up. Or maybe another wrinkle just popped up on your face. Whatever appears on you skin, one thing’s for sure: you sure aren’t getting any younger, and you hate every second of it.
Your eyes then dart back to themselves, and you realize all you see in them is dread.
Skin care is one of the most popular and lucrative businesses to be in – and for good reason. People all over the world are obssessed with obtaining and maintaining a healthy skin complexion. Everyone knows that skin purity can boost one’s attractiveness, which in turns boosts their perceived value, followed by his or her confidence.
It’s a beautiful cycle, and most people want to be a part of that cycle.
If you’re reading this, your main goal in skin care is probably one of youthful preservation and anti-aging. Maintaining youthful radiance and glow is a part of many people’s desires, and the more they get older, the more the desire grows.
Perhaps you almost feel guilty for wanting to stay young. Or perhaps you’re just in denial about your inevitable aging.
Either way, you’ve got a problem, and considering that there is a solution already out there, why not use it? They say youth is wasted on the young. I disagree. I believe wisdom is wasted on the old, as all they can do is part with it. With these anti aging skin care tips, you’ll have your cake and eat it too – enjoying the best of both worlds in youth as well as wisdom. Click Here To Read On.
I don’t know about you, but to me, aging sucks. As kids, all we wanted was to ‘grow up’ so that we can enjoy the freedoms and liberties that come with adulthood. But now that we’re old, all we ever think about is our happier, youthful, carefree times. It’s a cruel, almost ironic twist of fate, and as each day passes by we come closer and face-to-face with our own mortalities and limits.
Since we have made up our minds that we simply do not want to grow old, we here at senior healthy have dedicated our time, money and resources to finding the legendary, ever-elusive, fountain of youth as the cure to all our problems. But since it has yet to be found, these anti-aging skin care tips below will have to suffice in the meantime.
They’re not as permanent as the fountain of course, but you can sure as hell bet that they’re just as effective, and that your skin’s aging process can slow down dramatically if followed properly.
Sun
Simply put: you need to reduce your skin’s exposure to the sun. As you age, long term exposure to the sun causes a loss of collagen as well as damages elastin, resulting in that saggy, droopy, sunken-in face that most elderly have to suffer and endure with.
Source: BigstockPhoto
I get it, ‘stay out of the sun’ probably isn’t that pragmatic of an advice. We don’t expect you to stay pent up in your house the entire day with this obssessive need to protect your skin at all costs.
You’ll probably go insane if you do so, and that’s how crazy cat ladies are born. We don’t need any more crazy cat ladies in this world.
What you should do, instead, is simply make this goal quantifiable. Instead of ‘staying out of the sun’, aim to ‘spend 1 hour per day less in the sun’ or ‘halve your exposure to the sun’ – whatever works for you. If it can be measured, it can be managed.
The point here is to not let that beautiful star of our solar system ruin our skin, and you do that by simply reducing the time you spend in it every single day.
Another tip you could potentially want to use: apply sunblock. Older skin tends to be more vulnerable to the effects of the sun’s radiation than younger skin, so applying sunblock (minimum SPF 30) on your face before you carry out your day can dramatically prevent any form of damage you may face later on due to prolonged exposure to the sun.
Skin Care Routines
Just like a diet regime, you can only see substantial skin care results if you put in the work consistently day-in and day-out.
Its always painfully funny (mostly just painful) whenever I hear uninformed people boast about how they ‘ate salad for lunch today’, and expect to have a six pack a few minutes later. Its almost as if they’re seeking validation for the ‘hard work’ they’ve put in for that one lunch. What they didn’t proclaim was the fact that they ate a donut and some burgers for breakfast, and most likely for the past 20 years of their lives. Yet, they wonder, why they don’t have a slim body.
Nobody cares that you ate salad for one lunch.
What’s really impressive and what’s really going to get you results is doing that over and over again for a prolonged period of time with a sustainable workout plan to compliment your nutrition.
And this applies directly to your skin as well.
Just like a good nutrition plan, you need a good morning and night skin care plan – one that you can confidently carry out consistently to ensure your skin remains young and fresh.
Everyone’s routine should differ based on their individual needs and preferences, but here’s a basic example of what a skin care routine should entail:
- Apply sunscreen every morning. As we mentioned earlier, we want to preserve as much collagen as we can without the sun killing them.
- Before you head to bed at night, remove all makeup and wash your face. Chemicals and other pollutants are exposed to your face throughout the course of the day, and if you don’t wash them, this pollution will carry on at night as well.
- Apply a good moisturizer. Our skin is the largest organ of our body, and our body is made up of nearly ¾ of water. Lack of water and dehydration to our systems will prove detrimental to our skin if not taken care of properly, which is why moisturizers are perfect for combating just that. (Note: if available, apply retinoid first before applying the moisturizer)
- Side note: make sure to sleep on a clean pillow. Be sure to constantly change your pillow casing every couple of weeks.
Of course, this skin care routine may not apply to all of you, but you get the gist of what we’re talking about. It’s all about taking the necessary, preventive measures, each and every day to ensure you get the skin care results that you want.
Notice how this routine really doesn’t take much out of your time and life? Just like a good workout routine, your skin care routine has to be sustainable so that you can follow through with it each and every day. Remember: routines are supposed to add to your life, not take anything away from it.
Nutrition
Source: BigstockPhoto
Since we’ve already mentioned nutrition and diet in this post, it’s only
natural we segway into it with style.
Here’s a simple mantra for you to follow: Good skin should be a byproduct of a healthy lifestyle, not some chemicals in a bottle.
Doesn’t exactly roll of the tongue or rhyme or anything, but we were stuck with either that one or ‘Healthy skin comes from a healthy diet. Eat right and you probably won’t get tired’ – which granted, it rhymed, but sounded way too cheesy for this post.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for investing in the right type of skin care products to supplement your skin care regime. But as the name implies, that’s all the products should be – supplements. The main bulk of your skin care preservation should come naturally from the foods, water, workouts and healthy lifestyle that you are implementing on a day-to-day basis.
If you’re eating junk food and sitting around all day, not staying active, of course your body systems will deteriorate – your skin included. Staying healthy, keeping busy as well as in shape mentally and physically will do wonders for your skin in the long term.
With that said, here are a couple of basic pointers on health habits you should already be doing. If you aren’t doing them, simply remember the old chinese proverb ‘The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The 2nd best time is now’.
So take your shovel and get ready, we’re going to plant some trees.
- This should be obvious, but it cannnot be overstated enough: Drink. Water. Like we mentioned earlier, water makes up the majority of your body. You may think that you’re not dehydrated, but remember this: being thirsty does not equate to being dehydrated. Just because you don’t feel thirsty doesn’t mean that your body is being deprived of its natural liquid building blocks. Simply put, most of us are just, sad, confused, dehydrated people. Our bodies are crying out for more water every day, but we are simply not feeding them what they need. Have a simple goal: drink 10 glasses of water per day. Drink 2 glasses as soon as you wake up, 1 glass before and after each meal, and 2 more before you sleep. Goals are much easier to accomplish once you break them down into easily quantifiable chunks.
- Another obvious one, but your diet should mainly be consisting of whole, natural foods. Cut the processed foods and sugar foods out of your diet completely.
- Don’t drink any liquid calories. That includes, soft drinks, sodas and even alcohol. I understand we all got to live a little, but only have these once in a while on special occasions. Most of your liquids should come only from water.
- With that being said, if your lifestyle and health habits are already in check, choosing the right type of supplement to aid in your regime can prove to be useful beyond leaps and bounds.
If you have all these building blocks in place, supplements should only be an after thought. But if you insist of taking them, the supplements we recommend are Vitamin D ones as well as Omega 3 and Omega 6 fatty acids.
These fish oils and natural fats are important in protecting the moisture barrier – the protective top layer of skin that keeps the moisture in. As you age, this layer tends to thin, so it is vital that you do what you can to preserve it. Ideally they should come from natural sources like fish oils and salmon, but we know that you’d probably have to eat 5 cans of tuna just to get the necessary dose. In such cases, supplements are the best way to go.
Conclusion
As you can see from all our ‘tips’ in this post, most of them are not quick fixes. If you’re looking for some magic bullet to miraculously cure all of your skin care problems, then you’re out of luck – you’re reading the wrong site, and there simply isn’t any.
What there is however, is a systematic, step-by-step approach that if followed correctly, will provide you with fruitful long-term results in the years to come, and that is simply much more fulfilling than a short term, quick fix that will get you results in one second only to have it deteriorate a couple of minutes later.
We prefer preaching a much more holistic approach towards anti aging, especially on the sensitive topic of skin care, but if you’re looking for a more immediate and in-depth fix, simply visit your dermatologist for their counsel.
With that, the next time you look into the mirror in the morning and find yourself with clearer skin, smile, look out the window and greet the rising sun with happiness instead of dread.
Just don’t look at it for too long while you’re doing it. You don’t want to lose all that collagen you’ve worked so hard to preserve right?
