Look after your skin boys!

BEFORE I BEGIN: A shout out to EDDY AND NATHAN :) Because they wanted me to. Hi guys . TY FOR SAYING MY BLOG IS MORE INTERESTING THAN CHRISAU'S (speaking of Chris Au, his bag is funky XD )

Alright. I decided to do this because 9.15 is too early to go to bed and I'll have nothing to do anyway.

So in the past few years, there's been dramatic change regarding guys and their looks etc, thus the rising metrosexual trends etc. Even though I bag out guys why spend alot of time being vain, I accept some of the things they do. One of these things is maintaining nice skin.

Now think about it. Daily doses of sunlight, sometimes sun burn, wind burn, hormone influx, chickenpox, our skin goes through alot. Despite regenerating new skin everyday, we still have to look after it because what we do to it today will be reflected in the future.

Simplest things you can do to maintain healthy skin:

1. Drink at around 2 L a day- This will flush the toxins out of your system so they won't turn up in little pustules appearing on your face D:
2. Wash daily, preferably twice and use a moisturiser that is suited to your skin.
3. SLEEP. This is important. I know Í'm being a hypocrite, but I'm hoping this will change for me. Our skin needs time to rest and while we're sitting infront of computers or partying away at night, it doesn't get any of that. Getting some shut eye is the best solution. Apparently, the most crucial skin repairing/resting time period is between 11pm and 2am. So if you want lovely skin.. you know what to do.

Into more specific things now- wash your face daily, once in the morning, once at night. Washing your face in the morning can take off all that dirt and oil you've accumulated in your period of slumber and make your face look brighter and cleaner :D. Before you go to bed, you want to make sure your skin can breathe so it can rest easily at night.

Your daily ritual can be broken into 3 basic parts.

1. CLEANSING: If you are someone with relatively dry skin, look for a cleanser that has no soap (I recommend Cetaphil soap-free cleanser, but it has no bubbles or anything. + retains moisture in the skin) because soap dries skin out even more can cause irritations where you do not want it. There are tonnes of different cleansers that are available in the supermarket aisles, but if you're not picky and you just want to maintain the health of your skin, just pick a deep cleaning one or one of those "daily scrubs". It's easy peasy, follow directions on the back of the tube (or bottle). Usually it's just wet face, squeeze about 2cm of cleanser into palm, lather between your hands and SCRUB IN A CIRCULAR motion on your face. Remember to not neglect areas behind your ears, your neck and on the side of your nose where blackheads can build up. Some cleansers have beads in them and it sort of exfoliates your skin, but doing that every day is sort of detrimental to your skin, as well as making the skin more prone to becoming oily during the day. Also, using lukewarm water would be nice because it allows the pores to open up a little so you can get all that gunk out. I think that's about it for cleaning.. xD
2. TONING: Basically what happens here is you want to shrink the pores on your skin so it won't trap as much dirt/dust during the day. Some people like to use alcohol based toners because alcohol works well to shrink pores, but I think a more skin friendly/wallet friendly way is just to splash your face with freaking cold water. You can feel your skin tighten when you do that ('tis a good feeling). How to use alcohol toner: get a cotton swab and just put a little bit of the toner on it and wipe over face. Usually you'll be able to pick up dirt that you didn't wash off.
3. MOISTURISING: When you use an alcohol toner, you MUST moisturise your skin. Moisturisers. There are so many different ones for different skin types. If you have oily skin, find a moisturiser that is NOT oil based, preferably water based. Disliking the oily shine on your face? Use a mattifying moisturiser that will absorb most of the oil forming in the skin. If you have dry skin, go for the greasy ones. If you have combination skin, there are TONNES of oil-free moisturisers that hide shine and they're usually non greasy. When hunting for a moisturiser, make sure you don't choose the oil based products. The reason is because they clog up pores, trapping dirt and impurities, causing infection-> pimple. Examples of these products include chapsticks, vaseline.. If you have a really, really bad dry patch, try some vaseline (this stuff if also good for elbows and knees). If you have sensitive skin, choose a moisturiser without alcohol, fragrance-free and allergy tested.

Okay.

AND THE WEEKLY THING

EXFOLIATE. This gets rid of the layer of dead skin on your face and is quite important. Do it about once or twice a week depending on how oily your skin is. Doing it too often will irritate the young and tender skin xD so don't exfoliate daily. There are tubes of exfoliating scrubs with beads (or microbeads) and it feels like you're rubbing sand and moisturiser on your face. Afterwards, the skin is nice and smooth :)

MASKING: Using a face mask (like Chris) once a week (CLAY MASK) will absorb sebum off your face. Sebum feels oily, and it's secreted from oil glands in our skin. It exists to make our hair/skin waterproof etc, but too much of it is bad and blocks pores etc. I think it usually comes out of our hair follicles, hence BLACKHEADS (watch out for those pesky things) and it causes acne. So yeah. Masking once of twice a week is good.

THE OVERALL THING. Stress less. Changes in your hormone level influence the things that appear on your face.

That's about it for my first ever WHAT TO DO WITH YOUR SKIN post.

I never knew there was SO much to it. I feel so knowledgeable, though I guess most is common sense.

TC OF YOUR SKIN!