How Your New Year’s Resolution May Help Your Skin

Some of the most common New Year’s resolutions – stop smoking, manage stress, eat healthier, get fit – could actually help your skin too. Hopefully that’s more incentive to stick with them long term.How do these help your skin? Improving each of the areas can reduce free radical damage, which causes skin aging among other problems. Let’s take a look at each one.

• Smoking – this is a major free-radical producer. It actually affects intrinsic (biological) and extrinsic aging. It is not only toxic to the skin and body, but it also dehydrates the skin and causes deep lines to form around the upper lip. Attractive huh?
• Stress – stress damages health at the cellular level and can eventually lead to DNA damage, which can result in dull skin, slack pores, aging, and stress lines.
• Poor diet – food impacts aging. Foods high in antioxidants – fruits, vegetables, nuts, and certain grains – not only trim the waistline they also help improve the skin.
• Exercise – exercise is of course essential to maintaining a tone figure, it also regulates circulation and the oxygen flow to skin cells. This process carries nutrients to the cells and keeps them healthy. Be careful though, excessive exercise can have the opposite effect because it causes oxidative stress created by free radicals.

Of course it’s not too late to put your “best face first” in 2012

to your resolutions. This can be a simple and achievable goal just by

incorporating the mantra – cleanse, tone, protect – into your daily

routine. (Too make this even easier, see REDMethod's 1-2-3 Method Kit.)

If you’re feeling bold, or you just want some R&R, consider

regular facial treatments. These can be as simple as a 30-minute express

treatment (The Express) or more complete treatment like the Gentleman's

Facial or Sake Peel.

This is one of those resolutions you’ll be grateful you stuck to

later in life, because you’ll look younger and healthier than your

friends. Who wouldn’t want that?

Here’s to a happy, healthy and prosperous 2012!