Beauty Habits That Will Transform Your Entire Face (and life)

How you feel on the inside determines so much of how you look on the outside. This is going to sound strange, but we've got to talk about these things. I had been using cleansers all wrong for pretty much my entire life, so I made a few key changes that have now dramatically changed how I wake up and I thought that was the only way to apply eye makeup. I do really believe this habit is one of the most underrated beauty and lifestyle hacks. I do wish I knew this tip a long time ago. The first beauty habit. Something I didn't do for pretty much my entire life, but when I changed it, it dramatically improved my skin. I'm talking about cleansing your skin for at least 60 seconds. I used to stand at the sink, splash some water on my face, rub cleanser in for maybe 15 seconds, wash it off and be done with it. I never noticed a difference in my skin appearance, so I completely wrote cleanser off as one of those useless steps in a skincare routine and then I learned something not that groundbreaking, but really impactful for my skin. If you don't give cleanser enough time on your skin, you actually rinse it off before it has a chance to do anything. When I was learning about skincare, it helped me to understand the purpose and function of cleansers and there are two primary things that they do. Firstly, they dissolve oil and remove dirt. That's makeup, environmental pollutants, sunscreen, your own natural oils where you're producing too much and all the other stuff that just floats around in our air. Secondly, they prepare your skin for all of the other products that you're going to layer on top. Without a clean base, all of those expensive products that you're buying cannot get through all of the layers of your skin and do all the magic work that they're supposed to do. My routine now is supercharged. I first start with an oil-based cleanser and then I move into a gentle foaming cleanser. For both of these, I cleanse for at least 60 seconds, but I have noticed the biggest impact with using an oil-based cleanser. It not only cleans and hydrates my skin at the same time, my pores, specifically around my nose, look visibly smaller. My skin is significantly softer and my overall face appearance has gotten brighter and more vibrant. So if you've ever been like me and thought that cleansing was an unimportant, useless step of your skincare, try cleansing for a little bit longer. If you have already known about this for a long time, let me know in the comments below what benefits you've seen to your skin. This is the next habit, and it's going to sound completely insane and bizarre if you've never heard about this, but I promise it's pretty life and face changing. We're talking about mouth taping to promote nose breathing. I used to wake up in the middle of the night constantly with a sore throat, really dry lips, a dry mouth, under eye bags, and then in the morning, I'd always wake up with a headache. It was such an unpleasant way to wake up. Then as I was reading the book Breath by James Nesta, I read one very interesting line. Breath inhaled through the nose, kept the body strong, made the face beautiful and prevented disease. That line alone is pretty interesting in and of itself. What I learned about myself is that I was in fact a mouth breather. I went on a journey for six months of taping my mouth shut whilst I was sleeping with soft surgical tape to promote nose breathing. There is a lot of research that exists to back this up, the benefits of nose breathing versus mouth breathing. And one of the most interesting things to me is the fact that it can help realign your facial jaw muscles. In addition to that, nose breathing is one of the easiest ways you can start to clear your skin and reduce under eye bags or dark circles. I used to struggle so badly with this. I tried endless products, ice on my face, cucumber, you name it, I did it. Nothing ever worked to actually reduce the appearance of my under eye circles until I started to actively nose breathe and it became more of a pattern in my day-to-day life. The nose is basically a mini air filter. It can filter out particles, dirt, bacteria more than your mouth can. That means every time you practice nose breathing, your body is taking in better quality air leading to a more oxygenated body. And that's super important for our skin health and for the overall vitality and vibrance that your body has. After about six months of pretty religiously sleeping with my mouth tape on and practicing to nose breathe, I no longer wake up in the middle of the night with dry lips, a sore throat, I no longer wake up with a headache and I no longer have those dark under eye circles. This could be something that really, really helps you and starts to slowly but surely change and transform your appearance. I'm interested to know if you're aware of nose breathing and if you've tried mouth taping. Let me know in the comments below and what your experience has been like. We have to talk about eyes. They say that eyes are the windows to the soul. So it's worth getting this right. For a long time, I was applying makeup all wrong. I was making my eyes look smaller, darker in a non-flattering way. And I was generally just very confused and unsure how to work with my own eye shape and eye color. The problem is I grew up being exposed to black eyeliner and heavy mascara. And I thought that was the only way to apply eye makeup. But when I started learning about colors, exploring my own style through clothing, I realized that some of the same principles actually apply to your face. So I switched out my black eyeliner for brown because I have warm undertones, I have olive skin, and brown is a lot softer and less harsh on my skin. It's naturally flattering. Sometimes black on my skin tone can create a little bit too much contrast and too much harshness. I also stopped applying mascara from base to top, which made my eyes look smaller. So now I have a bit of a three-step process when it comes to applying my own eye makeup. So I have this really old eyeshadow palette, but it has this chocolate brown eyeshadow that I love. I take quite a small amount of product with an angled brush and I apply a little bit under my lower lash line. I focus the brush on the outer corners because too much on the inner corner would make my eyes look smaller. I'll then take that same angled brush and create a very soft blurred wing. This helps extend my eye. I don't apply too much product to the top of my eyelid as that will make my eyes look heavy. Again, making them look smaller than they are. I kind of keep this a bit blurred and smoky looking and blend this all into my lashes so it looks like a natural extension of my eye. Then I'll go in and create a little bit more contrast and definition with eyeliner. I go in with my favorite brown liner and follow the same pattern that I just did with the eyeshadow. Create one small line underneath my bottom lashes in the outer corner. Thin but long and curved wing. And then I usually avoid putting any liner on the top of my eyes because I find that again it doesn't help flatter my own eye shape. The last part is mascara. I still use black mascara but I've used brown in the past and I think it works great as well. The difference is how I apply the black mascara. I really only apply mascara to the outer edges of my lashes and I avoid applying the mascara from the base of my eyelashes basically where the waterline is all the way to the top. That's because my eyelashes have a tendency to drop down a little bit. So if I apply too much product to the very base of my lashes it's actually going to make my eyelashes heavier and result in my lashes dropping even further making my eye look smaller and more closed. I don't tend to add too much mascara to the bottom of my lashes because my bottom lashes are actually quite long and if I have mascara there it just puts makeup all over my under eyelid and that's not a great look. That's why I rely on the brown eyeshadow instead because it still gives the illusion of that fuller bottom lower lashes. If you have a lighter complexion than I do then a lighter brown shadow might work better. So pay attention to your own undertones the colour of your eyebrows, your own lashes and your hair and choose a version of brown that is a little bit more similar to that and that will help create a bit more of a natural blended look. We can't talk about improving appearance, mood and energy without touching on diet. The problem with constant diets and strict lifestyle changes is that they often focus on the outside appearance a little bit too much and they don't pay attention to what's going on in the inside which is sometimes way more important in looking and feeling better. Everything changed for me when I learned about digestion and gut health. It took the pressure off food and being kind of obsessed with that and trying to force change through that way. It's more about how it impacts you as a person. It is your second brain. Your gut and your digestion controls your hormones, inflammation, energy and yes your skin, your hair, even your face shape. Once I started to understand that I made some key changes to my lifestyle that have now significantly improved my relationship with food and my body which I think is the most beneficial thing out of all of this. I focus on the mechanisms and the tools that are going to help give me more vitality in my life. I purposely support my own digestion with things like L-glutamine which is a science-backed supplement that helps repair the internal gut lining, true fermented foods and even with prebiotics so that I can support the breakdown and digestion of all the different macro and micronutrients. The second tool I now rely on is chewing my food properly. The more you can chew and break down your food the more of a helping hand you're actually giving your stomach. Not to mention chewing properly and that means 20 to 25 times each mouthful actually starts to realign your jaw and help strengthen your jaw muscles and that can help you just sculpt your face and help you work with your own natural jaw shape. Chewing properly also reduces puffiness and water retention that gets stored in your cheeks. The last part of digestion for me is prioritizing fiber and deprioritizing sugar. Two of the biggest things that I've taken away is to start my meals with vegetables. This does two things for me. Firstly, it helps me slow down and chew my food properly and secondly, it helps prepare the gut and the stomach lining for all of the heavier proteins, carbs or fats that are about to come into your stomach. Fiber is amazing for our digestion and it can help improve your mood and create stable energy levels. It also means that you're actually eating enough vegetables throughout the day or throughout the week which I know many of us struggle with. Secondly to this, starting my meals with vegetables means that I have less space in my stomach to fill up on sugar. I've definitely noticed a dramatic difference in my overall appearance and my digestion when I eat less processed sugar. My face is less bloated. My mood is so much more stable. I have better energy levels. I'm just generally a happier, better person to be around. I think my eyes look more vibrant and it's helped me sleep better. So many positives that have come from a very small change. I do really believe that this habit, your digestion, is one of the most underrated beauty habits that you can implement in your life because it is a domino effect. Helping you transform from the inside out to something so empowering and life-giving. I know you know just how important sleep is. You don't need me telling you that. What I didn't realize though is how I was sleeping was affecting my face and therefore my mood and my energy. There was a period of time in my life where I was consistently struggling with a very puffy face and frizzy tangled hair. Through a lot of trying different solutions I figured out it was down to a couple of things. I was tossing and turning a lot, resulting in me waking up a lot in the middle of the night. I was getting frustrated while I was trying to sleep because my hair was either falling into my face or getting sort of behind my back in uncomfortable positions. I made a few key changes that have now dramatically changed how I wake up and improved the appearance of my hair. It starts with my eye mask, an absolute non-negotiable these days. There are two reasons why I sleep with an eye mask. Firstly because you don't realize how much light might actually be getting through your eyes or through windows if you're not sleeping in a truly pitch black environment. Too much light getting in could mean that you are squinting your eyes whilst you're trying to sleep in order to block out the light but you're not realizing it. Meaning you're holding a lot of tension and tightness in your face and around your eye muscles. That can lead to unnecessary wrinkles and then it also helps create a little bit of protection on my skin from tossing and turning. Your skin is a sensitive and delicate organ. Naturally as your skin rubs against a pillow or slightly harsher surfaces it's going to create friction. That friction could cause unnecessary damage to some areas of your skin. The second part of my routine is protecting my hair. I use this silk satin bonnet every single night. Since I've started doing that I have noticed a dramatic difference in the level of frizz that my hair creates and the level of breakage that I experience. I naturally have thick hair and it's prone to being a frizzy unmanageable mane and the unnecessary friction that's caused from rubbing your hair against pillows, blankets creates static. That static can cause buildup in your hair and lead to breakage and the frizz halo that none of us are too fond of. I found that sleeping with the bonnet also maintains my hairstyle so I don't have to continually reapply heat or product to my hair that could eventually cause too much damage. And lastly it gets me into a deeper state of sleep. With my hair tied back out of my face put away I am not distracted by it, it's not annoying, it's not falling into my face. All the things that make me annoyed and frustrated when I'm trying to fall asleep and lead to poor quality sleep. So now I might look like a crazy person with my hair tied up in my bonnet and my big chunky eye mask but it is a surefire way to help me get better quality, more restful, more beautifying sleep. The last tip of my sleep setup is all to do with my pillow arrangement. This might not sound important but if you are someone who struggles with any kind of lower back pain, neck pain or even digestive discomfort, this little tip is going to be super helpful for you. Sleeping with your upper back and neck slightly more elevated than your heart can help keep any kind of stomach acids and acid reflux down in the pit of your stomach as opposed to it flushing back up your esophagus. That not only helps prevent more restful sleep because you're not being irritated by that throughout the night but it can help reduce the puffiness that you might wake up with in the morning. And I have found it's a much more comfortable position because it reduces some of the strain that gets built up in your lower back from sleeping completely flat. If you haven't tried this, try it. That's all I can say. It's such a simple thing but it really changes how you sleep, how you feel in the morning, how rested you are, your energy and eventually your overall appearance. They are the habits that have seriously impacted and changed my life, have made me feel better from the inside and from the outside. So let me know which habits you are going to explore if they are things from this video or things that are already part of your life that have been really impacting you in a positive way whether that's from the outside or from the inside. I would love to know and they will definitely help other people who are looking for little things to improve their life, to change their mood. If you found the video helpful, subscribe, like so that I know you did. And as always, I appreciate you. Thank you so much for being here with me. Take care for now and I will see you very soon. Bye.