How to Have Better Skin

There are numerous ways to attempt to cure and heal your skin externally, whether with creams, cleansers, moisturizers, or masks. But all of these ignore a crucial factor in skin health. That is, what you eat. Your skin is actually your biggest organ. One of its many important jobs is to expel toxins from your body. When you sweat, your body is letting toxins leave your skin through your pores. When you break out in rashes or pimples, it is a sign that your body is trying hard to get rid of toxicity from inside. 

So using topical creams, ointments, cleansers, caking on makeup and concealer, or using any sort of external way to try and stop symptoms is going to be useless, and possibly even more damaging if the real inner cause is not being addressed. 

Diet is one of the most important things to be thinking about throughout your natural skincare journey. If you are having trouble with acne, take a look at your diet. Are you eating a lot of sugar, dairy products, fast foods and/or greasy foods, wheat and meat products? If you have trouble with dry skin, check your intake of things like coffee, sugar, salty foods, wheat and alcohol. 

For acne, some really beneficial foods are: Orange and yellow veggies and fruits (apricots, carrots, oranges and sweet potatoes, for example). Spinach and other dark leafy greens. Turmeric, green tea, brown rice, quinoa, lentils and beans, nuts, blueberries and tomatoes. Along with a healthy balance of other fruits and vegetables.

For dry skin: sweet potato, red pepper, kiwi, avocado, turmeric, green tea, chia seeds, orange and yellow fruits, oats, bananas, tomatoes, spinach, pumpkin and sunflower seeds, lentils and other fruits and vegetables. 

The lists are actually pretty similar, which just goes to show the wonder of nature. The same plants can help heal seemingly opposite problems! 

It may seem like the list of skin-aggravating foods included just about everything you eat. Don’t worry, I’m not recommending cutting things out of your diet immediately, not at all. 

Going to any extreme can tend to push people right back and often to an even worse extreme. For example, I might eat some fast food every day, and occasionally get a salad. If one day I decided to eat only salad for the rest of my life, I’d likely grow sick and tired of salad. Eventually I’d fall back onto fast food, but maybe never get salads again, because now they would taste gross. This is because I would not have developed a taste for healthy foods.

There are plenty of ways to slowly incorporate more healing foods into your diet and train your taste buds to enjoy rather than suffer through them. 

Some things you could try are: 

1. Only eat fruit for breakfast for 1 day.
2. If you eat meat every day, try one day without meat.
3. If you eat wheat every day, or at every meal, try going without it for one day or one meal.
4. If you always eat dessert after supper, try skipping it one day.
5. If you drink pop, or alcohol, every day, try going a day with just water.

There’s so many little ways you can implement this. Make sure you’re listening to your body and how it feels. Did just eating fruit for breakfast leave you feeling weak and low energy? Maybe try a chia pudding or some oatmeal for a more filling breakfast. Did it leave you feeling light and energetic? Maybe try doing that 3 days a week, or every day. It’s up to you to figure out what is doable, but if you make tiny changes every day to steer yourself towards more natural, whole foods, you will begin to notice huge differences in your energy, how you feel and how your skin looks and feels.

Pay attention to your results and how you feel. Keep a little journal about them if you want. They won’t necessarily come right away, but the more you focus on what feels good to your body, the more you will notice little things piling up. Clearer, fresher, brighter, glowier skin, more energy, even things like more motivation and inspiration. Not to mention how good it feels just to feel that you are in control of your body and eating! Don’t compare yourself to others, start where you’re at and focus on how your body feels.

Drinking water, homemade fruit and vegetable juices and focusing on incorporating fresh fruits and vegetables into your daily eating is going to get you feeling so good. Your body is naturally regenerating constantly, Earth’s magical produce help that process along in a massive way.

What can you do today that is just a little step towards where you want to be?