Beauty Care Tips: Nourishing Self-Empowerment

It is important to be conscious of your thoughts while touching your face or taking care of your body.  Where your mind goes, your Qi follows.  When we focus on things that illicit positive emotions and keep our bodies functioning in the parasympathetic response, healing can occur more readily.    

I use my skincare time as an opportunity to be present or to affirm positivity.  If my mind begins to wonder to plans for the day or thoughts about the past, I come back to the present with affirmations or a happy song.  Here are some examples of affirmations I use: 

1. I am the light.  The light I am.

2. Beautiful as a flower.  Adaptive as the wind.  An ocean of power contained   within.  With the wisdom of a tree, I love me.  I love me.  I love me.  

3. Open and do not close. Open and let it go.  Relax your shoulders, relax your heart, don’t give in no matter what.  Love is all there is.

Water is an important component to the electromagnetic processes in our body.  Without adequate water, conductivity is diminished and the neurological system, as well as the entire body, suffers.  Water is also important to aid in the elimination of toxins through the kidneys and gastrointestinal tract.  Though individual needs vary, a good rule for daily water intake is to divide your weight in half and use that number as the number of ounces per day to drink of plain water (not including tea and other beverages).  If you drink coffee or soda, you will need extra water to rebalance the dehydrating quality of these beverages.  

Do you know what's in your water?  Our tap water in the U.S. can contain chloride, fluoride, hormones, and pesticides.  Investment into purchasing spring water or a filter that cleans small particles like fluoride can be well worth it when we consider what these harmful agents can do to our health.

The following are a few plants (and their beauty care applications) that are easy to grow indoors in a sunny window: 

*Aloe: the gel from the succulent leaves can be used topically for burns and wounds to promote tissue repair and stop bleeding.  It is also a great light moisturizer that firms and tones the skin.
*Calendula/Pot Marigold Flower: an antiseptic that promotes tissue repair, it can be used externally for bruises, sores, and skin ulcers.  It is also good for the hair and a strong tea can be used topically as a hair rinse.  Taken internally as tea, it can help remedy gastrointestinal upset.
*Lavender: soothing to insect bites/stings, acne, burns, eczema, and psoriasis, it also calms tension and relieves headaches.  A strong tea can be used as a hair rinse to promote growth.
*Rosemary: stimulates circulation, promotes tissue repair, and the aroma can benefit the brain and memory.  It also makes a good hair and scalp rinse as a strong tea or infused oil.

Beauty is everywhere.  It is easy to find beauty in art and the natural world.  The real challenge comes in finding beauty in tough situations and among the hate and destruction that is so prominent in today’s world.  To do this, we must consider just what beauty is.  Think about what happens to your mind and body when you see something you consider beautiful.  Beauty is a forced pause in mundane, expected, and planned reality, as it thrusts you into the present, awe inspiring moment.  It opens your heart and clears your mind.  Appreciating beauty is truly a spiritual experience.  Finding beauty in everyday life comes from having a wide perspective and refusal to get caught up in limiting beliefs.  Yet, practicing the appreciation of beauty can be as simple as looking at pictures of nature and art on a daily basis.  By taking time to focus on beauty, we uplift our spirits to love and our thoughts to inspiration.  The more that we give our attention to these beautiful things in the outer world, the more that we will inwardly reflect this beauty, order, and harmony.  When we truly begin to master appreciation of beauty, it is then that we also inevitably create it.