Bad Habits That Ruin Your Skin and How to Stop Them
We all have specific routines that are developed from our lifestyle preferences, interests, and busy schedules. They allow us to keep certain tasks consistent and, therefore, easy to understand and perform over and over again. From these routines, habits begin to form—rituals or behaviors that we start executing automatically. Habits help us get through our daily preparations more efficiently and make it easier for us to complete monotonous things and move on with our days. But just like good habits can develop from regular routines, bad ones can develop as well. This can have serious effects on our overall well-being and even our skin’s vitality. If you want to maintain your health long-term, it’s crucial that you find ways to stop making these poor choices. Here are some bad habits that ruin your skin and how to stop them.
Skipping Your Sun Protection
The sun can cause some of the harshest long-term effects on your skin, from premature aging to hyperpigmentation and, more severely, skin cancer. There’s strictly no reason not to protect yourself from the sun in some way. Even so, many people still don’t remember to use sun protection outdoors—or want to take the time to. Basically, people leading hectic lifestyles often don’t see it as a priority. Slowing down to put on sunscreen might make your daily routine a bit longer at first, but sticking with the change can make it just another part of your day.
Missing Out on Sleep
Not getting enough sleep can also cause serious damage to your skin. The time you spend resting is when your body recuperates from the following day. It’s also when your body does the most healing, energizing, and generally taking stock of its physical state. As such, if you aren’t sleeping properly, it can severely hinder your skin’s ability to bounce back from injuries and heal itself of blemishes. You might consider yourself a night-owl and enjoy staying up late, but it’s important that you set a regular sleep schedule. This way, you can still be sure to get a full eight hours of sleep each night.
Forgetting to Wash Items That Have Direct Skin Contact
Whether you notice it or not, your skin has direct contact with many different items from the time you wake up to the time you go to bed. These things might seem perfectly clean on the surface, but at the cellular level, they could be covered in everything from dirt and grease to dead skin cells. For this reason, prolonged skin contact with these surfaces can transfer this debris to your pores and result in harsh breakouts. Cell phones and bed sheets are two common items this can occur with. As such, it’s highly encouraged that you get into the habit of regularly disinfecting or washing potentially dirty surfaces around your home.
Sticking with an Unhealthy Diet
Your diet also has just as much to do with the state of your skin as any external factors. After all, you’re bound to get out of your body what you put into it. If you tend to favor greasy, processed foods, it will certainly take its toll on your complexion. For the most positive effects, it’s important that you get full servings of fruits and vegetables every day as well as drink plenty of water. Additionally, you should take steps to rid yourself of other unhealthy consumption habits, such as smoking or drinking alcohol, if you want to see an improvement in your skin. Alcohol in particular is fine in moderation, but it can cause toxins that can damage your healthy skin cells to build up in your system.
Wearing Your Makeup to Bed
Another bad habit that’s potentially ruining your skin is wearing your makeup to bed at night. It might be easier to just let yourself fall into bed after a long, stressful day, but leaving makeup on overnight can cause it to sink further into your pores. Combined with the other dirt and oils you accumulated on your face throughout the day, this can clog your pores and inflame your skin into a full-fledged acne breakout. Therefore, cleaning your face before lying down is one of the best ways to keep future blemishes from occurring.
Over-Exfoliating and Not Using Lotion
Regularly exfoliating your skin is a key step to clearing your pores of excess dirt and grime, which can cause breakouts. However, there’s a reason why it’s recommended that you only exfoliate a few times a week rather than every day. Exfoliating too often or too harshly can actually rob your skin of the oils it needs and severely dry it out. This dryness makes skin very sensitive, and in particularly bad case, it can develop a painful rash similar to that of eczema. As such, if you want to make exfoliating a part of your routine, only exfoliate two to three times a week, and always moisturize afterward.
Changing Your Skin Care Routine Too Frequently
Even constantly switching up your skin care routine can have some negative effects on your skin’s health. Experimenting with new products on occasion isn’t a bad thing, but when you don’t give your skin time to adjust to the formulas, it can do more harm than good. In fact, frequently switching products can make your skin develop sensitivities to certain ingredients. This increases the likelihood of a reaction and makes it much more difficult for you to find products that work for you. Because of this, if you try something new, give it a few weeks to work before moving on to something else.
At Flawless Beauty & Skin, our mission is to supply you with everything you need to properly care for your skin, whether it’s skin-brightening soaps, anti-aging products, acne treatments, or even just knowledge. An effective skin care routine requires tools, so by ensuring you have the right products and a detailed understanding of how the skin works, we aim to set you up for the most success possible.
