Want to improve your skin in 2023? Make these simple skincare resolutions and you’ll quickly see results.
A little note about New Year’s resolutions, they are supposed to be fun and not stressful at all. And also they are not needed. But I like to have a little bit of guidance in my behaviors moving into the new year and goal setting or resolution making has always been something that is a bit of a New Year’s tradition for me.
For me a big part of goal setting or making a resolution is also having a why like why am I changing my behavior so I will include this “why” with each skincare resolution.
Skincare Resolution 1: Wear and reapply SPF every dam day!
My first skincare resolution is wear spf every day. But If you’re like me, I already wear sunscreen every day. Can we make it better? How are you on reapplying? Do you put it on your body? Do you wear lip SPF? There are always ways we can improve. But please don’t obsess over sunscreen application. This should be something that you don’t think about and really just becomes an everyday habit.
Why do I need to wear SPF everyday?
You could be trying to improve your skin health and reduce your risk of skin cancer. You also could be doing it purely for aging benefits. we know that chronic UV exposure accounts for about 90% of skin aging. So if you’re able to regularly apply sunscreen, your skin is going to look better, feel better and be healthier for longer.
Skincare Resolution 2: Toss out expired skincare
My next resolution for you is to toss out expired skincare.
Skincare products only have a certain amount of time they can be used once opened, To know when yours will expire look for the POA ‘Period After Opening’ (the little tub-and-lid symbol that has a 6M or 12M, for example, printed inside it): Most products on the market have a shelf life of over 30 months when left unopened. The 6 or 12 indicate it’s safe to use for that number of months after opening
The Why
This is one I really really struggle with as I always have so many products open that I’m trying out. But do I really have to throw away an expired product? Like is it working any less efficaciously because it’s expired? Honestly, we just don’t know. Expired products are thought to be less effective and could cause irritations. So it’s best to err on the side of caution and throw them out.
Tip. When you open a product write the date on it so you’ll know how long you have to use it
Skincare Resolution 3: Do your pm routine before your crash in front of the tv
One thing that has helped me be a lot more consistent with doing my evening skincare routine is once I know I’m done for the evening, the sun has set and I’m not going out anywhere I do my evening skincare routine.
The Why
If you’re like me, once you sit down on the couch in the evening it’s hard to move and I’m so tired, I’m lucky if I do the bare minimum of a skincare routine.
If you do your routine early on in the evening you’re much more likely to stick with it. Plus it gives your products more time to sink in and not rub off on your pillow case. I think the only downside to this is if you do your whole skincare routine and then someone texts you to like go out. I mean once my makeups off the day’s done.
Skincare Resolution 4: Introduce a retinoid
If you are already pretty consistent with your night time skincare routine and you’re trying to level it up a little bit. I think a great resolution is to introduce a retinoid into your skincare arsenal. Remember retinoids are not a specific product but rather a category of skincare ingredients that include retinol and retinal. I think the biggest deterrent and reason why people don’t put a retinoid into their skin routine is because a lot of retinoid products cause some initial irritation or redness or inflammation of the skin that is really undesirable and kind of just annoying. And so a lot of times people will give up on their retinoid before they start to see the beneficial effects.
The Why
The reason having some type of retinoid product in your skincare routine can be so valuable is because aside from sunscreen retinoids have the most data to support their ability to reverse and prevent the signs of premature aging. They promote collagen production within the skin and also decrease collagen breakdown within the skin. They make the skin tone more even and can make the skin look more plump and glowy. And I mean, who doesn’t want that??
Skincare Resolution 5: Give Skincare Time to Work
My next skincare resolution has to do with something that I think we’re all a little bit guilty of which is being impatient when waiting to see results from our skincare so this resolution is all about giving your skincare products time to work.
The Why
It’s really important to remember that the upper layers of our skin renew themselves about once a month. And that’s like the fastest that that happens. If you are older or you have more sun damaged skin, it can be 45 days, even 60 days for the skin to renew itself. So if you’re using a topical skincare product for anti aging or to improve pigment, we’re expecting a minimum timeline of improvement to be a month. Oftentimes we need two or three or even four months to see benefits now this can be incredibly frustrating because the last thing you want to do, is get to the end of four months of using a product and go wow that really did nothing for me but that’s the name of the game unfortunately that’s how skin care work
The other thing is if you are using a skincare product to tackle a specific issue like acne or melasma, and you know you’re going to be using a product for several weeks or months before you’re looking for improvement. I strongly encourage you to take some really good photography before you start. We naturally adjust to our new skin or a new face very quickly and we kind of forget what we used to be dealing with. So if you are looking for a very targeted improvement, take some pictures.
What skincare resolutions are you making this year?
