Having poor skin can affect your confidence and can certainly make you very self-conscious. It is the first thing that people see.
Your skin also affects how people perceive your age. There are so many anti-aging & anti-wrinkle products on the market that can attest to this.
So much money is spent on improving the skin. People go to dermatologists, estheticians or you see the infomercials on TV offering skin care lines for troubled or problematic skin.

None of these solutions are bad it's just that they all have their place.
Many go through many extremes in order to have their skin and looking healthy & vibrant. Some do plastic or laser surgery to remove acne and blemishes from their face.
How to improve your skin naturally is a question that we receive all the time at our Holistic Center
They want to know if working with us or doing a particular program will help to improve their skin. This is a serious concern for a lot of people, especially women.

Common Suggestions To Improve Your Skin

Drink more water

Drinking water is definitely a necessity for just overall good health and well-being because our bodies are predominantly water. We properly hydrated for our bodies to perform optimally and to flush out toxins.

Eliminate soda and other sugary drinks

Removing or reducing these drinks can certainly help to improve your skin.

Eliminate Processed Dairy

The hormones, antibiotics and other chemicals in commercial/processed dairy has been known to affect people's skin.

All of the items listed above certainly enhance the quality of your skin but we want to focus on ways to improve the quality of your skin naturally, so that you are happy with its look and feel.

The best approach to improving your skin is to take a holistic approach.

Before we dive into what this is, the first step in improving your skin is to understand what your skin really is.
It is really important to address what the skin is because how can you improve upon something if you don't truly understand what it is?

Your skin is a protective barrier but most importantly it's an organ of elimination.

We have different ways of expelling waste from our body and the skin is one way. When we sweat we are regulating our body temperature but we are also eliminating toxins via the pores of our skin.
When our body is not able to remove toxins fast enough, it will begin to expel toxins through different channels, so your body will actually use your skin to eliminate waste.
When people begin to have breakouts, rashes or experience other complications with their skin a lot of times there is toxicity within the body. Their body is trying to rid itself of toxins actually through the the skin. This is a cleansing response.  Unfortunately what commonly happens when a person breaks out is they put things on their skin to push the waste back down into their skin.
Which goes against what our bodies naturally trying to do.  It's like you're fighting against your body's natural internal process. Instead of allowing those toxins to be expelled from the body you are pushing them back in.
We need to get out of our bodies on way and allow those toxins to be expelled from the skin.

Our skin is a natural indicator of what is going on inside of our body.

When you have skin problems it's just letting you know that there is an imbalance going on inside of your body and this is just signaling for you to look a little deeper and address certain things that may be going on.
This can also be a reflection of your nutrition, how you currently eat.
Your skin is going to be a reflection of your lifestyle as well. All of these things contribute to what's going on with your skin and understanding your skin better.

Your skin doesn't just eliminate it also absorbs.

Your body drinks anything that comes in contact with your skin. Our skin is a protective barrier to protect the insides of our body from being exposed to the environment on a large scale and it protects us from outside things being exposed to inside of our bodies on a larger scale.
Things that come in contact with us do get absorbed so you have to understand that when you come in contact with different chemicals or different types of environments from the soaps and lotions and the different things that we put on our skin, just know that it's not just staying on the outside of our skin. Our bodies are absorbing these products on the inside of our skin as well.
When you use a lot of topical products on your skin to cover up skin eruptions or pimples a lot of times the chemicals in the products are very toxic. So is like your compounding the situation of pushing the toxins back into your skin and doing it with toxic chemicals which certainly doesn't help in the long run.
Just understand that the skin absorbs and it will also push out, so there is an exchange from the inner to the outer and from the outer to the inner when it comes to your skin. This is the very big piece of the puzzle.
So now let's talk about how your body's internal environment is being expressed on the skin itself.

When you are experiencing breakouts that's normally a sign of toxicity going on within your body and that your body may be overly toxic.

The one thing that is very important is detoxification, making sure that you cleanse your body properly.
An abundance of toxins in your body will be reflected on your skin.
Another common area of toxicity that occurs within the body deals with regularity.
Are you moving your bowels on a regular basis? This is a another major elimination channel within the body, so if you're not regularly having a bowel movement at least once a day then where are those toxin going?
They're going back within the body and recirculating and the body has to eliminate them to through another Channel.
In Chinese medicine there is a correlation between the colon (large intestine) and your lungs. and there's a huge correlation between your lungs and your skin.
We generally find if that if a person has a toxic colon that it reflects on their skin a lot of times.
So if you're experiencing constipation or an impacted colon and you are noticing that your skin is being affected as far as breakouts, acne, rashes. There probably is a correlation between your skin health and your colon health.

When we began working with people to detox their colon we noticed that their skin actually improved.

Another area to address when looking to improve your skin is nutrition.
If you're consuming a lot of processed foods, fast foods & dehydrated foods, these things certainly can affect your skin.
The nutritional density of your food is also very important because the nutrients in the food can also help to feed your skin.
So if you're consuming foods that are rich in vitamin C and beta-carotene. These foods are great for your skin and help to improve it's elasticity.
Diets rich with foods that contain the good oils and fats help to add moisture and hydration to your skin and also helps with skin constitution. It's not just about water.
On the flip side if you can send the poor fats, this is what ages your skin and contribute to cellulite and causes so much stress on the body.

We did a three-part series on fats. Fats that heal & fats that Kill. You can access those episodes here:

Episode 60 : The Truth About Fats: Fats That Heal & Fats That Kill – Part 1

Episode 61: The Truth About Fats: Fats You Need To Avoid & Why – Part 2

Episode 62: The Truth About Fats: The Fats You Should Consume – Part 3

There certainly are foods that will cause your skin to age and actually look worse.
Commercial dairy products that have been processed, will cause inflammation and can have a negative impact on the skin.
High alcohol consumption, stressful lifestyle and smoking can definitely effect your skin and lead to premature aging.

Conclusion

There are many ways you can improve upon your skin as well negatively affect your skin.
The main takeaway is to understand that there are many different factors that will determine the quality of your skin.
When improving the skin what most people do is pick one thing and just do that.
So someone may decide to eat a certain type of food to help improve my skin.
Or someone may decide to avoid all the things that may cause skin problems.
Or they decide to go to the dermatologist or they just use a specific type of facial product that they picked up.
Some may decide to do a detox, and feel like that will be enough.

It's really not that simple when you really start to understand the skin.

Your skin begins to replace itself within a month. You can actually start replacing old skin and begin to completely rebuild your skin.  But the million dollar question is, what is my skin replacing itself with?
You have an opportunity to completely improve your skin, if you take a holistic approach to that process.
Understand what your skin is and how internal and external environments affect the health of your skin.
Understand how what you put into your body impacts your skin for the better or for the worse.
High alcohol consumption, smoking and a stressful life ages your skin. So be more conscious and aware of your actions.
Implementing a good skin care regimen can also help to improve your skin.
And as far as a dermatologist, when you use one just understand that is more of a medical approach. There is a time and place for this, but as far as taking a holistic approach, we view the dermatologist as a last resort.

Apply these tips to help to improve your skin naturally.