Oil cleansing is no stranger to this community, but if you happened to stumble upon this blog post by chance, take this as a sign to ditch all traditional cleansers and start cleansing your skin with oil. My intention is to re-educate you on the beauty and RITUAL of skin care and the Magick of using oil on the skin.
𓂅
First lets dive into the origin of oil cleansing. Oil cleansing dates back thousands of years, it was one of Cleopatra's ancient beauty rituals. In fact, oil cleansing was the original method used to wash the face and body. Foaming cleansers weren't introduced to us until the early 1900s. This became the era where over cleansing and sanitizing was the new standard of cleanliness. Soaps and detergents have their role but that excludes lathering them on the skin.
𓂅
So lets get into WHY oil cleansing is so healing to the skin. Think of your skin like an ecosystem, full of trillions of good and bad bacteria. When we use traditional cleansers and exfoliants we are disrupting that balance of good and bad bacteria. Instead of nurturing our ecosystem, we end up destroying our facial bacteria and stripping our acid mantle of its precious oils. Washing the skin with soaps and cleansers leaves behind harmful surfactants. These surfactants burrow their way into the different layers of our skin and stay there. When these surfactants start to build up they wreak havoc on the skin.
Here are some KEY signs that may indicate that your skin's microbiome is out of balance.
Acne
Eczema
Oily skin
Dry skin
Oily/Dry patches
Flaky skin
Red/Inflamed skin - However this is different if your skin has red undertones. Red undertones are normal and are apart of your genetic makeup. A good way to test this is to press a finger firmly into you thigh, if it turns red soon after, its genetics.
𓂅
The skin is simple, given the right environment and healthy microbiome it can thrive on its own. When we cleanse the skin with oil, it reintroduces hydration to our skin and provides nutrients to the bacteria, creating a balanced and healthy ecosystem. Your skin recognizes oil, it knows exactly how to absorb the nutrients given. Oil Cleansing will harmonize your skin and bring it back into homeostasis. You will no longer have to rely on a product for hydration, your skin will start to, once again create its own natural hydration.
𓂅
Now that you are aware of the Magick of oil cleansing, choosing the right type of oil is ESSENTIAL, you don't want to use just any oil to cleanse. A lot of common oils are rancid upon use. You want to avoid grape seed oil, apricot kernel oil, sesame oil, and walnut oil. Using a high quality organic oil will transform your skin's microbiome into a healthy, balanced, and thriving ecosystem. I use and refer all my clients to The Best Skin Ever Seabuckthorn Oil by Living Libations. Nadine creates the purest botanical facial products that I have ever come across, everything is next-level, beyond pure.
I invite you to bring your skin regimen back to the basics, in harmony with NATURE.
You can find the products mentioned in the post below