According to Dr. Daniel Amen, author of ‘Change Your Brain, Change Your Body’, by taking care of your brain, you will be able to improve the appearance of your skin.  Each day my position on inner health stands a little closer to Dr. Amen’s position:  take a moment to think about what is going on inside your body and your brain and how your lifestyle and environment are affecting both your skin and your brain.

People, especially women, spend so much time and money working on their skin, when the first organ to take care of to have great-looking skin is your brain.  The cosmetics counter, the dermatologist, the plastic surgeon-this is where you run to reverse the aging process.  But, skin care products, laser treatments, and the scalpel are often only temporary fixes.  The real fix lies in your brain.

Once reading the above excerpt, I decided, okay, Dr. Amen, you have my attention, I’ll bite.  I’m still biting.  That was several books ago on internal health for external health, beautifying foods, the falsity of the cosmetics industry… all pointing with very large, brightly colored arrows toward one pertinent message:  It is not what you put on the outside, but what you put on the inside that matters most.

The prevailing concept behind the message has resonated with me for years but the universe is throwing it in my face everywhere I turn and now it’s time to share the enlightenment on the subject, or the opinions of my findings.

Dr. Amen, similar to many naturalist MD’s states that your lifestyle and environment are affecting both your skin and your brain, and usually not to the healthiest degree, but rather the opposite.

He explains over 18 lifestyle and environmental factors that play a negative role in the skin’s functionality and appearance.  I am going to highlight the most common.

1.  Too much Caffeine from coffee, tea, chocolate, or some herbal preparations dehydrates your skin, which makes it look dry and wrinkled.

2. Alcohol has a dehydrating effect on the body, sapping moisture from your skin and increasing wrinkles.  It also dilates the blood vessels and capillaries.  With excessive drinking, the blood vessels lose their tone and become permanently dilated, giving your face a ‘flush’ that will not go away.  Alcohol also depletes Vitamin A, an important antioxidant involved in skin-cell regeneration.  Alcohol abuse damages the liver and reduces its ability to remove toxins from the body, resulting in increased toxins in the body and skin that make you look older than you actually are.

3. Nicotine reduces blood flow to the skin, robbing it of that healthy glow.  It also destroys elasticity, which promotes wrinkles.  The act of puffing on cigarettes also adds fine lines to your upper lip.  If you smoke for ten years or longer you can end up with ‘smoker’s face’.  This makes people look older than their true age and includes the following facial characteristics:  lines at the corners of the eyes, on the cheeks, or the jaw, and above and below the lips; a graying tone and a reddish complexion.  And smokers are three times more likely to develop a very serious type of skin cancer, Squamous Cell Carcinoma than non-smokers according to a study in the Journal of Clinical Oncology.

4. Your daily food intake fuels your skin cell’s regeneration, which make themselves new approximately every thirty days.  Your skin reflects the nutritional quality of your diet.  If you eat a deficient diet, your skin will not have the proper nutrients to look well-aged.

5. Eating high glycemic foods and too many sweets causes wrinkles? Yes.  According to the British Journal of Dermatology, consuming sugar promotes a natural process called glycation, in which sugars attach themselves to proteins that form harmful molecules called AGE’s, or advanced glycation end-products.   These little molecules damage your brain and also damage collagen and elastin, the protein fibers that help keep your skin firm and supple.  The more sugar you consume, the more damage to these proteins, and the more wrinkles appear on the face.

6. When you don’t drink enough water, similar to consuming too much alcohol or caffeine, the body and your skin becomes dehydrated.

7. Without adequate rest your skin misses out on the crucial rejuvenation process that occurs during ‘sleep time’.  The result of this leads to bags under the eyes, increase in wrinkling, and overall premature aging of the skin.

8. Lack of exercise, or couch potato syndrome deprives you of the antiaging benefits of physical activity.  when the blood flow is increased, it allows the body to send vital nutrients to the skin through increased circulation.

9. Researchers have pinpointed a strong brain-stress-skin-connection.  Your brain sends signals to your skin that can result in pimples and breakouts in response to stress.  Scientific evidence has also found that psychological stress worsens symptoms of common skin conditions, i.e. eczema and psoriasis.

These are of the most common aggravators to aging skin, although there are many more that play a role in robbing our youthful appearance.   Be sure to take a vitamin supplementation-fish oil and vitamin D, drink enough water, limit the skin dehydrators to a minimal amount, exercise, and eat a brain healthy diet, for starters.