By Vanamala Mayr-Reisch
We all are creatures of habit. You might brush your teeth always with your right hand, open the door with your left, apply your moisturizer first on your left side and then on your right and so on. That means your muscles are used on one side of the body more often for certain activities than on the other. One of the main reasons why we lose our alignment in our bodies and faces are these habits. We repeat these movements hundreds or thousands of times without ever thinking about it.
The other day, I noticed that within seconds while walking through the kitchen, I had grabbed a pile of plates standing on the counter and stored them away into the drawers, before I even started to think about what I was doing. My husband stared at me in disbelief because he had just taken out these plates for dinner. This is the perfect example of how much our lives run on autopilot. I am still giggling about this peculiar incident.
The first step for Face Yoga is to become aware of unwanted habits. Many facial habits we repeat hundreds of times per day. For example, you are frowning, pulling down the corners of your mouth, or lifting your eyebrows. The repetitive nature of unwanted habits eventually creates wrinkles, deep lines, and asymmetry.
Face Yoga teaches you to bring awareness to your habits. You will learn to stop yourself from repeating these movements endlessly during the day, giving you the power to choose when and how to use your muscles.
How to break a habit quickly?
There’s a lot more to it than meets the eye. If you perform all your daily tasks the same way each day, your brain may have developed strong neural pathways, but much of your brain remains underutilized. When you start changing your routines, such as applying moisturizer with your right hand instead of the left, sitting in a different seat at the dinner table, or getting into bed from the other side, your brain becomes more active and adaptable and learns.
Previously dormant pathways will be activated. The right and left hemisphere of your brain will be stimulated to work together, which on the other hand will help you to improve your balance, your vision, your coordination and other crucial functions in the body. It is as if you open a dusty and forgotten wing of your house, which you haven’t used for a long time. As soon as you open the door to this place in your brain, a fresh breeze sweeps away the dust and cobwebs, and you will experience it in a different light.
to learn and to establish new neural pathways. You might find creative ideas start to surface, or you feel happy and refreshed as your mind sharpens.
Simple small changes in your life can change the way you experience the world. You might discover that it is exciting to see your surroundings from a different angle.
Furthermore, the new movements will help you to use your muscles on your right and left side more evenly, which could improve your posture and realign your body and face.
Try it today and implement small changes. Brush your hair with the other hand, carry your bag on your other shoulder, take a different route to work and stop frowning.
Face Yoga increases your awareness and gives you opportunities to recreate your life. It opens doors, which you didn’t even know existed.