About Yoga Workouts for Your Face
The yoga trend has made many people aware of its physical and emotional benefits, but the latest type of yoga promises cosmetic benefits as well. Classes emphasizing yoga for the face are making appearances around the world, and men and women swear by its power to firm up sagging face muscles. Madhavi Padhy, a yogi in India, points out that the face and neck have 57 muscles. Face yoga has students lifting, squeezing and relaxing these muscles. Gwyneth Paltrow, Madonna and Jennifer Aniston are among Hollywood's actresses who have jumped on the face-yoga bandwagon.
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History
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Annelise Hagen, a teacher at New York Health and Racket Club, if not the originator of face yoga, is definitely one of the sport's early adopters. In her yoga classes and her book, "Yoga Face: Eliminate Wrinkles with the Ultimate Natural Facelift," she popularized the face poses said to fight the effects of aging. Studios around the country have taken her lead, offering courses in Revita-Yoga, Yoga Face Lift, Fresh Face Yoga and Happy Face Yoga.
Features
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Some popular face-yoga poses include Lion Face, which involves inhaling and tensing the body's muscles from head to toe and then exhaling and relaxing them while sticking out your tongue. The Sphinx Smile addresses smile lines. Smile widely while keeping your forehead relaxed. The Satchmo looks ridiculous but firms the cheeks. Inhale and fill both cheeks with air. Pass the air from cheek to cheek until out of breath. Brow Smoother tackles those forehead worry lines by using the fingertips to slowly and lightly pull the eyebrows away from one another. Some classes incorporate acupressure massage techniques to further stimulate the facial muscles.
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Benefits
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Is it the fountain of youth? A good yoga workout for the face is said to tone and strengthen facial muscles, erasing years off the face. Instructors also teach students how to isolate the smallest of facial muscles for stretching, tensing and releasing. The process can invigorate these muscles and force people to release the tension they typically hold in their jaws, forehead and around their eyes. The process can also oxygenate the skin, soften skin texture and heighten skin tone. A side benefit to the classes is that laughter is a natural byproduct of creating such expressive faces in rapid succession.
Significance
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A regular practice of yoga poses for the face can aid the quest for a youthful appearance, but it can't accomplish the job alone. Smoking, a poor diet, dehydration, sleep deprivation, stress and not wearing sunscreen can battle the positive effects of a face-yoga workout. Gentle facials, face massages, relaxation exercises, healthy eating habits, vitamins and moisturizer can help keep the complexion more sparkling and youthful.
Misconceptions
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One of the main misconceptions about face yoga is that it will work miracles. While it can reduce the tension that people hold in their jaws and face muscles, thus softening lines and wrinkles, it is not the same as getting an extreme makeover. Think of it as a kinder, gentler Botox treatment. Yoga master Rodney Yee opines that relaxing the muscles of the face "...is an important part of yoga because the face is an indicator of tension in the rest of the body," but he adds that a regular yoga practice should focus on internal, rather than external, transformation.
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