Beauty is NOT Only Skin Deep

“Beauty is only skin deep...”: Whoever said that was a bit misinformed.

Beauty bubbles up from the inside out and gets impacted from the outside in as well.
Itʼs easy to forget that skin is our largest organ. It breathes, protects, and adorns us. Its condition reflects the total exposure we have to both the internal and external elements of our lives.

Letʼs start with the external. The sun, wind, car exhaust, and cat scratches of the outside world can all wear your skin away, causing sun spots, wrinkles, aging, and... um... scratches. This is where high-quality, toxin-free skin products can make all the difference, creating a protective and healing barrier between your skin and the inevitable onslaught of the outside world.

Internal elements are less visible but impact your skin like nobodyʼs business, even more than the external. What are these elements?

Water Studies have shown that you can improve your skin and reduce wrinkles by up to 30% simply by staying hydrated all day long. Try sipping room-temperature water all day long rather than chugging a glass of water when youʼre already thirsty. Better yet, squeeze some fresh lemon juice for an internally cleansing effect. Overall, aim for at least 1/2 cup each hour that youʼre awake.

“Clean” Foods Regardless of how you classify your eating habits (vegan, flexitarian, vegetarian, fruitarian, omnivore... and so on), prioritize a generous variety of high quality “clean” foods. For veggies and fruits, this means organic. For animal foods, look for naturally and humanely-raised options grown without antibiotics or hormones, fed what theyʼre supposed to eat (e.g. grass-fed, not grain-fed, for cows) and, ideally, raised with exposure to the sun. For both produce and animal foods, avoid genetically modified organisms (GMOs), which you can do so by looking for “organic” or “non-GMO” labels. Choosing clean foods will greatly reduce the amount of toxins entering your body and will better support the elimination of existing toxins.

Your Trigger Foods Not all foods are good for all people. You may think youʼre eating healthfully, and yet one of your usual - even “healthy” - food choices may be wreaking havoc with your skin, making it break out in pimples, rashes, or hives, or making it look sallow or otherwise less-than-perfect. Allergy tests combined with a delicious, well designed elimination-challenge diet can make all the difference.

Your Mindset It is no longer woo-woo to believe that what you feel and think impacts how you look and function in your body. There is plenty of science now to back this up. Reducing stress and adopting a more positive outlook on life all have immense immune system and regenerative benefits that will show up beautifully on your skin. So get happy!

As an added bonus: the good internal stuff makes you more resilient to the bad external stuff. Your skin will become a stronger natural buffer against natureʼs and lifeʼs onslaught.


The author, Simla Somturk Wickless, MBA, CHC, CNE is a holistic health coach, nutritionist, healthy lifestyle expert, speaker, and founder of Delicious Health.

She works with entrepreneurs, busy professionals and autoimmune clients internationally, transforming Busy Bodies into healthy Balanced Beings™ so that they can enjoy deliciously fulfilling lives. She loves inspiring her clients to take action and make lasting changes to increase energy, tame stress, find their natural weight, and promote self-healing… for good.

Questions? Feel free to post them on Simla’s Facebook page here.