A simple facial exercise routine can improve not just your skin’s appearance, but your entire quality of life. Because while we often think of facial exercises (also referred to as face yoga) as a natural alternative to botox, they do so much more for your overall wellness.
More on the immense benefits below, so keep reading!
If you spend time online, you may have noticed people making targeted movements and massage on their face and neck. They’re likely doing facial exercises that have become more popular on platforms like YouTube and TikTok.
Learn more about facial exercises and how to do them to start enjoying their benefits today.
New to Facial Yoga Exercises? Start By Reading This Introductory Article
The Immense Benefits of Doing Facial Exercises
If you are curious about these exercises, learn about the fascinating benefits of doing facial exercises on a regular basis! The results speak for themselves, and the practice does much more than help people maintain a youthful appearance. It’s really fascinating once you dive in!
1. Minimize Signs of Aging
Face yoga is a gentle exercise that stretches the muscles and effectively reduces visible signs of aging compared to procedures like face lifts or injections.
Many people try facial exercises to reduce common signs of aging, like wrinkles. Costly topical treatments or injections may take longer than they want to wait for results. The idea of signing up for an anti-aging surgery procedure also doesn’t appeal to everyone.
Face yoga is a non-invasive anti-aging technique that creates tighter skin elasticity without anything other than the muscles in your targeted facial regions. You can start naturally tightening wrinkles today without paying for a product or waiting for an appointment.
Jump right in with these 3 Anti-Aging Face Yoga Exercises for Healthy, Firm, Glowing Skin
2. Helps You Sleep Better
Massaging your facial muscles doesn’t just help your skin. The gentle movements also relieve tension that might keep you up at night. Some people store their stress in their bodies by contracting their muscles. You might not notice the tension until you feel too wound up to fall asleep.
Completing facial exercises before bed could improve your sleep quality after your first attempt. Gently press around your face to see if one area feels tighter than another. You can target your tension or try a comprehensive massage to fall asleep faster. A common area in the face for people to store tension is the jaw.
3. Clears Sinuses
Dealing with a stuffy nose doesn’t always mean you have a cold. The same stuffy tension also occurs during a sinus infection or allergy flare-up. Face yoga may help relieve this symptom alongside your preferred sinus infection or allergy treatments.
Interestingly enough, chiropractors use facial massages to drain mucus and reduce inflammation in clients suffering from sinusitis, also known as sinus swelling. Ease your tense or stuffy sinuses at home with face yoga videos focusing on the nose and forehead (we have one in this article!).
If you don’t get the relief you need, you can always get professional help from a doctor or chiropractor to learn the best way to reduce the pressure in your sinuses.
Need more allergy support? Try These 6 Effective and All-Natural Allergy Remedies
4. Can Help Reduce Anxiety
When people leave a traditional yoga class, they often feel the pleasant relief of post-exercise endorphins. While yoga often isn’t as intense as cardio or weight lifting, the movements still relieve the anxiety or stress you might feel.
Facial yoga movements create the same effect. You’ll apply gentle pressure around your face and neck to work your muscle groups. The pressure soothes the nervous system, allowing you to gain greater control over your anxiety.
Try These Online Yoga Classes for Stress Relief on YA Classes!
Parts of the Face That Benefit From Regular Exercise
Let’s break down the idea of facial exercises to better understand which parts of your face would be part of each exercise. Check out the specific regions that benefit the most from gentle facial exercises like the ones included in this article.
1. Mouth and Jaw Muscles
Many face yoga routines involve applying light pressure around the mouth and jaw. It’s part of easing the tension and improving the circulation in those areas. You might not think these areas have many muscles, but the tongue and neck muscles meet along your jaw and mouth.
Applying light pressure could reduce your typical daily tension or minimize the signs of aging in those areas if facial exercises become a consistent part of your routine.
2. Forehead
The forehead is another area in your face that tends to store a lot of tension. Your forehead muscles get a workout every day. They’re how you non verbally express your shock, frustration and confusion without saying a word.
The muscles controlling your brows and forehead benefit from facial yoga exercises. You’d ease them with a light touch, ultimately reducing your stress and decreasing the appearance of wrinkles as you age.
3. Neck
The neck can hold significant amounts of tension. Your shoulders constantly pull against your neck while your head uses your neck muscles for support. Trying facial yoga on your neck muscles could ease your daily neck pain.
It’s crucial to know that if your neck is sore after a weight-lifting workout or another form of physical exertion, don’t push yourself to do facial yoga. You should warm up your muscles with gentle stretches to improve your blood flow and reduce your risk of injury.
Afterward, you can apply the kind of light pressure that’s a core part of facial exercises without potentially damaging your recovering muscles.
4. Tongue
Your tongue may become your favorite place to focus your facial exercises because the high amount of nerve endings makes any pain relief more noticeable. It’s one large muscle connected to your jaw and neck. Working it with specialized face yoga techniques will relieve any tension held in the muscle so talking and eating are more comfortable.
Who Can Benefit From Doing Facial Exercises?
Anyone with facial aches or tension will benefit the most from facial exercises. People dealing with continuous high stress levels or anxiety may feel better after completing a strategic massage around their neck or face. Those living with sinus swelling can also relieve the pressure in their head with quick facial yoga routines.
If you feel recurring aches in the same areas (like your jaw for example), face yoga could be an effective pain management solution in addition to what already works for you. Follow along with a few of the facial yoga exercise videos below to experience relief today.
Anyone looking for a self-care practice that revolves around skincare will greatly appreciate these facial exercises. Also, anyone interested in natural skincare maintenance and prevention, since face yoga techniques are so effective.
Explore These 5 Facial Exercise Tutorial Videos on YouTube:
The following facial exercise tutorial videos are categorized by their specific focus and benefits. Press play on one or all of these YouTube videos based on your specific needs. These popular videos will help relieve tension, reduce the signs of aging or even support lymphatic drainage, depending on your goal.
1. Ease Your Jaw Tension
Learn how to relieve your jaw tension with Danielle Collins in her quick YouTube tutorial. The face yoga expert will lead you through a series of steps that are easy for beginners to follow and fast enough for people that don’t have a lot of time. Add this facial exercise to your skincare self-care routine, especially if you grind your teeth or clench your jaw frequently.
Reference these steps as you follow along to help learn the technique:
- Inhale, then exhale while letting your jaw rest completely open
- Repeat the first step two more times for a total of three exhales
- Massage the left and right sides of your jaw with the pointer and middle fingers on each hand, working upward toward your ears in small circular motions
- Once you reach the ears, continue the circular motions beneath and behind the ear lobes, applying as much pressure as feels comfortable
2. Reduce and Prevent Forehead Wrinkles
The precise movements of this facial exercise reduce forhead wrinkles by activating your facial muscles. This video from Sonali Beauty is perfect for beginners and takes about five minutes to complete (the first minute and a half is an overview before diving into the facial exercises).
Use these steps to follow along with the video:
- Apply medium to light pressure with all four fingertips from each hand on your forehead and gently rub
- Use three fingers in a zigzag motion in parallel lines across your forehead while the other hand’s fingers keep the forehead skin pulled taught
- Use the heel of the palm to gently yet firmly press the area between the eyebrows. Then repeat the same motion in an upward direction over each eyebrow. Repeat each side three times
- Use peace sign fingers to pull up from between the eyes, tracing over the eyebrows, and all the way down the sides of the neck
- Make a J-hook with your fingers to trace above the eyebrows to the temples with medium pressure. Repeat 3-5 times
- Make a fist with both hands and place your knuckles against the middle of your forehead. While applying light pressure, drag your knuckles toward your temple and down to your cheekbones
3. For Glowing Skin
If you want glowing, tighter skin, this face yoga exercise gently increases circulation for brighter, radiant skin. This tutorial from the All You Can Face YouTube channel takes about 10 minutes.
Adding this exercise to your schedule increases your commitment by automatically saving time for your facial yoga exercises each day or week. Watch the video while following along with these steps:
- Rub from the corner of your jaw down your neck and shoulder twice. Continue the same movement while patting along your neck muscle for another 25 seconds
- Repeat this step on the other side of your neck for the same length of time
- Curl your pointer fingers in toward your palms. Press them against your chin and rub one along your jaw to your earlobe repeatedly for 30 seconds. Repeat this step on the other side of your jaw for the same length of time
- While still curling your pointer fingers, place one against the upper curve of one nostril. Rub it in one continuous J-hook under your cheekbone and up to your ear. Repeat this step on the other side of your nose for the same length of time
- Place the tip of your pointer finger by each nostril, like you’re pointing at your nose. Massage both fingers in continuous circles for 30 seconds
- Place the pointer and middle finger of each hand on one of your cheeks. For 30 seconds, run them briskly up toward your eye so you’re only ever touching your cheekbone in a brief upward motion. Continue this movement quickly throughout the 30 seconds. Repeat this step on the other cheek for the same length of time
- Place the knuckle of your middle finger on the inner corner of your brow while putting the knuckle of your pointer finger against the same side of your nose. Do this on both brows and cheeks. Move both hands out toward your ears repeatedly for 30 seconds, applying light pressure with each movement
- Place the pointer and middle finger of each hand between your brows. For 30 seconds, run them up toward your hairline in quick upward motions
- While keeping your head still, move your eyes up and down for 30 seconds
- Still keeping your head in place, move your eyes left and right for 30 seconds
- Gently tap around your neck, face, forehead and head for 45 seconds
- Place the pointer and middle finger of each hand on your forehead. Rub two circles around your forehead and down your temples. Repeat this motion for 30 seconds
4. Face Lifting with Lymphatic Drainage
Give yourself a natural cheek and eyebrow lift while benefiting from lymphatic drainage in this facial exercise tutorial with The Moments YouTube channel. It’s an upper cheek, eyebrow, and forehead exercise that works the muscles while increasing circulation and lymphatic drainage.
Follow along with the video and read the highlight steps below:
- Using three fingers, pull them down along the side of your face, down the sides of your neck. Repeat three times
- Pull three fingers from each hand parallel across your forehead and down to your temples. Repeat three times
- Using middle and ring fingers, gently sweep up over your eyebrow towards your hairline
- Using ring fingers on each hand, start with inner corner of eye, then sweeping down, over cheekbone and up to the temples
- Gently draw small figure eights around the sides of your eyes and temples
- Using peace sign fingertips to frame the corners of each eye, gently apply pressure, then release three times
- Ring fingers of each hand will gently trace the outer lower perimeter of the nostrils three times
- Using all four fingers of each hand, horizontally pull fingers from nose to ears, then pull them down the sides of your neck
- Relax your neck and shoulders as you rest your cheeks on the heel of your palms with your elbows resting on a table and remain here for at least three seconds
5. Clear Your Sinuses
Clear the stuffiness in your sinuses with these simple movements demonstrated in this YouTube video from Rehab My Patient. The routine takes less than two minutes to complete and is especially helpful when you have a stuffy nose due to allergies or a cold.
Follow along with these steps as you watch the face exercise tutorial video:
- Place your pointer finger above the inner corner of one eyebrow and repeatedly massage in a clockwise direction
- Continue the clockwise massage between your brows, down the side of your nose and below your cheekbone
- Place your pointer finger in the same starting position above the inner corner of the same eyebrow. Massage clockwise while moving your finger along the top of your eyebrow
- Continue the massage down to your temple, upper cheekbone, the corner of your jaw and just under your jaw bone
- Repeat these steps on the other side of your face, switching back and forth until you feel sinus pressure relief
Now You’re Ready to Reap the Benefits of These Facial Exercises!
While some practitioners might think that one form of face yoga exercise is more effective than another, all of them can be beneficial when practiced regularly. Whether your goal is tightening wrinkles or easing sinus tension, choosing the right facial exercises tailored to those needs will yield the best results.
Any face yoga routine, when done regularly, will tighten the skin on your face by promoting better circulation to the muscles and skin cells. Increased blood flow means your skin receives more oxygen, aiding in muscle repair and strengthening over time.
Facial exercises like these offer numerous benefits, from improved circulation in your face, reducing tension, and diminishing wrinkles. You can easily do them at home or with an expert’s guidance, depending on your schedule, goals, and priorities.
Incorporate these face yoga exercises into your daily routine to enhance your overall facial health, skin health and wellbeing.
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