Kickstart your holistic approach to beauty and wellness

It’s no secret that healthy skin and hair is a priority for many people, considering the beauty industry earned almost $50 billion in 2019. However, it can be easy to get hung up on treating an individual symptom with a single product. The truth is that clear, glowing skin and strong, full hair are directly correlated to your overall health and wellness. For long-term solutions to common problems such as hair loss or acne, it’s important to take a holistic approach to your skin and hair care routine.

The concept of holism has been practiced for thousands of years in eastern healing practices of Ayurveda and ancient Chinese medicine. It’s these time-honored traditions that brands like HANAH and Collective Laboratories turn to when creating products that provide results that you can see and feel. Dedicating yourself to a holistic beauty routine might sound like a big undertaking, but it’s not as daunting as you might think. HANAH and Collective Laboratories are teaming up to inspire your shift to a more holistic approach to hair and skin care.

So what does a holistic beauty routine look like? You may have noticed the term cropping up in the beauty industry more and more. Unfortunately, it’s often misinterpreted or used by brands as a catchy marketing ploy. For something to be “holistic” means that it considers the wholeness of the body, mind and spirit to achieve a desired result, rather than addressing a specific part or symptom. When applied to skin and hair health, it means going after the root cause as opposed to treating individual symptoms. A holistic approach is recognizing that everything from your environment, diet and even mental state has an effect on the overall balance of your bodily system, and an internal imbalance can manifest externally in the form of skin or hair problems.

Elements of a holistic skin & hair care routine

The importance of ingredients

Our skin, including the scalp, is an extraordinary organ that performs many crucial functions for the human body. It’s important that we carefully consider the ingredients that we introduce to it. Do your research and seek out brands that are transparent about their ingredients and sourcing. Collective Laboratories searches the world for the most effective and highest quality natural ingredients and provides detailed information and studies for each one. The Collective Laboratories Regimen sets the stage for healthy hair growth by going straight to the source—the scalp—to detoxify, fortify and revive with the right ingredients.

Consider your diet

The saying “beauty is more than skin deep” is actually true. The food or supplements that we consume are directly linked to our skin and hair health. A balanced, nutrient-dense diet keeps our internal systems balanced, which is reflected outwardly through your skin. Foods that are rich in vitamins and antioxidants nourish hair follicles, strengthen hair shafts and provide protection from free radicals that attack our healthy cells. Food supplements can be another helpful addition to your diet to provide needed nutrients. HANAH Coffee Boost: Beauty combines four powerful herbs known for their antioxidant, antimicrobial and anti-inflammatory properties with coconut milk powder to support radiant, clear skin and healthy hair.

Hydrate, hydrate, hydrate

Drinking enough water might be one of the most important things you can do to maintain overall health and wellness, which makes sense considering that most of the human body is made of water. Water helps to maintain optimal blood circulation, flushes toxins from the body and carries nutrients to the cells, all of which keeps your body balanced. When the body senses a shortage of water it can borrow from different parts of the body, leaving our skin and hair susceptible to dryness, breakage and an overall lackluster appearance.

Get your heart pumping

Exercise provides a multitude of mental and physical benefits that can ultimately lead to healthier skin and hair. Exercising helps ease stress and regulate cortisol—a hormone that not only produces acne-causing oil and inflammation, but can also derail the body’s most important functions when its levels rise. Our circulation and blood flow also increases during physical activity, transporting oxygen and nutrients to skin cells and carrying waste away.

Beauty sleep

It’s called beauty sleep for a reason. We’ve all seen a bad night’s sleep result in under-eye circles, puffiness or just a general lack of vibrance. But sleep also provides a much needed window of time for the body to rest and restore. During this time of rejuvenation, the body releases a hormone that produces collagen, the protein responsible for firm skin, shiny hair and healthy nails.

Stress less

As if stress isn’t bad enough when it's wreaking havoc on our mental health, it can also have a significant physical impact. When we’re under stress, our usual routines can be disrupted, such as diet, exercise routine or sleep patterns. And if you’ve made it this far, you already know how each of these contributes to our overall health, and ultimately, the health of our skin and hair. Stress can even affect the natural growth and shedding cycle of our hair. Self-care practices such as meditation, establishing a morning routine or simply carving out some time to do something you love can be powerful in combating stress. The body is so interconnected, that even the previous points such as sleep, exercise and hydration trickle down into how much stress we experience. This reiterates the main concept of a holistic approach, that the body consists of many parts that function as a whole.

A holistic approach to healthy skin and hair doesn’t have to be difficult, but it does require a shift in thinking. When you’re tempted to treat a pimple with only a spot treatment or combat dry strands with a deep conditioning mask, take a moment to consider the ways in which the body is interconnected. Thoughtful products with quality ingredients are an important piece of the puzzle, but when you address skin and hair health from a multi-faceted, or holistic point of view, you’ll begin to achieve the long-term results that you’re looking for.

Written in partnership with Collective Laboratories

Do you want more content like this? Check out these blogs:

• Introducing HANAH Coffee Boost: Beauty
• Cacao tea beauty elixir recipe
• Beauty from the inside out—how ashwagandha and ghee boost your glow