Gua Sha – the five-minute facial treatment being dubbed the ‘at home face-lift’ – RSVP Live
The shortcut to a sculpted face could be here. Gua Sha is a traditional Eastern Asian medicine technique that involves using a smooth-edged tool to ‘scrape’ your skin.
The thousand-year-old treatment has been trending on TikTok recently and with all of its benefits, it’s clear why.
The purpose of Gua Sha (Gua meaning ‘scrape’ and ‘Sha’ meaning ‘sand’) is to increase blood flow around the body.
READ MORE: Helen Mirren, 78, swears by €2 anti-ageing beauty secret that transforms skin and iconic hair
It involves putting oil on your face and using a smooth tool to glide along your skin, following your cheekbone structure. This motion will contour your face by draining puffiness.
This is generally caused by fluid retention, which the gliding gesture helps to shift. Gua Sha can make your face appear slimmer and more defined. Popular oils to use are vitamin b, argan or retinoid.
Stones for Gua Sha can be found in just about any chemist recently. These are smooth slabs generally made from rose quartz, amethyst or jade. They are considered to be healing stones, with each one having different properties.
Gua Sha also has multiple benefits when conducted on the whole body. The gliding motion has been found to improve blood flow.
Poor blood circulation can lead to adverse health effects such as heart conditions. In the shorter term it can cause stiffness, swelling, tightness or pain.
The process is also thought to relieve muscle and joint pain in the body, in the same fashion. In the age of sitting hunched over, whether it’s at a desk or over our phone, we could all do with a bit of attention in this department.
The original goal of Gua Sha was to move qi, which is an energy that exists in the body, according to traditional east Asian medicine.
Often times, if the practitioners carry out Gua Sha with strong force, it causes tiny blood vessels near the surface of the skin called capillaries to burst. This can result in some bruising that will usually disappear after a few days.
This form of Gua Sha is not recommended for people who have medical conditions affecting the skin, blood or veins.
With A–listers like Jenifer Aniston and Emilia Clarke jumping on this affordable, at home hack, there is nothing stopping you from achieving their sculpted, youthful look.
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