Two Powerful Steps to Minimalise Your Personal Care Products

I will walk you through the two simple yet powerful steps on how to get it done in a small corner of your room. Before you decide to rearrange your entire house, let’s first put work on your personal care products collection. A small mission at a time to guarantee success where the feeling would help you to touch up every corner of your very house later on.

My lean living journey was not a smooth one either. But, the most and foremost way to enter a minimalist lifestyle is by asking yourself the importance of doing so. Reasoning with our mind is a crucial step. Yet, not everyone succeeds to answer ‘why’ it is so important to decluttering our belongings from time to time. So, let’s roll by questioning:

STEP 1: Why the Correct Skincare is Needed

When it comes to beauty, it seems many of us ‘enjoy’ having more and trying more. Even further, the number seems everything for people with this high level of obsession. Either in the number of products they currently have, mission-to-finish products and a wish-list of products to try next. This phenomenon happens because many are unable yet to find the correct skincare product for their skin. And I call this as…

CALAMITOUS BEAUTY

Just a simple question between us. Don’t you think that the maximalism in personal care products is a disease in human society, -especially the beauty products in womanhood? For a while, I have been putting a thought about it. And I truly consider it as a social disease. Indeed, isn’t it?

Now, imagine if…

• If we could successfully find the correct product to take care of our facial skin,
• If there is a skincare line that offers both instant results and extra benefits in the longer term through their no BS formula,
• If we can save time in daily skin routine while achieving the maximum result for the skin appearance day by day,

Ah! Life is too good to be true already as thus, we can put focus on what matters most.

TIME GULPER

Another reason ‘why’ we need the correct skincare is its ability to allow us to allocate our precious TIME.

How much time do we spend in a day for a twice-daily routine? Let’s count in simple math for a simple skin routine. Not body, not hair treatment. Just the facial care part. So, let’s jump into it…

In the morning, we start with:

1. Cleansing, and then
2. Toning, following up with
3. Moisturising,
4. Layering,
5. Colouring, and
6. Finishing.

Some people, especially men may skip a few steps in the basic of this skincare regimen, such as step (2), (5), and (6). Yet, it is a very unlikely scenario for working women. Those all 6-basic steps demand at least 30 minutes of our worthy time in the morning. Some people may spend their time in front of a mirror for up to 1~2 hours just to do their step (4) and step (6). I am not making this up as I had shared a room, once, with a person who fell under these ‘calamitous beauty’ rituals.

And don’t forget how many microdust we could suck per routine session, *cough cough*. Poor the lungs!

To be a little nice here, let’s discount this “morning routine” to 30 minutes requirement only. With this number on hand, we can calculate it in a real-life scene. That 30-minute each morning turns to 3.5 hours in a week. Imagine what we can do with these extra 3.5 hours a week? 15 hours a month? It is 180 hours or over 7 days worth of free time per year.

And for the women who spend their skin routine up to 2 hours a day, it equals 1 month of time wasted in a year. It is more than enough to do a profitable project for that amount of time, isn’t it?

Now I don’t think we should continue to add up the Nighttime skin routine, do we?

I personally only spend a maximum of 5 minutes AM routine to get to my finished look. That includes the time to brush my teeth. And another 5 minutes for my nighttime routine from cleansing to moisturizing. Also including my mouth hygiene. I believe that spending a small amount of time with just the necessary products in our daily skincare routine will help us to keep our skin healthier and become a better human in general. Time~ you cannot take back once it is wasted, be mindful of Time.

If the above math-style calculation is not worth any consideration, then nothing will change your mind to simplify your routine. The next step can only be done once your mind is set and agree to taste a bite of lean living starting from decluttering your beauty corner. Only after your mind is fully accepting the importance of decluttering then we can continue to the second step below.

STEP 2: Be Bold!

Tell yourself that today is the day to break free from the beauty trap. Commit yourself that this needs to stop. Until you can say this out loud, there is no way you would do the below point wholeheartedly. Keep these tips below until you are fully ready to get out of the beauty maze.

Before jumping to the execution steps, I have to share with you our family’s two rules to shortcutting our personal products:

• If you haven’t used an item for 1 year, you probably will never.
• If you keep one stuff until it is overly used, it is time to replace it with a better one.

“시작이 반이다”, it means that “starting is half the battle“.

Korean proverb

So, let’s get it to start!

THE EXECUTION STEPS

1. Gather out every stockpile of your personal care products and lay it all out on a clean surface. From your small travelling pouch to your bathroom cabinet, no exception.
2. Separate the empty and almost empty bottles and place them in a separate corner. You can decide later on what to do with them. Consider recycling some of them.
3. Gather in products that you wear and use daily.
4. Slot your cosmetics into two sections, i.e. skincare and makeups (*only if you are wearing makeups)
   • Arrange skincare products based on the flow of their application, e.g. cleanser, toner, moisturiser, and so on.
   • *Pick makeups that suits your colour palette or your fave light. Let the remaining makeups in a hiding mode (step 6 below)
   • Place accordingly skincare and *makeups in a visible yet secure spot. Avoid direct sunlight and humidity. Follow the storage information of each product.
5. Toss products that have exceeded their expiration date, separated in texture, and changed in smells and colours. Some products with an icon of an open jar have a ‘prolonged expiration’ as the date is counted after the packaging is opened and shall be expired by the number it is written on the jar icon. Always write the date of opening on the bottom of the jar to track its expiration.
6. Hide products that you think you still want to wear from time to time. For example, the makeups in which colours are out of your *palette zone. Label this stockpile with a date. Set them aside for a couple of weeks and continue to hold it up to three months mark. If you don’t search for any products in this bundle within three months period, slay step #4. toss them, or simply donate them.

WHAT’S NEXT?

If you are still with a lot of supply after going through the six execution steps above you have to:

• run through the primary Step 1 once again.
• be careful when deciding before purchasing new products. Ask yourself WHY you have to purchase it? Is it a new need or are you tempted? If your skin needs an anti-aging product, find the correct one and stick with your winning item. And don’t be drooled of having a new product based on an eye-catchy packaging or sparkling colour inside the bottle or the attractive scent of the new product.
• consider keeping only the essential products that can help maintain our general health for both body and skin.
• remember that colours are for the eye and fragrances are for the nose. Your skin needs NONE of them!
• remember that protecting your facial skin is a priority even if it takes throwing high-end looking products into the bin. It doesn’t matter how fancy the look of the packaging is, how hi-branded it is, and how pricey when you bought it. By any meaning, cautiously select products that go on your face. Your face is your self-summary.

All the necessary and only the necessary

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WRITTEN BY: Frida Pigny

Photo Credit: Sanibell