{"id":4029,"date":"2019-03-24T07:00:41","date_gmt":"2019-03-24T07:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tilibeauty.co.uk\/?p=4029"},"modified":"2019-03-24T07:00:41","modified_gmt":"2019-03-24T07:00:41","slug":"lauren-bravo-lent-beauty-resolutions-i-might-actually-stick-to","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stories.qvcuk.com\/beauty-insider\/josie-e\/lauren-bravo-lent-beauty-resolutions-i-might-actually-stick-to\/","title":{"rendered":"Lauren Bravo: Lent beauty resolutions I might stick to"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Here we are then, halfway through Lent. Perhaps you\u2019re still dealing with a caffeine comedown, or seeing giant, talking chocolate bars where your colleagues used to be. Maybe you\u2019re counting down the days until you can sleep with your phone under your pillow again, while trying to ignore how well-rested you feel. Or maybe you had no idea it was going on at all.<\/p>\n
But while few people I know observe Lent seriously anymore, I’ve always liked to use it as a kind of New Year 2.0 \u2013 a chance to take stock, again, this time with marginally less depressing weather, and make a few manageable resolutions to see me through to spring.<\/p>\n
This year they\u2019re all beauty-focused, and \u201cmanageable\u201d is the operative word. Because we all know that if we are too hard on ourselves in the short-term, we\u2019ll only go harder on our vice in the long-term. This is as true of heated styler abuse as it is of swearing off sugar.<\/p>\n
So with that in mind, and a Lindt bunny in hand, I\u2019ve made the following vows and am sticking to them religiously. More or less.<\/p>\n
Look, I\u2019m a pimple-popper. I have made peace with this fact. Squeezing, picking and otherwise faffing about with my face is virtually a recreational hobby, and a very hard habit to break.<\/p>\n
But I know it isn\u2019t doing my skin any favours, so my first challenge is to practice what I\u2019d like to think of as \u2018mindful squeezing\u2019. If not with scented candles, classical music and a glass of wine afterwards, then at least with a properly sterilised blemish wand. Only in the calm and privacy of my own bathroom, not in high street changing rooms, or the mirror of a violently swaying train. I am endeavouring to dab them with salicylic acid first and give them room to heal afterwards, rather than burying the offending craters under comedogenic layers of concealer.<\/p>\n
And most of all I am trying to remember that my skin is the only skin I have, and it pays to be nice to it. If I have to suffer the injustice of being a 30-something woman with adolescent breakouts, I can at least deal with them like a grown-up.<\/p>\n
Not just on the no-tights days, or the no-cloud days. Not only when I\u2019m planning to frolic in the countryside, or eat lunch on a bench in the park. Every single day. The grey days, the drizzly days, the days when my only outdoor expedition is a walk to the postbox and back. Because the best defence is a good offence (yes, I learned that from the headteacher in School of Rock) I know that using sun protection every day as a matter of habit is the very best thing I can do to protect it, respect it, and prevent it taking on the appearance of cr\u00eape paper recently fished out of the bin. I know this, as we all do. And yet\u2026 it\u2019s funny how the healthiest habits are the easiest ones to break, isn\u2019t it?<\/p>\n