3 Mindset Changes That Helped Heal My Acne

I remember the first time I got a zit. It was in between my eyebrows like a third eye, staring at me each time I looked at myself. It’s been ten years since then, and I’ve struggled with acne ever since. I thought that once I hit my twenties my skin would clear and I’d never have an acne bump ever again, right? Wrong. 

Ance is so much more than puberty hormones or clogged pores that need to be washed. It’s a tell-tale book for what’s missing in your daily nutrients or even something happening in your body. For me, my acne didn’t begin to heal until I shifted my mindset.

My healing journey began as I looked at my acne as a way my body was trying to communicate with me. Then, after plentiful research, and lots of trial and error, I finally figured out what my body was trying to let me know. Today, I want to share with you some of the mindset changes that lead me to discover the source of my acne. Everyone has different skin and the same care routine won’t work for everyone, but I truly believe these mindsets can help anyone on their skincare journey. 

1. Food is Medicine
“You are what you eat,” is a term I grew up hearing. Yet it took years for me to realize my skin health was directly related to my diet. The children’s story of a girl who turned into chocolate after eating too much chocolate never clicked until my early twenties when I began cutting out different foods.

I must clarify - cutting out food was not simple, or completely black and white. I had to find food that triggered flare ups, and learn to minimize my intake. It was the most difficult thing. I could not bring myself to fully cut out ice cream, fast food, or meat. It was too convenient and delicious. 

I then came about the saying “food is medicine.” If I was treating the topical area of my skin with ointments and oils as a self-care routine, what was really stopping me from doing the same about the products I ingested? 

To be honest, I never felt that great after eating fast food. But I also never noticed the difference until I learned how good it felt to eat a healthier diet. 

I’m not here to tell you to “eat healthily and cure your skin issues.” Everyone’s body reacts differently to food. What I’m saying is this: if you really want to make a change, and the idea of cutting out food is too difficult (and it’s okay if it is), try changing your mindset. Food can be both filling and delicious. You don’t have to cut out entire food groups. Learn how your skin reacts to different food, and adjust your diet as needed.  

2. Stress is normal 
I heard so many times about how stress makes for a skin mess...which honestly just stressed me out more. Because how can you stop being stressed when everything is so stressful? As I tried to follow tips on how to not be stressed, I found myself stressing over being stressed when I tried to not stress. Talk about a paradox. 

To push past this, I really had to accept the fact that no matter how hard I tried to live a stress-free life, it was not going to be possible. I would most likely encounter some form of stress each day. 
I had to be okay with that. This may sound crazy, but once I let myself believe that stress is normal, my stress decreased. 

Keep working at your tension-relieving routines and grounding habits. Those things are important. But once I stopped fighting stress and just let it flow as a normal thing, slowly, the things I found incredibly stressful were not so terrible anymore. 

Essentially, I had created a balance between accepting stress and doing what I could to relieve it. If it didn’t work, I was still stressed after a cup of tea, then that was okay. This day would just feel stressful, and tomorrow could be better. 

3. Water cleans your skin on the outside and inside 
I’m sure we’ve all heard this one before: stay hydrated! But really, I have to mention it because it was such an important mindset change in my skin-healing journey. This really connects to my first mindset, food is medicine. What we put in our bodies really matters. 

To take it a step further, I found that thinking of each drink as a tonic for my body was helpful in removing drinks that could be worsening my skin. If I drank soda when I was sick, what would that do? Probably not help me get better faster. So why not apply the same idea when I had broken-out skin? 

In the end
If I really wanted my skin to heal, and my acne to fade away, I needed to treat myself as a patient in all aspects, and realize that my physical and mental well-being would have an impact on my skin health. While my body wasn’t sick, in a way my skin was. And I needed to treat it as such. 

Written by: Seairra G