Have you ever “brushed” your skin? “Why would I do that,” you’re probably asking? Brushing your hair is one thing, of course. It’s a way to remove older strands of hair and to boost the circulation in the skin surrounding your skull—plus, brushing your hair feels good.
Well, brushing your skin can impart similar benefits—except on a much bigger scale. Your skin is the largest organ in your body and usually the most overlooked.
While some people remember to use a little hand cream from time to time and maybe a little facial cream to help stave off those wrinkles—the rest of the skin that houses and protects all the body’s major organs, muscles, and bones is left to its own devices. Most of us ignore our skin. Here’s one important reason why you should give this organ a little TLC: brushing your skin is a great way to remove toxins.
Why Brushing Your Skin is Important?
Your skin is constantly shedding old, dead cells. It is also helping to carry other wastes out of your body—including toxins. By some estimates, up to a pound a day of unwanted and unneeded wastes are removed through your skin. This is a necessary and important job. When you don’t remove toxins efficiently, they can cause much more serious problems if they linger in your internal organs.
By brushing your skin, you can help your skin tremendously in its daily job of trying to keep good substances in and bad substances out. Dry brushing stimulates your skin and gets your circulation going, helping to make the toxin elimination system more efficient.
Benefits of Dry Brushing
Dry brushing also helps to clear away all the old dead skin cells that have been pushed to the surface of your skin. Your skin has an ingenious method to remove toxins in that it pushes toxins to the surface and deposits them in these dead skin cells. As these cells fall off your skin, they take toxins with them.
How many dead skin cells do you think you lose every hour? 1.8 million! Dry brushing is a great way to help your skin with this herculean task. Keep in mind that when your kidneys and liver have too many toxins to deal with, your skin takes over. Easing this burden on your skin also directly helps your kidneys and liver.
When you first start dry brushing, you’ll likely need to use a gentle pressure with the brush. After a period of gentle brushing, you can begin to add more pressure and do some “deep tissue” work. When choosing a brush, opt for natural bristles rather than synthetic ones.
Brushing regularly can also help to improve lymphatic drainage. Your lymphatic system runs throughout your body. It helps to carry food for cells, blood cells used to boost your immunity, and waste emitted from cells. By keeping your lymphatic system healthy, you’ll be boosting the performance of your immune system. In this way, dry brushing your skin could even help protect you from bacterial and viral infections.
One final benefit you can gain by brushing your skin is increased energy. The more efficiently your skin removes toxins, the less energy is needed to deal with these toxins. A toxin-free body is able to conserve energy rather than expend energy.
Sources:
Jockers, D., “Dry brushing to detoxify your body,” Natural News web site, June 4, 2013; www.naturalnews.com, last accessed June 6, 2013.
“What is Lymphatic Drainage,” WiseGeek web site; www.wisegeek.com, last accessed June 6, 2013.