When my dad was in the hospital, transitioning from breathing tubes to a tracheostomy, I became mesmerized by the concept of breath — inhalations, exhalations, breathing — so much so they inspired a poem exploring the shallowness we’ve attributed to our inhales and exhales. How we take for granted this default transaction simply because of the automation most of us are blessed with.
The autonomy was stolen from my dad’s lungs, and from so many other lungs over these years — especially in this last year — but those of us still inhaling and exhaling in automation, this post is for you, us.
National Blog Posting Month comes to an end tonight and it’s bittersweet. Half of me is relieved that the pressure to post, post, post is coming to a close. The other half is nervous I’ll default back to my overwhelmed nature and forget to sustain my passion for blogging. Then I was scrolling on Instagram a few days ago and came across a skincare video that caught my attention. A young woman was reminding folks to extend their time when using an oil cleanser as part of the first step of their double cleanse.
FYI: Double cleansing is one of the healthiest ways to ensure your skin is fully cleansed at the end of the day, and it is recommended you do the first cleanse with a non-comedogenic oil cleanser as it more effectively breaks downs dirt, oils, sunscreen, and makeup. (Subscribe for more sporadic pro tips — from laundry to skincare, haha!)
In this particular video, the woman was encouraging viewers to follow her lead of spending anywhere between 5-7 minutes oil cleansing. While I appreciated the reminder (as it led to the inspiration behind this finale post), I don’t recommend spending that much time daily on facial cleansing. That’s a good way to irritate the skin, but anywhere between 70-90 seconds on an oil cleansing is magnificent, and I had forgotten that.
As I started my oil cleanse I realized I had barely been giving it 30 seconds most nights. The moment I got the sunscreen and makeup broken down, I rinsed and moved on to the next cleanse. So that night, I started counting (aloud, to myself) and made it to 120 seconds of oil cleansing and was blown away by what I had been hoarding in my pores. I ended up laughing and saying (again, aloud, to myself — this is a frequent phenomenon), “Why am I so dismissive of time???”
Despite often hearing and saying, “Time is money,” and “Time is everything,” and so on, I had managed to let time slip in the little things and it made me reflect. I remembered my poem on breath work. I remembered how the IT/computer engineer guy at the old nonprofit I briefly worked at said, “After powering up your computer, let it sit for a solid five minutes before you start using it,” and how in high school someone told me the same about cars.
I tried my best to honor time this month: keeping my articles as short as possible to ensure readers were not overburdened; taking a breath and posting joint posts when I knew I needed time (like yesterday, when a triggered migraine overpowered me and has sustained till today). And I hope to continue remembering to honor time and the way it manifests in all we do — breathing, writing, resting, driving/commuting, communicating, liberating, and everything else we put our all into.
So to wrap up this beautiful month, I want to thank you, readers, for having taken the time to read each day and support my return to the blogging world!