You are worth 5 minutes of your time
As a full time worker in the beauty industry I spend my days working with lots of different women. And these women all have different lives and different responsibilities, different jobs and are in different phases of life. The differences in lives and responsibilities makes a big difference in each person's level of caring for themselves.
If they are coming in to get facials then they are already investing in themselves more than 50% of the population of women. However I do hear such varying degrees of caring for themselves and their skin in their personal lives. Some women only wash their faces in the morning and sleep with their make up on (and are coming to me wondering why their face is broke out). Most women only use soap and moisturizer on their skin. Very few even exfoliate their skin on a regular basis. If I had to recommend just one step for women to add to their weekly care routines it would be exfoliate! I suppose I'm often surprised at how little people tend to care for themselves. I wonder if their is a correlation....if people who don't care for themselves don't care for themself. If they did I would think that they would see their value and invest a little time in themself. Even 5 minutes extra a day can make a big difference!
Over the 8 years I've spent in the beauty industry I have found that the women who take the time to care for themselves have a greater sense of self worth and happiness. I've found that taking that extra 5 minutes a day to invest in themself, their body, their skin has not only visible external results but the results of giving attention and mindfulness to one's self and body can have great results internally as well.
Personally, I come in on the opposite side of this. I'd say I put an hour a day extra into my face, my skin, my hair, my body. I've been this way since I was a teenager. I'm a product of the 80's and 90's. For self entertainment I bought magazines and read them cover to cover multiple times and tried every trick these articles suggested. I'd spend hours trying to tone my abs and making hair masks. Becoming an esthetician was really a no brainer. I have decades of useful AND useless information. I am my own crash test dummy and if there has been any sort of fad, I've probably tried it! I know a lot of things that work and a lot of things that don't!
I'm not saying go to the extreme like me. I get paid to figure out what works and what doesn't when it comes to anti-aging, body and skin health. But I am asking you to take 5 minutes extra a day to invest in yourself. Use those 5 minutes to do a full body sugar scrub in the shower. Soak in a bathtub with epsom salt and baking soda. Do a moisturizing hair mask. Do a face mask. Pluck the dark hairs off your face if you can see them. Exfoliate the dry skin off your feet then put vaseline and socks on. Try it for 30 days and I guarantee you will not only see the results on the outside but you will feel a greater sense of self worth on the inside as well! And check back here and I'll be sharing my decades of experience and self care tips.