BEAUTY IS NOT SKIN DEEP
Beauty: A combination of qualities, such as shape, color, or form, that pleases the aesthetic senses, especially the sight.
The dictionary definition of “beauty” is one to ponder and ask ourselves if we can expand further beyond just the aesthetic senses, especially the sight, redefining what beauty truly is and how our health is tied into it.
As we peel back the layers of what our beliefs are around beauty we start to realize the answer to being beautiful on the outside is not as simple as buying a product, receiving one treatment and/or injecting our bodies with toxic ingredients that may be harming us if not in the short term, but possibly long term. Let’s take a closer look at why I believe beauty is more than skin deep.
For many years I have studied Dr. Zach Bush’s work on the Skin’s Microbiome, soil science, toxic chemicals disrupting our systems, and how Regenerative Farming brings us back to talking about the health of our skin. I believe that we have been told many lies over time in the beauty industry allowing companies to make a profit. Most companies really don’t have our backs, yet there are some amazing smaller companies with an invested interest in your health as they offer healing products. If we can move beyond what the industry giants want us to think, feel and believe about beauty, we can become empowered, save money and time, living our lives excited to feel our best. Finding a new gorgeous energetic vitality and glow about yourself shining through to the outside of your beautiful body and to others! Health is everything and when we feel healthy we usually have a better chance of feeling BEAUTIFUL!
So who is Dr. Zach Bush?
Zach Bush MD is a physician specializing in internal medicine, endocrinology and hospice care. He is an internationally recognized educator and thought leader on the microbiome as it relates to health, disease, and food systems. Dr Zach founded *Seraphic Group and the nonprofit Farmer’s Footprint to develop root-cause solutions for human and ecological health. His passion for education reaches across many disciplines, including topics such as the role of soil and water ecosystems in human genomics, immunity, and gut/brain health. His education has highlighted the need for a radical departure from chemical farming and pharmacy, and his ongoing efforts are providing a path for consumers, farmers, and mega-industries to work together for a healthy future for people and the planet.
Let me share Dr. Zach Bush’s article “Beauty Is Not Skin Deep”. Take notice how you feel before reading it, then how you feel after. I am hopeful that something will stir deep within you, inspire you as you ingest his words of wisdom to make positive change in your own life bringing forth, more than ever, that beautiful being you are and always have been!
The New Biology of Beauty Reveals Your Skin To Be An Expression of The Whole of You.
by Dr. Zach Bush
Our skin is obviously the most visible organ in the miraculous system of our bodies — and one of the largest too. For these traits, we should know more about our skin and its biology than any other organ, but unfortunately this is far from reality. Our skin is one of the most overlooked and misunderstood organs of the body, with less research dollars and hours committed to it than any other.
At the same time, in the US we spend $55 billion on cosmetics that bury our skin in a vast array of synthetic chemicals. On any given day, the average woman in western nations places more than 120 chemicals on their skin. Many of these chemicals are known to disrupt hormone signaling, damage the immune system, and even increase risk of cancer. This market is growing at 7% a year and quickly becoming one of the most long term, steady consumer markets in the world. (Reference.) It is time for a radical shift in our understanding and care for our skin.
Our skin and microbiome
This extraordinary diverse cellular system rivals the human gut in its complexity of immune function, endocrine signaling, and neural network. In fact, the complex biologic landscape of our skin is interconnected through these many systems to our gut ecosystem.
The skin is a multilayered system that provides a critical array of functions to allow for human life to occur. When we think of skin, the epidermis (the thin multi-layer of dehydrated cell skeletons that stack 10-30 cells deep) gets all the attention, and perhaps appropriately: the term “only skin deep” reflects this superficial quality. This is not to say the epidermis is not critical, however. This layer of desiccated cells provides a moisture barrier to keep our body hydrated, acting as a protective barrier against external insults — from sunshine to insects.
This common perception of the epidermis is extremely myopic in that it has always understood itself within the belief of sterility. With the discovery of the role of the microbiome in recent decades, we have begun to understand the epidermis not just as a barrier, but as a landscape of diverse bacteria, fungi, yeasts, protozoa, and parasites that dwell throughout this coral reef-like structure of the epidermis. Billions of nooks and crannies in the epidermis form unique micro-ecosystems that differ from region to region across our body’s surface.
The use of soaps, alcohol-based sanitizers, and antibiotics (both topical and oral) have a devastating effect on the diversity and vitality of this skin microbiome. As we lose microbiome, we lose communication at the skin level, and regenerative potential of the skin fades away. But as we dive deeper, the real magic and vital role of the skin in our biology comes to light.
