Marie Nadeau

Doctors are absolutely right to talk about the risk of more wrinkling with facial exercise. This is why I go on and on, until people beg me to stop, about dynamic wrinkling. I've talked about this in other answers, but it can't be said too often-there is a right way and a wrong way to exercise your face. Any expression that you make repeatedly creates grooves in the surface of your skin--make the expression over and over and the lines stay in your face even when you have stopped making the spression. This is dynamic wrinkling. It follows that exercises where you repeatedly scrunch your face, scowl, purse your lips or somehow make lines in your face are going to result in more wrinkling, not less. Yoga facelift exercises are different because they stress isolating various muscle groups and using isometrics, which works against resistance, to tone and exercise muscles. Look in the mirror frequently to make sure you are not wrinkling other parts of your face when you exercise, for example, a very common tendency is to scowl in concentration while you are exercising your lips in the carp curl. Done correctly, facial exercise can help smooth out expression lines because, for one thing, you become aware of how you are using your face. The sagging question is interesting. Muscles lengthen over time due to gravity, and when you exercise a muscle it becomes toned and actually shortens. Toned musculature gives you a firm appearance--your face, neck, even the skin over your chest--can feel like it's been pulled ever-so-slightly upwards. Particularly for the neck area, where we usually see the first signs of sagging, exercise can do wonders to firm and tone. I can't imagine anyone suggesting you don't want to exercise because you will create more sagging. By the same principle you wouldn't want to pull in your protruding paunch because you are creating more sagging by forcing your tummy muscles to work. Even if someone convinced me that were true I can't imagine permitting myself to let it all hang out. Ugh!

Would it be too late for you to start exercising your body? The answer is, absolutely not. I have students in their sixties and seventies who are seeing wonderful results from regular facial exercise, just as you would with any other form of physical exercise. The one thing about being older and going into any program however, is that one should not charge into it, overdo it, and be disappointed if you don't see results after the first time you try it (though you might). I am looking down the barrel of 60 myself and I am trying to learn patience--so I know what a hard lesson it is. Nevertheless, patience does pay off, so --when you are doing the turtle exercise for the neck (a great way to strengthen the muscles in back of the neck so you don't slump, by the way) remember the lesson of the turtle-- slow and steady wins the race!

Yoga facelift is about facial exercise, but it is a specialized program, based on exercises specially designed to tone the muscles of the face and neck without creating dynamic wrinkling. When you are doing exercises which have you scrunch up your face or purse your lips you notice you are creating lines in your face. Dynamic wrinkling is a term used to describe the expression lines we create in our faces when we repeatedly make the same expression, for example scowling. Repeatedly drawing your brows together creates furrows, or grooves in the surface of your skin that eventually don't go away even when you are not frowning. This is dynamic wrinkling. However, all is not lost. Aside from face scrunchies and other horrors there is a whole repertoire of exercises you can do that use the principle of isometrics, where you work against resistance, that do a wonderful job toning and strengthening the muscles without creating wrinkles. Done correctly, facial exercise can help reduce sagging, smooth out expression lines and re-energize the face so you look and feel great!