Well, this episode is coming to you from my bathroom. Because, you know, life is pretty busy and I had this idea for a podcast episode, so I thought why not just multitask while I'm getting ready for the day, and send you this message. Because if you're anything like me, you're a very busy mom, and thoughts come to you in the most random of places and if you don't take action in the moment, you know that it won't happen. 

This podcast is about a personal story of me and my face, and also how that related to my confidence. I have this naturally red skin when I exercise. And I didn't come from a super active family. We kind of didn't do a lot of sports or activities. I was never really raised in a family where we were doing sports on the weekends. We might go to a baseball game or watch some sports on TV, but we weren't super active. How that relates is that I didn't really grow up doing very many sports. I know that my parents tried to put me in some sports and I tried some things, but they never really stuck.

But as I got older, when I did do exercise, I would get a very red face and I found it to be quite embarrassing. And the reason why I'm bringing this podcast up today is because I left yoga this morning, and I was just thinking about how red my face was, and about how for so many years. Like most of my childhood and young adulthood, I let that red face that embarrassed me hold me back. I can tell you that I didn't enjoy doing PE in high school. In fact, I learned that I could skip PE if I did a sport so I did the most inactive sport that there is. I did golf, my freshman and sophomore years just so I could get out of doing PE. I didn't love exercise until after I got married and my mother in law introduced me to Jazzercise. So here's where this story gets even more crazy about not liking my red face. I took Jazzercise and then I ended up becoming a Jazzercise instructor in my young 20s because I finally found an exercise that I liked. I understood that to be healthy, I needed to exercise and so I finally found an exercise that I liked. And then when I became an instructor, I would wear a full face of makeup when I was teaching because it would cover up that red face. 

As you can imagine, this was 25 years ago, I did not know about the toxins in makeup. I was using my favorite brand Mac and loved the coverage and was not at all thinking about the fact that when I'm exercising, my pores are even more open. I'm sweating and I'm being exposed to whatever is in that makeup during a heightened part of my day, where my body is even more receptive to the harmful ingredients, the fragrances, the phthalates, all the things. 

Sad to say that I actually was an instructor while I was pregnant with my oldest, so she was exposed, in addition to harmful chemicals in the womb. If you are new to this idea of the blood-brain barrier and how it impacts an unborn child, you definitely should look it up because it's even more important to be toxin free as you're pregnant. 

I can't go back and change that but it's just an interesting topic to think about. How we think about ourselves, and how that impacts our actions, and how it can change, really, the course of our lives and our health. 

So now I'm in my 40s, I'm certainly a lot more confident, and I don't care as much about the red face. But it took me a long time to get there. So if you are a person who does not feel confident, who really has something about them that they just don't like or don't like to expose to others, I feel you. I was in the same boat and it took me a long time to get over it. And now you'll even see me occasionally putting on makeup on a very bare face on social media. Just because I do it sometimes doesn't mean I love it or that I’m not uncomfortable when I'm doing it. But I usually do it because I want to share with others that I'm not perfect. I have wrinkles, I have imperfections, I have redness. And we judge ourselves much more than others judge us. 

It's been a lifelong journey to get to where I am now. I feel pretty confident. But again, I have definitely struggled with it over the years. I just wanted to share this podcast episode to say if you are not loving something about your body, or your face, or something, you could do what I did and cover it up for many years. That helped me feel more confident. I still love wearing makeup because I do feel more confident. And in some cases, yes, I am covering things up so that I can feel my best. And other times, I know that my skincare and makeup has such great ingredients in it, that it is helping me look better when I don't have my makeup on too. 

So that's my little stick today. Kind of a ramble. But I figured if I had these thoughts, I bet someone has been through this as well and I know that it feels good to have someone kind of say oh my gosh, I've been in those shoes before, I've had those thoughts before. 

If you are looking for skincare and makeup that makes you feel confident, skincare and makeup that improves your skin, not just skincare that improves your skin, but actual makeup that has skin benefitting ingredients in it, I'm your gal. I would love to help you figure out the right routine for you. You can email me megan@detox.design.  I have a clean beauty quiz that you can access at bit.ly/tftcleanbeautyquiz. If you answer all those questions, I will get an email and I can give you some personalized suggestions for how to switch up your routine and adopt a safe beauty and skincare routine every day so that you can start feeling confident and beautiful every single day and with the confidence that knowing the ingredients in your products are safe and healthy. 

Thanks for listening. As always, I appreciate your support and for being here. I also really appreciate your support when you purchase Crunchi through me because that helps fund this podcast. I'm not getting paid to do this podcast, but by funding and supporting me through your purchases, I am able to keep sharing this information and getting the clean beauty story and the importance of it out there. So again, you can shop at bit.ly/tft10off if you're ready to jump in on Crunchi.