Massage Scalp With Oil Before You Shampoo

A good time to get a scalp massage in is actually before you even hop in the shower. Since oil attracts oil, rubbing some into your scalp and hair when they're feeling extra dirty (like, say, post-workout) will actually remove some of the grease. And, since hair is more fragile when it's wet, this will help prevent any unnecessary breakage from scrubbing too vigorously in the shower.

Avoid Using Your Nails

If you decide to give yourself a scalp massage in the shower, it might be tempting to scratch at your scalp while you shampoo, but doing so can cause more harm than good. Not only can scratching cause burning and irritation but any dirt or bacteria lurking underneath your nails can lead to an infection. Stick to using the pads of your fingers, and feel free to apply as much pressure as you like while you scrub.

Scrub Every Single Spot on Your Scalp Thoroughly

Part of why having your hair shampooed by someone else is so satisfying is that they can see the top of your head, which makes it a lot harder to miss any spots. So, you'll need to be strategic with your motions. Once your head is thoroughly wet, pick a place to start (the back of your head and your temples are good starting points since they tend to sweat most), and then work your way around your head in a circular path, moving towards the center of your head, to ensure that you cover every spot.

Pay Attention to Your Hairline

Whether it's from sweat or residual makeup, the area around your hairline can feel like a total dirt magnet. This is a spot that salon assistants focus on, not only because scrubbing and massaging this area will make your scalp feel cleaner, but because it can also be very relaxing (massaging your temples eases tension and stimulates blood flow to your head). Start with your hands at your temples and massage in small circular motions, moving upwards on both sides to the top of your head, and back again.

Massage the Back of Your Head

Another important spot to focus on is the back of your head—where your neck meets the base of your skull. Again, this area not only sweats a lot, but people can often carry a lot of tension here. Place both hands on either side of your head, with your thumbs at the base of your head and your fingers around the top of your head. Apply some light pressure at the base of your skull as you massage in a circular motion, and pull the skin on your scalp upwards slightly with your thumbs.

Make the Most of Your Conditioning Rinse

Since shampooing strips hair of its natural oils, you might feel like both scrubbing and massaging your scalp as you shampoo will damage your strands - especially if your hair is fine. If that's the case, wait to massage your scalp until after you've rinsed out your shampoo and have applied conditioner to your ends; this will let you separate your hair with more ease, allowing your fingers access to your scalp with minimal pulling. When you're done, try using cooler water to rinse out your conditioner to seal the cuticle of your hair for maximum shine.

Most people are aware of the need to look after their skin - taking precautions during excessive sunlight, or keeping it moisturised – but we are less inclined to pay attention to our lips. But there are very good reasons why you should actually be taking more care with your lips. Why? Three main reasons.

For a start, the skin on your lips is much thinner than the skin covering the rest of your body. Not only that, it is subjected to a far greater degree of wear and tear. From conversation to eating to many other functions, your lips are pretty much in constant demand from the moment you wake up.

Secondly, women love decorating these sensitive areas of skin with lipstick. This is being applied, wiped away and then re-applied, sometimes many times a day. All this activity adds to the potential damage to the skin.

Lastly, melanin is the pigment in your skin that protects skins cells from radiation. This is what helps you to develop a tan. But there is far less of this substance in your lips, meaning they can be prone to sunburn and dryness.

So what are the top tips for looking after those lips?

Don't lick your lips. When saliva dries on skin it eventually evaporates, taking valuable moisture away. Worse than that, there are enzymes in saliva that will eat away at the skin surface. So next time you want to show your appreciation of a tasty meal, complement the chef rather than licking your lips!

Our lips need to be exfoliated just like any other part of our skin. By doing this regularly you'll remove dead skin cells in order to reveal the vibrant young skin beneath. On a weekly basis, use a toothbrush to brush away dead skin from your lips.

Because a common and unseemly aspect of unhealthy lips is chaffed skin, it makes sense to use moisturiser. This will prevent the skin from cracking, and will nourish and protect new skin cells that have been exposed by exfoliation.

The healthy properties of good old H20 can't be overstated. If you hydrate regularly you'll stop your lips from drying out and developing cracks. Most medical experts concur that aiming for 2 litres a day is a quota that will promote good health – and excellent lips!

If the damage has been done, don't fret. Chemists provide over-the-counter remedies for chapped or dried lips. Available in cream or gel format, these can be easily rubbed into your lips to repair the affected areas.

Mobile phones are everywhere. The chances are you are reading this article via a web browser on the screen of your very own personal device. And you could be anywhere – in a train, in bed, or if you're fortunate enough, a sun-soaked beach!

This is the essence of the modern mobile phone. They provide all the traditional functionality that telecommunication has provided over the years – the ability to converse with friends, family or business colleagues – with a whole raft of mouth-watering extras. Your phone has long-evolved into so much more than a device for making phone calls. Now you can watch films, do bank transactions, maintain a daily calendar, store vast photo galleries, make music videos … The possibilities are limitless. But there is a downside to all this. Modern mobile phones are prized by opportunist thieves.

So what steps can you take to guard your previous device? You should always treat your phone with due respect. Don't place it on a work surface or by the sink in the office toilet – where you might inadvertently walk away and leave it. Never let an untrusted person borrow it.

One of the most basic tasks you should undertake is to password-protect your phone. You'd be surprised how many people don't bother to do this, yet it could prevent sensitive details – bank codes, confidential messages or personal information – getting into the wrong hands.

When unrecognised devices request a connection, don't just accept as a matter of course. There are genuine approaches but there is also spyware that can delve into your phone's innermost secrets. Never click on a hyperlink in an unrecognised text or email. This is how malware – malicious software - spreads

Because modern mobile phones have powerful storage capacity, many of us using them instead of physical photograph albums. But this is another reason why losing your phone can be catastrophic. Increasingly, today's devices offer virtual storage facilities. If you use iTunes you can access the iCloud to do this. You should look upon your phone in the same way you do any computer – and keep backing-up the content.

Cell-phones often come with a built-in GPS (global positioning system) or are GPS-enabled. This allows you, or those you have connected with, to keep track of the location. This is a strong deterrent for would-be phone snatchers. Here is where speed is of the essence. If your phone has gone missing, regardless of whether this was a result of pickpocketing or your own carelessness, you must report the loss as quickly as possible. Contact your provider to have your account suspended. You won't need to pay any further charges for a device you no longer own, and in the case of smart phones your service provider might be able to erase any sensitive information remotely.

It's an age-old dilemma – battling the onset of age! Wrinkles seem to creep up on us. One moment we're fresh-faced, carrying on as if we don't have a care in the world. Then we catch a photo of ourselves that someone has posted on Facebook and our eyes are instantly drawn to those terrible lines that seem to have appeared in our features overnight.

When Hollywood starlets take a long hard look at themselves in the mirror, if they don't like what they see they'll consider tackling those encroaching wrinkles by paying a visit to their local cosmetic surgeon. But you can rest assured that there are many different methods of easing wrinkles that avoid such drastic measures. And here are our top five:

1. Eating fish

Fish is a terrific source of protein, especially cold-water species such as salmon. Protein is one of the basic building-blocks of skin, and as well as this it's a great source of one particular key ingredient for healthy skin – a fatty acid called omega-3. This will help to nourish you skin and keep it looking plump and youthful.

2. Cutting down on coffee

Coffee is a refreshing beverage that is now available in a bewildering variety of flavours. While many of us rely on coffee to provide a little kick-start to our day, where your wrinkles are concerned it would be far more advisable to switch to cocoa. Researchers have discovered that cocoa has high levels of epicatchin and catchin, two dietary flavanols that not only improve circulation to skin cells, they protect your body from sun damage. Circulation is also enhanced with these substances, making your skin feel smoother.

3. Eating vegetables and fruit

Fuit and vegetables boast one crucial component when it comes to countering skin wear and tear – antioxidant compounds. They assist the skin in staying health-looking by countering the damage that is caused by cell-damaging 'free radicals' (unstable molecules).

4. Avoiding excessive washing

While face-washing might seem an obvious choice for keeping your skin refreshed, dermatologists have proved that water actually strips your skin of natural barrier oils – the very ingredients in your natural chemistry that protect against the onset of wrinkles. Use cleansers instead.

5. Moisturising

Moisturiser creams that can be easily purchased over the counter are a simple weapon in your anti-wrinkling arsenal. By applying these treatments on a daily basis you'll keep your skin moist-looking. Creases and wrinkles will be far less noticeable.

Sensationalist, but true fact coming up: eating more raw food will improve every aspect of your health.

Cooking food aids our digestive system and we absolutely need to ensure that we kill off the dangerous bacteria that grows in raw meat, however we can meet a happy medium with the type of vegetables we consume. However bear in mind that vegetables lose most of their nutrition when they are cooked.

The most common form of raw vegetables served up as a standard dish is a salad. You can get really creative which vegetables you combine in a salad instead of opting for the usually expected ingredients such as; lettuce, mixed leaves, tomatoes, cucumber, beetroot, celery and peppers. Why not opt for something a little more creative that adds a great amount extra to the nutritional value of the salad and add in some raw spinach leaves, kale, carrots (grated), courgettes (thinly sliced), mushrooms (finely chopped) and some blended broccoli.

Of course the above ingredients don't have to be used all at once, it's simply a choice of adding something different in the nutritional spectrum and to spice up a salad in a different way.

Juicing has become a popular phenomenon in ensuring that a large number of nutrients are being absorbed by the body each and every day. There are a vast number of books and websites dedicated to the subject of juicing and there is certainly a plan for everyone. If you fancy venturing down the juicing avenue, preparing and drinking the juice in the morning is the absolute optimum time. Your body has been repairing itself during sleep and there's nothing better to start off a new day with a nutritional cocktail for your vessel, which works so hard for you unconditionally.

If you want to go the extra step and really say thank you to your body, opt for a three or five day juice cleanse. It not only cleanses your entire body but also cleanses your mind. If you have a dependence on food which you know not to be good for you, then this is the perfect way to break lifetime habits and do something nice for yourself.

The juice cleanses to go for are the ones that include vegetable juice as well because you don't want to be running off just sugar from fruit for five days. A balance between both will allow you to obtain more nutrients and keep your blood sugar levels evened out as well.

Always seek medical advice if you have any health problems and always look at the qualifications of the person supplying the juice cleanse. Nutritionists spend an extremely long time ensuring that their plans are not only delicious, but totally stable, something you don't want to go the cheaper route on.

This article is going to tell you what you didn't know about brushing your teeth. Ok, yes, so you've been brushing your teeth since you could hold a toothbrush, and you've been repeating this action twice a day, every day for the entire duration of your life, right? Well, a recent visit to the dental hygienist brought to light certain factors that are not widely circulated, and they should be the foundations for everyone's dental care.

1.

Switch to an electronic toothbrush

- Why? Aside from the obvious superior cleaning ability they possess against good old elbow grease, manual toothbrushes cause receding gums with their back and forth motion. In later life, receding gums can cause a lot of issues and accelerate the process of teeth falling out. Save the dentures for the last possible moment and use an electronic toothbrush instead.

2.

Use a round-headed toothbrush

- They are designed to concentrate on one tooth at a time and this is exactly how you should be cleaning your teeth. An oval or rectangle shaped head doesn't quite allow you to angle it the same way as a round-headed one and therefore does not allow for the same standard of cleaning.

3.

3 days

- This is how often you should charge your toothbrush in order to make sure that you are getting the consistent amount of power during each clean. The battery may last way longer than three days, however, as the amount of power in the battery diminishes, the performance of the toothbrush does as well.

4.

4 seconds

- This is the amount of time you should be spending on each tooth surface before moving on to the next. The toothbrush should not be pressed tightly up against each tooth but rather just skimming the surface with light pressure for the most effective cleaning.

5.

5 sections

- You should divide your teeth up into five sections to tackle; the front of the teeth (top), the front of the teeth (bottom), behind the teeth (top), behind the teeth (bottom), the contact point of the teeth (where you chew and bite) (top and bottom).

6.

6 months

- Visit your hygienist every six months for a professional clean. Despite all of the above cleaning and maintenance, you would be surprised about how much build up is surrendered out of its hiding place when the professionals get in there with their fancy tools and scrapers. Keep the date; your smile will say it all.