BLOG 78: 3 HANDS FREE FACE YOGA POSES TO DO DAILY

Face Yoga works beautifully with a clean face and a lovely oil like Fusion by Danielle Collins Pro Lift Moisturising Serum. But sometimes using our hands or touching our faces doesn’t seem accessible. The good news is that there are several hands-free Face Yoga poses that are still refreshing and rejuvenating  – and they won’t mess up your makeup (but you may want to be careful about doing some of these poses if you’re driving a car or operating heavy machinery) 

HERE ARE THREE OF MY FAVOURITE HANDS-FREE FACE YOGA POSES FOR YOU TO TRY TODAY:

POSE 1 

The first pose is just about deep breathing through your nose  – no hands required. To start off, you’ll breathe in through your nose and hold the breath until you’ve counted to four. Once you’ve reached four seconds, you can breathe out through your nose and exhale until the count of six. 

You can repeat this exercise as many times as you want, but while you perform it, try focusing on the rise and fall of the abdomen. Feel your abdomen sink while you breathe in, and then feel it fall as you breathe out. 

This pose is all about nasal breathing, and there are plenty of benefits that come along with it, such as: 

• Increasing the air flow to your veins and arteries 
• Increasing your oxygen circulation and intake
• Slowing down your overall breathing and relaxing your body
• Reducing your exposure to foreign substances 
• Improving your overall lung volume 
• Keeping your diaphragm working properly
• Aiding your immune system 
• Lowering the risk of seasonal allergies and hay fever

Along with those various benefits, one of the most noticeable advantages to nasal breathing is how quickly it calms your body and face  – which makes this a great exercise to try if you’re feeling stressed out or overwhelmed. 

POSE 2 

With the second pose, we’re moving from nasal breathing to your tongue. You can continue nasal breathing while you do this, but you don’t have to. With your tongue, you’ll want to trace it on one side of your mouth, along your jaw, up to your nose and then back down again. 

If you can, try to repeat this exercise on the same side of your mouth for thirty repetitions  – after a few different repetitions, don’t be surprised if you start to feel it working the muscles in your mouth (or your tongue). 

Once you’ve completed around thirty reps on the side you started with, try taking a short break but then you can move on to the other side: on the opposite side of your mouth, move your tongue along your jaw, up to your nose, and back down again. 

With this second pose, there are also quite a few benefits to reap, including: 

• You may improve swallowing ability 
• You may feel more relaxed in your face or body after completing the exercise
• You may have an easier time breathing or opening your airway to breathe deeply

If you don’t mind adding your hands in, you can always do a little facial massage at the end of this pose, but if not, you may just want to take a few moments and rest. 

POSE 3

The final pose of hands-free yoga focuses on your eyes, so you may not want to attempt this one if you’re in the middle of driving or operating other types of heavy machinery. To start off, you’ll just want to move your eyes from one side to the other without actually moving your head. 

After several repetitions, you should start to feel a little fatigue in the muscles surrounding your eyes, including those ring muscles (also known as the orbicularis oculi muscles). If you get tired of moving side to side, you can switch to moving your eyes from up to down. Repeat this exercise as many times as you’d like or until you feel a little bit of fatigue in your eye muscles. 

FINAL THOUGHTS

While using your body or your hands may seem like a vital part of face yoga, it doesn’t have to be  – there are various parts of the face and the muscles that you can activate without lifting a finger!

For more Face Yoga tips, check out The Face Yoga Expert Podcast or my YouTube Channel