Yoga for your face? It’s not as silly as it sounds

If you’re looking for a way to achieve naturally glowing skin with a side serving of positive wellbeing, you needn’t look further than face yoga. That’s what Melbourne-based practitioner Akiko Grabin believes. She’s been a face yoga teacher for two years and says the benefits of the practice, which aims to relax and tone facial muscles, are multi-fold.

The main reason people give it a shot is because of its effect on skin, with Grabin claiming that face yoga can prevent wrinkles, or at least smooth their appearance. And there’s some evidence to back these claims. Research from 2018 found that 30 minutes a day (or every second day) of facial exercises over a 20-week intervention might improve the appearance of skin, along with mid-face and lower-face fullness, in middle-aged women.

There are about 70 poses that can be found on YouTube or through a practitioner. Credit: Stocksy

Fumiko Takatsu is credited as the creator of the Face Yoga Method. Takatsu wrote about its origins on her website, saying she came up with the concept following a car crash in which her body was injured and her face was left looking “asymmetrical”.

Standing in front of the mirror one day, Takatsu had a realisation: “If I exercise my body muscles, I should be able to do the same for my face.”

After Takatsu started practising this method, people began praising her appearance and were eager to know how she achieved such results. The Face Yoga Method was born. But Dr Imaan Joshi, a cosmetic physician with Skin Essentials, remains sceptical of the practice. She believes face yoga can have “some beneficial effects” in terms of improving lymphatic drainage, but says there’s no evidence it can reduce or prevent wrinkles.

Joshi explains that wrinkles form from repetitive, life-long movement of facial muscles, compounded by loss of collagen and fat as we age. “So as much as the theory behind face yoga
is great … really, there’s no realistic way of getting rid of wrinkles apart from reducing or freezing the movement of these muscles.”

Nevertheless, Grabin says stretching and toning these muscles through face yoga can make a difference to one’s appearance. If you’re keen to give it a go, she recommends starting with “the big O”, a pose she teaches everyone that’s designed to stretch your “smiling” lines.

To do “the big O”, drop your jaw, like you’re yawning. Then, form a loose “O” shape with your mouth and look up to the ceiling, without wrinkling your forehead. (You know you’re doing it properly when you feel a stretch between the corner of your mouth and your eyes.) Next, breathe in deeply and strike the pose as you exhale. Aim to hold the pose for 10 seconds. Continue taking slow, deep breaths as you repeat this process three times.

To learn more poses – Grabin says there are about 70 of them – hop onto YouTube or make an appointment with a face yoga practitioner who can devise a “workout” tailored to your needs.

Ideally, Grabin recommends practising face yoga twice a day, morning and night, for at least five minutes at a time. She says that most people who do so will see a benefit in two weeks to a month.

But face yoga isn’t just about improving one’s appearance, Grabin notes. She says engaging in the practice is also a form of “self-loving”. She savours the time she dedicates to the exercise, saying it’s a great reprieve from the daily grind. “When I’m doing face yoga, I feel calm and relaxed.”

This article appears in Sunday Life magazine within the Sun-Herald and the Sunday Age on sale August 8. To read more from Sunday Life, visit The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.

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