Face Exercises That Prevent Premature Aging by Jeanette Johnson

It only makes sense that we can preserve at least some of our youthful facial appearance through exercises. We run, go to the gym, perform calisthenics and lift weight to grow bigger muscles in our arms, legs and abdomens -- or at least to keep the muscle we already have.

After some time exercising those muscles, they do get bigger or at least firmer.

We don't want our facial muscles to bulge out like a bodybuilder's biceps, but it'd be nice to keep them firm even as the years pass. And it only stands to reason that firmer facial muscles will make the skin on our faces look firmer.

As time goes by, these muscles lose their natural elasticity. They still react to our facial expression -- frowns or smiles, but this is not enough activity to maintain their youthful control.

When you're young and you squint a few thousand times, the muscles involved naturally return to their original condition and position. However, beginning in your twenties, they start to lose that natural adaptability and squint lines start forming.

So facial exercises may not eliminate all worry wrinkles and frowns, but may help prevent or firm up sagging jowls and chins.

This book is the result of research the author did over thirty years to develop her Designer Exercises. She outlines the facial muscles, and it's interesting to learn there're ten of them, from the forehead to the neck.

Plus, according to the author, these exercises help stimulate the growth of fat cells around the muscles. Although we ordinarily do not want to encourage the growth of fat cells, this case is exception.

Our faces naturally have enough fat cells to make our face look full and vital when we're young. Losing fat cells is part of why our faces look sunken and puffy when we're older.

Most of the book consists of the exercises, divided into sections based on the facial feature. She starts with the lips and lower face because that's the area most affected by premature aging. Plus there are exercises for men and women over the age of 40.

One section is devoted to biofeedback, since many people will at first have trouble isolating small portions of their faces to exercises just those specific muscles. Her point is not to have people buy a regular biofeedback machine, but she cites experiments to show that people can gain greater awareness and control of their bodies, with time and practice. So she is encouraging, because many readers will have trouble at first, but should not give up.

One criticism I have is that she doesn't give an overall program. In notes, she says that since you won't have time to do them all every day, just do some every day. Concentrate on problem areas.

But for many people, their entire face is the problem area. What is the best way to rotate the exercises? Or is there one that will help with all the rest? She doesn't offer any systematic guidance. Just do the ones you have for.

She does suggest the amounts of time to do the exercises and the number of repetitions, and adds that you can do more than this if you feel the need. But it could be weeks before someone realizes that the suggested number of repetitions is not enough for them. They may quit rather than simply increase the number of reps to a high enough number to get the results they want.

It's difficult to write a book that can fit every reader, because everybody's different and so are their faces and facial problems, but more guidance toward formulating your own workout plan would have been helpful.

At the end she includes a chapter on using a tape masque to get rid of wrinkles. That's putting adhesive tape on various sections of your face to pull them together.

I haven't tried that -- I'd feel like a fool putting adhesive tape all over my face. That's just too "metrosexual" for me.

Maybe it works but, as a man, I feel more comfortable with the idea of exercising muscles.