Under eye bags

[mona]

Hello everybody,

I am a newbie and excited to be here

One of my big issues are the under eye bags.

I wonder if anybody really got rid of them with facial exercises and massage? 

Thank you for your feedback

Mona

[Sean]

Hi Mona

Okay great to have you here and big welcome to you.

I'm one of the trainers, and so I feel I can respond to your post.  Have people got rid of under eye bags - YES.  Part of the key with dealing with under eye bags is working out what triggers them (so for example, salt, diet etc are biggies), and also being healthy (so good lymph, digestion etc).  When you start doing things like the exercises and massage, you start to help lymph flow return to normal, and this in turn starts to minimise them, and then as the skin thickens, these start to disappear.  It is a gradual process and doesn't happen over night - but I've lost count of the number of clients that I've worked with (and pleaded with for before/after photos).  Even dehydration plays a role here at times, so its really important to ensure you are starting off in the best place with nutrition, rest etc. 

Plus now we've been finding that a lot of people are really having success since we now tackle the bone in the under eye area too.  This was a real shock and surprise to me when we first started out - but it can literally transform the face, when you put a stop to bone diminishment as well.

Also want to add, that whilst these may be your bug bear at the moment, don't spot train or focus just on the lower lids.  This is counter productive.  Also don't be tempted to do the lower lid exercise hundreds of times a day or several times a day.  Its a common misconception that more is better.  In reality it really isn't and you will end up worse off.  Muscle building with resistance is a science and artform of itself, but you need rest and recuperation from the workout.  In the beginning, people will focus on a problem area, and neglect the other exercises and then they slow down their progress and results.  We've lreally made it so simple for people to get fast results - but of course we can't make anyone do anything. 

Best wishes

Sean

May 15, 2018 5:12:35 GMT -5 mona said:

Hello everybody,

I am a newbie and excited to be here

One of my big issues are the under eye bags.

I wonder if anybody really got rid of them with facial exercises and massage? 

Thank you for your feedback

Mona

[mona]

Dear Sean,

thank you from the heart for your detailed answer<3
I will take in count everything you have mentioned. I am already eating well balanced and taking the supplements.
The only thing I suspect that might be a problem is dairy...so I'm waiting for the right moment to stop eating it for a month or two and see what happens.
The liquid accumulating under the eyes surely are problem of lymphatic flow. I do hope to get them smaller though by strengthening the muscle around the eye.

I am 52 and what I don't like about my face is the sagging (jowls, eye bags, neck), and my upper lip and NL wrinkles could get lost, too;-)

I am doing a mix of Ageless and Flexeffect: I flex forehead, eyes and neck and do the Ageless programm for the cheeks plus eye exercise as Loulou recommends (I started 1,5 months ago).

I massage every 2 days, sometimes daily and brush the whole body, face included, every day.

Will keep you informed while progressing and send fotos as soon as I think that there has been some improvement.


Take care and have a happy time


Mona

[Sean]

Dear Mona

Great re eating a well balanced diet and taking supplements. I know its hard to believe, but the number of people who don’t understand the connection between these and working out still surprises me. I have also found that sometimes, later on in time, people will come across posts like yours and will not have the same knowledge that you do, so I always try to cater for that to make sure the information is easily accessible to everyone that reads the forum.

 
Now dairy is a common issue for a lot of people nowadays. Many people simply suggest that in the past people didn’t experience such things and try to write it off as a psychosamtic issue – but its no where near that. For one, nowadays we are mass farming dairy products from animals. The foods they eat are mass produced and often chemically mixed to provide with nutrients and of course that has an effect on the products that the animals produce. Even so called organic products nowadays are able to bypass certain regulations in that only a percentage of the product has to be organic, and that they can be combined with other htings to ensure shelf longevity etc. So my advice to everyone is really to work with their bodies with where they are at. It can actually be an exciting adventure finding out what works for your body and what doesn’t and that knowledge alone is not something that you can ever learn from a textbook.

 
Now with lympathic flow, the massage is your number one tool to cater for this. I’ve trained in lympathic massage so can really speak about the power and ability of massage to help it along but there are other things I can suggest to you. For one the lymph doesn’t have a pump like the heart does (the heart pumps blood around the body) so for lymph we need to do things to help it move along and stop it accumulating in places. Often times when the lymph accumulates on the face, it also is accumulating within the body too – so one easy thing to do is skin brushing the body. This helps both lymph and circulation, exfoliates dead skin cells and tones the skin too. So it’s a great thing to add to your daily routine.

 
Now with the eye area, its not just about strengthening the eye area, but making it healthy. So another key thing is the tapping after the massage/exercises. This really does help to drain the lymph area. Now its also important to play with what works best for your body. So two things with the tapping I’d recommend you start now and try out for a week or two are using pressure. So start out with light tapping. The lighter the better. It is literally like your fingers are a feather (its that light). Take photos now and then try it for 2 weeks and see. This is the vodder lymphatic massage style – everything is super light. Next try increasing the pressure somewhat. Now by increasing the pressure Im not talking about damage pressure. Simply increase the pressure so its sterner. This is more European lymphatic massage but it has equal benefits. You will find one works better than the other, and when you discover that, it will help motivate you to keep it up. For me personally, I do both (but hey I trained in massage so know both have benefits). 

 
Now sagging interestingly often is both about muscles but also more importantly minerals too. You see whenever there is skin sag, minerals are involved. So smoothies etc are a great way of providing these to your body. Now with Flexeffect, please do the full programme. It will really help with all the things you mention. The muscles are interconnected, so you want to work everything because it will really impact everything. With Ageless, its fine to do it alongside, but Ageless neglects some muscles so it won’t help with jowls etc. Whilst Loulou has the belief that the cheeks lift everything up, I’ve found many people who do Ageless tend to need to incorporate specific exercises for the lower face in conjunction with it to get to where they are happy. Also Ageless’s eye exercises focus purely on the orbiculars, whereas the lids themselves also need to be strengthened and worked too (in my opinion).

The splashing technique may also help you out here too with lymphatic drainage that was recently discussed.

 
Good luck to you on this adventure and wishing you every success!

[mona]

Dear Sean,

thank you again for your sincere and detailed answers.
Tomorrow I will start doing Flexeffect as it is recommended, without shortcuts and mixing it up with other methods.

Loulou looks beautiful. But l think that maybe she already looked so good when she developped Ageless, she did Flexeffect before, maybe that’s what made her so youthful😉

l will keep you  informed about my progress, surely with fotos.

Have a lovely time🌈
Mona

[Sean]

Lou designed her program around her goals and seeking to find muscles that have the greatest impact, which is great and fine and works for some but not everyone.  Its a short and fast program, but I've noticed that she even started to add components like massage and body workt o her routine. 

For me though, the real issue is that it creates an imbalance in tha some muscles get neglected entirely.  The body always tries to do the best it can with its available resources, even with the face, so when any imbalance is created it will try to correct it or work around it. 

So I like to work with the body - not to neglect anything which is why I always take a holistic approach in looking at the body and its challenges.  You can work with your body or against it and the same is true with the face.  Now its true that there are some exercises for some where the muscles are very responsive, but it takes time to learn which muscles are weak and which are strong.  There isn't a shortcut to gaining this knowledge and its based on practical experience that you gain from doing the workout.  However thats better than neglecting muscles which then start to look strange in comparison to other muscles being worked out. 

Our bodies and faces really are amazing creations that do their very best and if we treated another person the way we treat our bodies they would often tell us where to go! 

May 17, 2018 16:24:22 GMT -5 mona said:

Loulou looks beautiful. But l think that maybe she already looked so good when she developped Ageless, she did Flexeffect before, maybe that’s what made her so youthful😉

[cm5597]

May 17, 2018 3:21:32 GMT -5 Sean said:

Dear Mona

Great re eating a well balanced diet and taking supplements. I know its hard to believe, but the number of people who don’t understand the connection between these and working out still surprises me. I have also found that sometimes, later on in time, people will come across posts like yours and will not have the same knowledge that you do, so I always try to cater for that to make sure the information is easily accessible to everyone that reads the forum.

 
Now dairy is a common issue for a lot of people nowadays. Many people simply suggest that in the past people didn’t experience such things and try to write it off as a psychosamtic issue – but its no where near that. For one, nowadays we are mass farming dairy products from animals. The foods they eat are mass produced and often chemically mixed to provide with nutrients and of course that has an effect on the products that the animals produce. Even so called organic products nowadays are able to bypass certain regulations in that only a percentage of the product has to be organic, and that they can be combined with other htings to ensure shelf longevity etc. So my advice to everyone is really to work with their bodies with where they are at. It can actually be an exciting adventure finding out what works for your body and what doesn’t and that knowledge alone is not something that you can ever learn from a textbook.

 
Now with lympathic flow, the massage is your number one tool to cater for this. I’ve trained in lympathic massage so can really speak about the power and ability of massage to help it along but there are other things I can suggest to you. For one the lymph doesn’t have a pump like the heart does (the heart pumps blood around the body) so for lymph we need to do things to help it move along and stop it accumulating in places. Often times when the lymph accumulates on the face, it also is accumulating within the body too – so one easy thing to do is skin brushing the body. This helps both lymph and circulation, exfoliates dead skin cells and tones the skin too. So it’s a great thing to add to your daily routine.

 
Now with the eye area, its not just about strengthening the eye area, but making it healthy. So another key thing is the tapping after the massage/exercises. This really does help to drain the lymph area. Now its also important to play with what works best for your body. So two things with the tapping I’d recommend you start now and try out for a week or two are using pressure. So start out with light tapping. The lighter the better. It is literally like your fingers are a feather (its that light). Take photos now and then try it for 2 weeks and see. This is the vodder lymphatic massage style – everything is super light. Next try increasing the pressure somewhat. Now by increasing the pressure Im not talking about damage pressure. Simply increase the pressure so its sterner. This is more European lymphatic massage but it has equal benefits. You will find one works better than the other, and when you discover that, it will help motivate you to keep it up. For me personally, I do both (but hey I trained in massage so know both have benefits). 

 
Now sagging interestingly often is both about muscles but also more importantly minerals too. You see whenever there is skin sag, minerals are involved. So smoothies etc are a great way of providing these to your body. Now with Flexeffect, please do the full programme. It will really help with all the things you mention. The muscles are interconnected, so you want to work everything because it will really impact everything. With Ageless, its fine to do it alongside, but Ageless neglects some muscles so it won’t help with jowls etc. Whilst Loulou has the belief that the cheeks lift everything up, I’ve found many people who do Ageless tend to need to incorporate specific exercises for the lower face in conjunction with it to get to where they are happy. Also Ageless’s eye exercises focus purely on the orbiculars, whereas the lids themselves also need to be strengthened and worked too (in my opinion).

The splashing technique may also help you out here too with lymphatic drainage that was recently discussed.

 
Good luck to you on this adventure and wishing you every success!

Hi Sean,

I love some of your thoughts and comments in this thread.

I wanted to follow up on the lymphatic massage: What style or styles of lymphatic massage do you recommend the most? Is they the two you mention above: vodder and the European style? Currently, what's your opinion of Tanaka? For the style or styles that you most recommend, what are the best resources for learning those styles? In particular, are there any youtube videos you recommend?

Thanks SO much!

[cm5597]

Mona,

I want to add one more thing to Sean's great tips: sleep is also a biggie whenever you have lymphatic fluid accumulation in the face, including under and around the eyes. In the past few years, we've had a major breakthrough in understanding the function and purpose of sleep in the body, and sleep turns out to be for removing a lot of metabolic wastes in the brain and probably the body as well, in part through the lymphatic system. So getting more high-quality sleep will make a difference. Also, sleeping on your back and/or slightly elevating your pillow will reduce the amount of lymphatic fluid that pools in the face after sleep. HTH

[mona]

Thank you for the suggestions😊
l know that the longer I sleep the bigger the bags are in the morning...l will try to elevate the head a little more, still it shouldn‘t stress the cervicals...

[Sean]

I have also heard it suggested that sleeping without a pillow is actually better to stop the fluid build up around the eyes and jawline too. Some people sleep on a tower of pillows and this actually leads to a fluid build up under the eyes and along the jawlines. Like most things it varies individual to individual.

Jun 2, 2018 12:01:23 GMT -5 mona said:

Thank you for the suggestions😊
l know that the longer I sleep the bigger the bags are in the morning...l will try to elevate the head a little more, still it shouldn‘t stress the cervicals...

[Sean]

There are many different types out there. I spent three years learning the vodder method which I personally really like but there are many out there.  When I trained back in 2005, it was at that time the most respected method, but there have since been other methods that have developed.  I keep my training up though with Vodder and really like its theory and practicality but like most things, there are many different methods out there and no one size fits all.

With Tanaka - originally I watched it and said I spotted some lymphatic movements but then I got misquoted and it was reported I said it was a lymphatic massage - which is wrong and incorrect. It isn’t a lymphatic massage at all but it has some similar movements. Like most things if some chooses to do it - at the end of the day it is better than nothing.

Professionally speaking it is much less superior results wise than the massage routine in the book we all have which is far better results wise because it deals with more than lymph - it works at cellular level to strengthen skin, connective tissue, muscles etc. That’s more than Tanaka does or can do. I also believe that there is more information behind Tanaka waiting to be translated.  I suspect that we will find specific recommendations about that particular massage and how often to do it and things to look out for - when or if that does get translated into English.  Sadly much of what is known is purely from the video which has only been translated.  In some ways it similar to watching just the dvd - there are probably specific recommendations behind the suggested movements. 

With lymphatic massage - it is actually a science and art form that I don’t think its a good idea to self teach such a form of massage, as there are a lot of contraindictaory signals that you have to be aware of and so my opinion is that if someone has particular issues with lymphatics to actually seek medical help or a trained and insured professional to prevent mishaps. 

[cm5597]

Hey Sean.

Are there any introductory materials on the Vodder method that you recommend? Thanks so much!

Also, is the Vodder the only lymphatic massage that you <u>regularly</u> use on your body and/or face?

[Sean]

Bidder was actually an autocorrect change (was supposed to say Vodder). Ha ha, it can sometimes be helpful and sometimes its not. 

Dec 1, 2018 18:56:58 GMT -5 Sean said:

[Sean]

Vodder was the most popular method at the time that I choose as it had a loyal following and seemed to be really current and widely appreciated.  Plus I had gone to a therapist for Vodder massage treatments so was eager to learn why it helped me so much.  That was over 10 years ago). Nowadays there are different methods available and different methods of teaching.

There isn’t any introductory material that I’m aware of that I can point you in the direction of it because Vodder is heavily theory based combined with practical application sessions. I still have sessions myself with practitioners. It’s not something that you can completely self treat (although you can incorporate parts) however the regular massage does impact the lymph. If lymph is an issue for you (or anyone) then rather than self treat - I would recommend going to a qualified practitioner instead who will be able to give specific advice or tools for you to use.

They are very focused in their training, so for example when I learned there were 5 modules of over 40 hours worth of teaching and lectures and practical sessions that you had to undertake (and 40 hours per module sounds like a lot, but each module all seemed to take double that amount of time to complete).  

Lymph is like anything a hugely complicated science in and of itself that isn’t easy to break down into simple short paragraphs
, however there is a lot of good information out there nowadays and the internet has helped a great deal in highlighting information for people.  


Read more: flexeffectworkshop.proboards.com/posts/recent#ixzz5YiPB4Oo7

Dec 1, 2018 8:55:13 GMT -5 cm5597 said:

Hey Sean.

Are there any introductory materials on the Vodder method that you recommend? Thanks so much!

Also, is the Vodder the only lymphatic massage that you <u>regularly</u> use on your body and/or face?

[cm5597]

Thanks, Sean.