To start, trying to begin this regimen cold-turkey will fail. Start piecemeal, most important of this list is brushing your teeth every morning and every evening. Teeth health is the most important of all of these because it's the most expensive to fix. After you've gotten in the habit of brushing your teeth, start implementing other parts of this, in order of what matters to you most.
This article will be a rough checklist of things to do with tips on how to do it properly. I'm still learning even as I write this, so if you read something that doesn't appear right, please email me with your criticism.
Those without facial hair are free to skip this section.
If you're saddled with facial hair, you know you need to shave every, say, week-ish to not appear homeless. I would suggest upping this frequency to daily, to achieve a roughly even look as you go about your business on a day-to-day basis. Not only will this help you settle into routines better with the discipline required to implement it, it'll also give others the impression that you care about how you present yourself. The latter helps dramatically in all forms of social communication, from the professional to the intimate.
To start, we must speak of the two types of shaving: shaving to remove all hair, and shaving to remove some. We'll start with the former.
I would recommend going out and purchasing a Safety Razor for this kind of shaving. Razor replacements are incredibly cheap, evening out to around 30-35 USD yearly. When replacing razors, please take care to not cut yourself. The sides of the razor are designed to cut your disgusting face hair off, they can cut through skin quite easily.
When preparing for shaving it all off, I would recommend using shaving cream every time. Not only does it help iron out where you want to shave, when you do shave it also hydrates the skin before during and after the razor crosses your skin. This helps prevent shedding that happens quite often when you skip the cream. What cream you get doesn't really matter, just make sure to not overuse it. A layer that's about two millimeters thick works just as fine as one that's about a centimeter thick.
When you go about shaving, make sure to shave with the grain. I've made the mistake of doing the other and while not the worst it does introduce possibility of cutting the hair too short and getting an ingrown hair. On your face. Not great.
When shaving to a length of hair, not just all of it, you'll need a more specialized piece of equipment. Go out and buy a beard trimmer. I use the one from Manscaped, but the action on it leaves something to be desired, hard to get an even shave. Recommend me one.
Your beard hair is much like your head hair, it needs conditioner. Your beard hair will be softer, and much more fun to fondle when you're bored.
If you have hair on your head you need to wash it. Regularly. A good recommendation is to shampoo your hair every 3 days if you get a "regular" amount of exposure to dust and other particulate matter in the air. More if you live in a desert or stick your head up your boss' ass often. Apply the shampoo before anything else in the shower, to let it sit and clean while you work on the rest of your body.
Buy a washcloth. Or something to rough up your skin while showering. Seriously. I didn't do this for quite a while and a washcloth makes an objectively better shower. Here's what you should do with it when you get it (and you're in the shower):
- Wet the washcloth
- Scrub the middle of the washcloth with soap until a quite visible lather forms
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If you use:
- Liquid Soap: Make sure to replenish the washcloth regularly during your shower
- Bar Soap: Place your bar soap in the middle of the washcloth and form a "dumpling" esque wrap around the bar. This provides an excellent handle and washing surface for later.
Now that we've prepared our washcloth, we scrub from top to bottom. Do not scrub from bottom to top, it wastes soap (and time). Same principle as cleaning a window from top to bottom. Gravity's a bitch. Make sure to scrub well in areas that have heavy acne, on me this is the back of the shoulders and the back. I generally start with the chest but I should start with the arms. Shoulders, bicep, elbow, forearm. Like clockwork. Armpits, chest, back. Ass, back of the thigh, front of the thigh, kneepit, knee, back of the calf, front of the calf. Clean the sole of your foot too.
Now that we've done the body, undo your washcloth (if using bar soap). You now have an excellent device to clean your junk. Do so, make sure to get under that foreskin if you haven't had that taken from you. Now, a most important step. Clean your asscrack. No one likes a stinker. I wipe once at least twice, make sure to clean if you notice any brown spots. After those, scrub well, there should be a noticable lather when you remove the washcloth to rinse and scrub again.
Now, squeeze all the soap you can out of that washcloth so you can store it. If you did shampoo today, don't forget to wash it off. Trust, I've forgotten plenty of times. Dry the washcloth to the best of your ability, store for the next shower. I usually try to cycle washcloths weekly.
OPTIONAL: Conditioner. Please email me if you have good suggestions so I don't need to awkwardly ask my barber the next time I see them.
You need to wash your face too. If there's one thing this guide is, it's telling you to wash. I use a different washcloth for this task. There are specialty "face soaps" out there but regular bar soap does the job. Same kinda deal, but no funky dumpling magic. Wet the washcloth, scrub to a lather, slap it on your face. If you have facial hair make sure to go with the grain again. Top down. After you're satisfied with the clean, rinse the washcloth and run over your face once more to clean off excess soap.
Self-explanatory. You were taught this. 2 minutes, 30 seconds a quadrant, morning and evening. I would recommend getting a mouthwash for after your teeth brushing, helps with all the gross bacteria that's in there. If you believe in ads that Smart Mouth stuff works for this quite well. I find it quite annoying that there isn't a mint flavoring for it though so I have a can of Altoids to make me feel good.
"Moisturizer" is lotion. Use it, especially if you live in a dry environment or have a dry skin condition. (Or, if you're like me, both!) After you dry your face, apply lotion there. After you dry your arms and legs, apply lotion there. If you notice some dry patches on your torso, apply lotion. I'd bathe in it if it didn't look like I just got out of a particularly white warzone.
Basically do everything above but the shower and the shave are optional.
As stated at the top, this is version 1.0.0 of this article. If you notice a mistake, or would like to suggest something, please email me.