Here are twelve beauty tips that are guaranteed to work, if you follow them *all*. There’s no point eating fresh fruit and vegetables, and then smoking like a chimney!

1. Moisturise.

This is a misnomer, you can’t actually put water in your skin. You can, however, oil it up (like leather!), and trap water next to the skin.

After every wash, put an inert oil on your face. Johnson’s Baby Oil is good. Put it especially on your laughter-lines (around the eyes), your forehead, around the mouth and on the neck.

You don’t need expensive ointments; independent studies show these are a con.

2. Eat Good Food.

Eat plenty of fruit, fish and vegetables, drink water. A healthy diet makes for a healthy body, and health makes you look younger.

3. Sleep.

MOST IMPORTANT.

At least eight hours. A good night’s kip will make you look years younger.

Go to bed before midnight, as early as possible. You’ve had enough when you bound out of bed in the morning, full of energy. If you don’t, you need more, or you’re depressed, or you went to bed after midnight.

Lack of sleep is very ageing. If you don’t get enough sleep you look haggard i.e. old. Sleep deprivation is akin to being a zombie; your IQ is less, memory poorer, and your reactions slower. You become more prone to disease.

4. Don’t Smoke.

Smoking constricts the capillaries in your face. This is why smokers look pale. It ages the skin. It makes your hair lank.

A smoker is essentially in a constant state of ill-health; weaker immune system, less energy, less stamina. In time smoking can lead to serious disease. It lenghtens recovery time from other diseases. Doctors tend to write-off smokers; they know their work is being wasted.

Cigarettes contain poisons like formaldehyde, ammonia, arsenic, and benzene. The reason people crave them is because they also contain nictotine, which is more addictive than heroin. You can kick heroin in five days; nicotine can take weeks.

5. Don’t Drink Alcohol.

Again, alcohol is a poison. Drunkenness is a mild form of poisoning; hence its alternative name: intoxication.

I once knew some Australian girls when I first came to in London. They used to ‘party hearty’. One of them was very pretty. After 6 months she looked like she’d aged fifteen years; 20 going on 35.

When I was very young I used to wonder why adults looked so old, tired and fed up. Certainly life has its disappointments, but we help death mark our card early on.

6. Don’t Sunbathe.

In neolithic times men used to cure animal hides by exposing them to the sun. This was the earliest form of tanning; they were making leather.

This is what’s happening to sunbather’s skin. That’s why 35 year-old sunbathers look 45, and 45 year-old sunbathers have skin the texture of a leather armchair.

Sitting in the sun for hours is weak-minded. Look at the great beauties, the older ones. They kept well out of the sun; their skin is milky white. You don’t see their sisters in magazines, who, for a season’s healthy glow, sacrificed their looks forever.

7. Don’t Dye Or Bleach Your Hair.

Unless your hair is grey or mousey, leave off putting chemicals on it. If you are healthy, your hair will reflect this. Bleaching is bad for your hair, and you may damage the follicles. If the dye doesn’t suit your skin tone, it won’t make you look good anyway.

8. Don’t Wear Formal Clothes.

Dress younger, look younger!

9. Don’t Wear A Beard Or Moustache, Or Long Hair (for men).

If your hair is thinning and long, or you have a beard or moustache, you’ll look older by ten years. Conversely, a short hair-cut and a clean-shaven face takes years off you. Cut off your sideburns; voila! instant youth.

10. Don’t Have Cosmetic Surgery.

This is a trap. Because a man has M.D. after his name doesn’t mean he has the skill of a Michelangelo or Da Vinci. That’s what you need to remodel a human face.

Why? Because our perceptions of human beauty rely on very subtle clues in another’s face; small lines, dimples, contours, expressions.

A cosmetic surgeon cuts these out, and you are left with a mask. You lose some of your personality. You become a type; a Hollywood social x-ray, a waxen-faced thing. Don’t do it, girls!

We are not machines; cut us, take a part out, replace it, and we are never quite the same again.

11. Don’t Over-diet, Over-exercise.

This makes you look scrawny and haggard. A slightly fleshy face looks younger; the wrinkles fill out a bit.

A bit of exercise gets the blood flowing, and reminds your muscles they exist. Too much intense exercise (more than two hours a day), a low carbohydrate diet, and you look haggard; worn out, old, under par.

12. Don’t Worry!

If you have problems, resolve to deal with them, or deliberately avoid them; but decide, and then put them out of your mind. Stress and worry make you haggard, and pre-dispose you to disease. They keep you awake at night, and ruin the quality of your sleep.

Meditate. Resolve your problems before you go to sleep at night. Observe your thoughts and emotions dispassionately. You may be surprised to find how crazy most are!

In short, youth is a combination of factors; one cream or regime won’t do. Address your entire person, body and mind.

Here’s to your good health!

T. O’ Donnell is the author of ‘The Black Book Of Power’, a free personal development ebook, and lives in London, UK.

1. Eat Wholesome Food.

Eat plenty of fruit, fish and vegetables, drink clean water. Depending on where you live, you may need the bottled stuff, or the tap water could be OK. Avoid chlorinated water. If you’re in a First World country, and the tap water looks clear, and doesn’t taste of anything, it’s probably OK.

Packaged food is full of additives. These are flavourings, colourings and preservatives. The more ingredients a food has, the less healthy it’s likely to be. The preservatives are poisons, put into kill bacteria.

Try and get organic food, if you can. It’s less likely to be tainted. A healthy diet makes for a healthy body.

2. Sleep.

Get at least eight hours a night. If you need twelve, take them! Ignore those fools who say they can manage on four hours a night; maybe they can, but if you’re like a zombie at work, or you sleep longer at the weekends, you’re chipping away at your health.

Lack of sleep is very ageing. You become more prone to disease. Recovery time from colds is longer, and you get more of them. If you don’t get enough sleep you look haggard i.e. old. Sleep deprivation is akin to being a zombie; your IQ is less, memory poorer, and your reactions slower.

3. Avoid Drugs.

This includes cigarettes and alcohol.

A smoker is essentially in a constant state of ill-health; weaker immune system, less energy, less stamina. In time smoking can lead to serious disease. It lengthens recovery time from other diseases. Doctors tend to write-off smokers; they know their work is being wasted.

Cigarettes contain poisons like formaldehyde, ammonia, arsenic, and benzene. The reason people crave them is because they also contain nicotine, which is as addictive as heroin.

Alcohol is a poison. Drunkenness is a mild form of poisoning; hence its alternative name: intoxication. It attacks the liver, which is vital to your well being. You don’t want your doctor to tell you have the body of a fifty-year-old at the age of twenty-five.

As for illegal drugs: Apart from the direct effects of the substance itself, it may be mixed with additives that end up poisoning you. The vendors have no fear of consumer watchdogs; they can put whatever they like in their products.

4. Take some exercise.

Exercise gets the circulation going, and gets more oxygen into the body. I’ve noticed when I sit at my PC all day, I get stiff. If I do it for days in a row, I feel colder.

When I take a long walk, I can feel my joints loosening up, and I just feel ‘better’ at the end of it.

We share a common ancestry with the great apes. They are very strong; a chimpanzee can kill you quite easily. This is partly because they take a lot of exercise swinging around the place and foraging for food; no sitting around for them!

5. Avoid Worrying.

Consider your problems dispassionately. Solve them in your mind, or put them aside. Continuous worry never solved anything; it just wears you down. If you have problems, resolve to deal with them, or deliberately avoid them; but decide, and then put them out of your mind. Stress and worry make you haggard, and pre-dispose you to disease. They keep you awake at night, and ruin the quality of your sleep.

Meditate. Resolve your problems before you go to sleep at night. Observe your thoughts and emotions dispassionately. You may be surprised to find how crazy most are!

Look, all you really need are clothes, food, and someplace warm to sleep at night. Everything else is a bonus. Remember, it all ends in the grave, for rich and poor alike. Today’s major problem will be tomorrow’s vague memory. So cheer up, and get healthy!

T. O’ Donnell publishes self improvement, Wordpress theme and loan calculator softwares in London, UK.