Coffee; nectar of the gods, the drink that enables life, the magical elixir. Coffee is the wonderful liquid that makes the world turn and allows us to conquer the most hectic days with pep in our step and a smile on our face. It has been said that it can improve cognitive functions, decrease heart risk, improve workouts and help with weight loss but coffee has a lot of amazing uses that you may not know about. Along with being the liquid magic that helps us get through the day, coffee also can help us be more beautiful than we already are. We have compiled a short list of the wonderful benefits of using coffee for more than just a morning pick me up.
Coffee is an antioxidant. We can beautify our body from the inside out by simply drinking a cup-o-joe. The antioxidant powers of coffee can help keep your skin in tippy tippy shape by battling chemicals found in the air and the damaging UV rays from the sun. The grounds of coffee from that pot you just drank can also be used to make a masque for your hair. The same antioxidant properties that protect our skin when we ingest coffee can be applied topically to hair to protect it from sun and pollution.
Coffee is an anti inflammatory. If you had a few to many cocktails last evening, are running low on sleep or are having allergy issues you can apply a cold compress of coffee grounds to your under eye area and you will get almost instant relief. The caffeine in coffee restricts the blood flow to the applied area, therefore decreasing swelling and puffiness. And believe it or not, this is also a quick fix for jiggly legs! The caffeine helps to tighten up skin temporarily by pulling out water from the area, so if you have a few problem areas that are affected by cellulite, try applying a cold compress of coffee grounds for a quick (but unfortunately temporary) fix.
Coffee is an exfoliator. Forget the man-made micro beads and expensive designer skin products, coffee grounds work as an excellent exfoliator for your skin. Mix some grounds with your favorite soap to get nice smooth skin or for extra silkiness try mixing the grounds with a lotion in the shower and then rinse off, the heat and moisture of the lotion will keep your skin baby smooth.
Coffee is also a magician. Applying a masque of coffee grounds to your face not only calms redness and irritation in the skin but it ALSO increases blood flow to give you a great glow oh and did I mention that it has anti-aging properties when applied topically?
So, now you have a reason to save those old coffee grounds! Pinterest is full of articles on DIY scrubs, masques and other uses for coffee check them out here.
Written by Danielle Maravelas of Babbling Ink