We all have busy lives and life may seem too short for a beauty treatment, but when you have tired feet and aching legs, it’s more than just a simple beauty treatment you need! You need to sit down and take the weight off of your feet…especially if you’ve been standing or sitting for a long time. In a lot of cases just simply sitting and literally putting your feet up may do the trick.
Putting Your Feet Up as a Health and Beauty Treatment
If your feet are sore after a long day of walking, standing or just being, the first thing to do is stimulate the circulation and get the blood flowing back up again. This is your excuse to be lazy, so lie down on the bed or sofa and prop your feet up on something, so that they are about 30 cm above your head. This is a great start and gets blood and fluid that has pooled in your feet and the bottoms of your legs to flow back toward your heart.
Soak Your Sore Feet Away
Next, run a bowl of water to soak your poor tootsies in. Add some Epsom salts, as they are great for muscle relaxing, and you might also want to add a few drops of soothing essential oil to the bowl as well. Lavender is good for relaxing, or if it’s revitalising you want, try adding uplifting oil such as peppermint, lemon, lime or bergamot.
You can try this with cool water as well as warm, depending on what effect you want. Cool water will be good for reviving you and putting a spring back into your step, and warm just makes you feel good. Or you could be really brave and alternate between the two; this hot-cold water therapy is used in hydrotherapy spas to give circulation a bit of a boost, and is far more than just another beauty treatment!
Avoid very hot or cold water as they can be a bit too much of a shock to the system, especially if you’re diabetic. Add some foot cream after your soak and you’ll feel relaxed and ready to jump to your feet again. Or, you could finish with a beauty treatment combined with a therapeutic massage – and have a foot scrub.
Scrub Your Tired Feet and Legs Back to Life
Make your own foot and leg scrub with a handful of coarse salt, some carrier oil (or if you don’t have any, olive oil will do) and a few drops of essential oil. Peppermint and lavender work well together. Mix well in a bowl, and apply in an upward motion to your legs and feet, massaging as you go. Rub the mixture into your heels and balls of your feet to soothe any soreness, then rinse away, leaving feet and legs soft, soothed and fragrant. Apply some good quality foot cream afterwards and that completes your soothing beauty treatment!
The Tennis Ball Feet Massage
For extra tired feet, try this massage with any standard tennis size ball. Standing up, put the ball on a hard surface and rest your foot on it.
Working from the middle of the heel, move the ball down either side of your heel, then down to the ball of your foot. This will help to release tension that you’ve built up in your feet during a busy day, and relaxes the muscles and connective tissue in the arches of your feet. It also helps to spread the bones in the ball of your foot.
So, when you’re feeling the strain of a day on your feet, just put them up, soak and scrub and they’ll feel like new before you know it.