Everyone is obsessed with their face
and more thoughts from Lizzy and Alden
Today’s letter includes Alden’s thoughts on Feed Me’s Beauty Black Book, where Sophia Coppola gets her facials and a bribe. Lizzy discusses sports massage, how being in awe can affect the nervous system, fruit facials, and the best moisturizer.
Alden’s thoughts of the week:
I enjoyed reading Feed Me’s NYC beauty black book where she asked a lot of cool people for their beauty and wellness recs. It was heavy on the facialist recommendations. I guess people are obsessed with their faces. I’m influenced to try Raquel Medina-Cleghorn now. Also love that my girl Christine Chin got a mention from Romilly (who has impeccable and trustworthy taste). I first went to Christine Chin after seeing that Gwyneth Paltrow goes there. I doubt she still does. SJ at Sofie Pavitt is an angel and an amazing esthetician. I got the microcurrent lift and tone facial. I looked really good after. I love that the Chelsea Hotel spa got a shout out. I run Hotel Chelsea’s Instagram. The Spa is very beautiful. I’d recommend trying their healing arts– I did Craniosacral Therapy and it was interesting… Since we’re on the topic of facials, a little birdie once told me that Sophia Coppola is a frequent visitor of a Spa in the West Village that shall remain nameless… lots of other chic women also go there but you’ll have to find it for yourself.
Me at Christine Chin; me with an inherent glow after microcurrent with SJ. This leads me to think that most people are gatekeeping the really good people. I will only share my acupuncturists with people I actually like. Sorry. If you want to pledge actual $$$ to this substack I’ll DM you names.
Texts from a friend after sending them to my acupuncturist. I went to Amangani today for a deep tissue massage. It was beautiful and hardly anyone was there. My massage was a little too light on the pressure, but my mom had a fantastic experience and said she just asked for more pressure in the beginning. I have a hard time asking for what I want.
I’ve been so unhealthy lately and have to say the only wellness practices I’ve maintained recently are taking my vitamins and somewhat moving my body. These are the vitamins I take. I also started wearing mouth tape again. For mouth tape you don’t need to buy anything special– 3M tape does the trick and that’s what James Nester uses.
I’m in Jackson Hole for the next ten days. I’m so excited to be outside, breathe fresh air, go hiking, get out of nyc, not talk to anyone lol… Let me know if you have recs in the comments. I liked this juice bar. Any place that sells living libations is a friend of mine.
Lizzy’s week of being “well”:
I have been lucky enough to spend the last ten days out on the farm and I don’t know how to explain it but I am suddenly obsessed with the beauty of the leaves changing. Maybe this is the first peak leaf season where I’ve spent this much time outside. This feeling of awe reminds me of one of my favorite excerpts from Zach Bush’s talk on beauty as the fabric of the universe (skip the first 9 minutes). He just launched a free library of all of his talks here. Being in a state of awe seems to have lifted my spirits or maybe regulated my nervous system? I am feeling a bit more “well”.
This week my friend and talented teacher of all things functional movement, Kate Posch, gifted me a massage from a sports masseuse, Nate Taylor, and it was unlike any massage I have had. He combined stretching and guided movement with massage and he walked me through a breathing exercise. Apparently, I tend to inhale with my neck muscles and it might be contributing to the build up of tension in my neck and shoulders. This is your reminder to breathe from your ribs and belly.
Breathe in slowly through the nose into the belly, hold for 4
Exhale slowly through the nose and release the belly, hold the exhale retention for 8
Repeat
Fruit facials: I visited J.I. Rodale’s library and found this insane article from the first issue of Prevention magazine on the different effects that fruit has when slathered on your face
J.I. Rodale’s personal library. 
Strawberry facial instructions. Abel makes 100% naturally derived fragrances, ‘pause’ is meant for women going through menopause (which isn’t me but I know people who are) and is designed to calm the body and mind during hormonal change. I found that pretty cool.
Sky High Farm’s Tallow is the only thing keeping my hands moisturized after working in a kitchen for 3 days washing dishes. I think it's too heavy to use on my face but am now putting it all over my body. The packaging is 100% home compostable and proceeds go to Sky High Farm which donates all the food they produce to community partners to achieve long-term solutions to food insecurity.
