I tried dry brushing to see if it would give me skin like Gwyneth's

The other day, I commented — apropos of nothing, and rather egotistically — that my skin is looking amazing. (Seriously touch it, I implored everyone within a 14-foot radius.) It's taken a lot of eye-watering prescriptions, an ill-advised peel phase and approximately 450,000 OXY pads, but I've finally reached an armistice with my forehead grease. Even my pores are holding steady at "overlarge." And yet, I want to slough it all off.

Now that winter is coming (hello, flaky skin) and microbeads are beauty enemy number one, I was keen to explore other methods of exfoliation. One option is dry brushing: the Ayurvedic (and Goop-approved) practice of taking a dry brush to your body to buff away unsightly dead cells. Other ostensible benefits of the technique include increased circulation, banished cellulite, better lymphatic drainage and the elimination of toxins — a spurious phrase I would honestly prefer to never type again.

Related: I drank a ton of water for a month to see if I’d turn into a supermodel

Now, do what you did to your body, but in tiny circles with a tiny brush on your tiny face! Every Monday and Thursday, for 60 seconds at a time, I applied the soft bristles of Aveda's Tulasāra Radiant Facial Dry Brush to my cheeks, always channeling the gentle, meditative scrubbing of Nana Pine Sol–ing her kitchen tiles on bended knee. And as instructed, I followed the scrubbing with a pat of face oil, a luxurious step the internet told me was crucial.

It's possible that my lymph nodes are beyond help, but I have to say, after three weeks of waxing my cheekbones off and on, I didn't notice a marked difference in the puffiness of my face or the flakiness of its covering. I'm not a dermatologist (or Gwyneth Paltrow) so I'm not qualified to comment on cell turnover or circulation. What I can say is that whether you use a Clarisonic or coconut oil, it's important to remember that, in every beauty trick, there lies a bit of alchemy — so do you. Brush your face or don't.

Teeth, though, are non-negotiable.

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