Gut Skin Connection Is Why Your Skin Keeps Reacting

0:00What if the expensive serum you were put in on your face was never going to fix the real problem because the real problem was never on your skin at all. But thousands of years, one of the world's oldest healing traditions has taught something modern science is only now catching up to. That your skin, your scalp and your gut are deeply connected and that the real lasting beauty starts from inside out. Now my guest today bridges those two worlds, ancient of our Vedic wisdom and modern skin care science and she's here to show us how and she's here to tell us how women could actually use it. Now if you've never felt like you've if you've felt like you've tried everything for your skin and nothing sticks, this conversation might completely change how you think about it. My guest today bridges together something I love ancient wisdom and modern science.

1:01Now Mangala is a our Vedic practice here and a founder of Kazma skin, a women led our Vedic skin and scalp care company built around plant based bioactive ingredients inspired by ancient science of our Vedic. Our mission is translating time tested beauty rituals into something practical and powerful for today's woman. Now Mangala, I'd like to welcome to the show. I think this is going to be amazing. I think a lot of women want to hear what you have to say. Now a lot of people have heard the word our Vedic but you don't really, a lot of people don't really know what it means, especially when it comes to beauty. In simple terms, what is our Vedic, what does it actually mean in modern our Vedic need to you? Well, thank you Stacy for having me. That's a great introduction and thanks for asking the questions, the hard questions on what we can be thinking about differently and how we can be our best self.

2:03That's really what IRV that really sort of teaches us. Like you said earlier, it's a thousand year science based off of plants. IRV that really means wisdom. It's a science of life for the science of wisdom. It's a teaching that has been around four centuries that really focuses on looking at your health as a holistic being. And so not thinking of beauty as separate categories from health because there are many things that IRV teaches us. It teaches us about your hair and your skin and your scalp is being separate microbiomes just like you've got. It also shows us what's reflecting inside the body is happening. You see it on the outside of the body. So your digestion, your stress, your sleep, your hormones, nourishment, daily rhythms. So it's not asking itself, what can I put on my hair, what can I put on my skin to reduce wrinkles or improve hair growth or improve the density. It really encourages to think about what is my body trying to tell me.

3:04So I really always say that the biggest thing that I like to say is that your gut is whispering and your skin and your scalp are screaming. And that's really that's what IRV teaches us. I love that. Now what does this ancient tradition understand about beauty and wellness that our modern quick fix approach tends to miss? Yeah, I think so. We live in an instant world. Everything is at our fingertips. We want answers. We want it right away. And we don't have the patience for it. And so IRV does really round the first, I think the practice on longevity science. So it does take time to see results. It does take intention. It does take rituals. And that is really where you see the benefit. It's not a quick fix. And so in IRV that it's not just about putting oil on your hair or saffron on your face or from that instant sort of lift, these rituals are beautiful and they're much bigger than

4:04the ingredients itself. It's a system of understanding the individual and really understanding the balance of what's happening in your body. So two people can have the exact same complaint like sitting hair or drawing skin or poor sleep. But IRV does sort of ask the question of why is this happening to this person? So what is happening in this person's body that's causing the reaction? Now this is ideal. I find that it's very fascinating. And I think it will surprise a lot of people. You talk about the connection between skin, scalp and gut. Like can you explain how they are linked? Absolutely. So in the skin, we think of the gut as a microbiome. Right? And so we put nourishment into our body and our gut process it and it sends the signals to rest our body to perform. And that's unique. Our skin is also microbiome. So our skin is a living, breathing organism that is reacting to the environment around it. So that's how it is. It's an area where we absorb nutrients.

5:06That's what I mean about it being a microbiome. And it's an area where we absorb direct nutrients. Now when someone has skin or scalp issue, it just won't go away no matter what products they try, what might be actually going on underneath? So what's probably going on underneath is an imbalance of your natural constitution. So an IRV that the three basic principles of our constitution is broken into three areas. Air, it's fire and it's earth. So the doshas, as they're called, pita is fire, kafa is the earth or ground and vata is air. So when your body is off balance, it's one of your doshas are off balance. So we have all these doshas living in our body. We don't talk about water because we are mostly made up of water, but really we have the water, we have the air, we have the fire, we have the grounding. So when one of those things are out of balance, that's when we start to see our body react. And so a great example is the winter, is the, is the weather seasons.

6:06The weather seasons are kind of dosha connected. So the summer season often connected with fire, it's pita, so there's a lot of heating. In winter, it's vata, it's very much air dry and spring is really around the idea of kafa. Spring and fall kind of fall in the kafa season of where it's a little bit more kind of across between right before a vata season of dryness, but a lot of grounding energy surrounds the season. So really when your body is out of balance in one of those areas, it starts to show up differently in your skin and your hair. So for instance, when your vata or your air is out of balance, dry skin, I have dry skin, I'm sort of a vata pita dosha where I have dry and sensitive skin and scout. And so I have to be really mindful on the ingredients that I put on my skin because I can either aggravate one of my doshas and I start to see your reaction. Now we live in a world of 10 step routines and miracle products and yet so many women still struggle with their skin. Like why do so many of these modern quick fixes fall short?

7:09It's so funny, it's a quick fixes and a 10 step program. So then it's like the opposite of a quick fix, right? But if you do the 10 step program, you'll have a solution. And it's sort of throwing everything at the wall in a 10 step solution to see if one of those things are actually going to have an impact. So the truth is you have seven layers of epidermis and your skin care products have to penetrate in order for it to actually work. Otherwise you're just putting on your face and you're washing your off. So what a 10 step system does is layers. So you're layering and layering and layering. But sometimes and oftentimes you layer too much, you're actually causing more damage. You could be causing congestion on your skin, which then can show up as oily or acne. And so you have to really be careful on what you're layering and you really only need three products. You need a solid serum that's full of active, you need a good moisturizer. And I always say a face oil to seal it all in and really to penetrate your skin care within the epidermis to get the healing properties from within. I love that.

8:09Now when the shift of a woman needs to make from chasing products to actually addressing the root cause, why is that? What's the shift a woman actually needs to make to do that? So oftentimes these shifts happen because they're seeing something on their skin or they're experiencing something on their hair. And that's when, okay, they're wondering why am I getting more wrinkles? Why am I shedding more hair? And rather than thinking about what's happening inside the body, they immediately run to the pharmacy, the Sephora, the Elta's, the drugsters to find a product to put on top of their face. But it's very surface level. It doesn't actually penetrate or address what's happening within the body. So when you see shedding in your hair, that could be a reaction of a nourishment. That could be the products that you're putting on your scalp is actually irritating your scalp. Champ, like the air very fact of washing your hair is irritating to the scalp. You're causing it stress. So when you put heavy products that strip the moisture, you're further aggravating your

9:11scalp. And guess what happened to your scalp? It's aggravated. It starts to react. It starts to react by making it itchy, making it sensitive. And then you start to shed hair. The another reason why you could be facing hair loss is you're going through your hair cycle and your DHT is low. And so that could be causing a blockage and causing you to shed more. And then as it relates to wrinkles on your face, that is a system, that's a season of vat that where you've got dryness. So your skin is starting to pucker. So you're adding hydration, but you're not addressing the hydration from within. Right. Now you translate these ancient rituals for busy modern life, people who are on the go consistently. And I love that. You know, what are some of the simple time tested Ayurveda practices a woman could actually work into her real busy life? Yeah, you know, I, I doesn't have to be complicated and it doesn't have to be arduous. It can be easy. And the best thing about rituals is that you do them every day.

10:12That's really where you see impact. If you do it once in a while, you're not going to see the impact. And so some of the things that I always recommend is, you know, using a great face serum. So face washes are face washes. You want to use a face wash that doesn't strip away the moisture from your skin. And so you've got a good face wash, you know, I think really any of them will do. They do the job well of clearing your skin. And then you want to add intentional ingredients that help heal your skin that address some of the concerns that you have, whether it's dullness, whether it's dark spots, whether it's wrinkles. So adding a face serum that's full of rich ingredients like turmeric or green tea, as well as peptides. And I love, you know, adding my serum to have a alternative to retina called bakuchu, which is a plant-based ingredient that behaves very similar to retina, which is really suitable for people that have sensitive skin. And so that an active, really, those active really help get your skin, trap your skin

11:14to receive the skin care it's going to achieve. Next step is having a strong moisturizer. A level moisturizer that's got healing ingredients like Ashwanda, green tea that calms any the redness down, as well as nice cinnamon. That really dresses the last to stay of your skin and give you back that that bounce in that strength in your, in strengthens your skin barrier. And finally, a face oil with rose tip oil and sea buckthorn are again, you know, a really rich face oil that's not greasy. That's thin, but that's a nice slip that seals in all your skin care that can really help get all that skin care beneath the epidermis is super important to really help transform your skin. And that's three steps that can be done day and night. It doesn't have to shift. Maybe you add a little bit more face oil at night because you want your skin to feel even more hydrated. But these are simple rituals that can be done daily that can really help unleash your best skin. And for as it relates to your hair, a simple head massage, it doesn't have to be complicated. Use a hair serum daily. My hair serum, luscious, fox flowering hair serum is made with great ingredients like Ashwanda,

12:20Sapa Meadow to help block the DHT as well as caffeine, rosemary, oil, biotene. It really, and also has a peptide in it. It's a daily serum that you're meant to massage into your scalp daily that really helps clarify, hydrate and just stimulate your scalp to create the healthiest environment for hair growth. Simple daily rituals like that can really help transform your hair and your skin. That's amazing. Now for someone who's like intrigued but overwhelmed, like where's the best place to start? Like one small ritual that makes a real difference. Yeah, you know, the one ritual, one I evade the ritual that I grew up with doing is oiling my hair. But over time, it has been so confusing. I have people that oil their hair, leave their oil in their hair all night and they're like, and they put it on their scalp like my scalp is greasy. I don't understand. And so it's such a misunderstood ritual, but I think it's such a great place to start. It's just by oiling the ends of your hair.

13:20And if you're going to oil your scalp, don't leave that oil in your scalp for more than 20 minutes. You can leave oil in your hair if you've got thick, coarse hair like myself. I can leave oil in my hair for hours on end, but I cannot leave it on my scalp because it will irritate my scalp. This is really distinguishing the difference between scalp treatments and hair treatments because society, the breeding industry is just focused on the hair and not really on the scalp. But really, if you want your hair to be healthy, you have to focus on your scalp. So a simple ritual like a scalp serum is a great place to start to really help get your best hair. I love that. Now, your whole philosophy is that the real beauty starts from within, not just from what we put on our skin. What's the beauty from the inside out actually look like on a day to day basis? Yeah, that's a great question. And the one thing that everybody always jumps to, and I do too, as well as your digestion, but the one conversation I think that's super important is your nervous system.

14:20And so when your nervous system is dysregulated, it shows up in your sleep, it shows up in your digestion, it shows up in your stress. And so I really feel the one thing that we can do from an I of 8, the glances of regulating our nervous system. And that is simple through pranayonic breathing, which is a simple way to do deep breathing to really kind of take a moment to kind of ground yourself and collect yourself and sort of move through your day with intention. I can tell you, I did not do that through many years. You know, I, like I said, I discovered I have either in sort of in a more obvious way in the last six years, but you know, I grew up with a lot of rituals and ingredients, but you know, I was fighting it. I was running marathons. I was working a full-time job traveling every week. I was fighting aging. But what I wasn't recognizing was how my nervous system had been so dysregulated that it was showing up through my skin in my hair. I lost a ton of hair. My skin was highly inflamed and highly sensitive. I ate all the right things.

15:22I was doing all the right exercises, but I could not understand why my skin and my scalp were just a mess. And it was really because my system was dysregulated. Wow. That's so interesting. Now, how connected are our skin and our overall well-being, like our diet, our stress, our balance? What does it mean for how we should really care for ourselves? They're all interconnected. You know, it's not separate things. You're digestion, you're skin, you're your scalp. They're all interconnected. And I have a vision that is an interconnected system. So it's interesting that modern skin science is finally kind of making those connections itself through the gut skin sort of access and the relationships between the microbiomes and the inflammation and skin health. So it's really around understanding where inflammation is showing up in your body. And how do you treat that inflammation? So turmeric is a great way to treat inflammation. You know, turmeric tablets are then really popular. Tumoric lattes. I use turmeric in my face serum. It's an excellent way to help cause, help reduce inflammation in the body.

16:25Love that. Now, you've dedicated yourself to bringing this ancient wisdom into modern women. So what do you want most for every woman listening to understand about her skin, about her beauty, about truly care, about herself, you know, from the inside out? You know, it's for a long time, I struggled with the concept of beauty from the inside out and what and beauty from within. I didn't really understand that in an intimate way. And only after I really sat with it, and I had issues of myself and I was trying everything and I could not solve it. I'm a natural problem solver. Did I realize that was actually my nervous system that was causing all of my issues, was causing information in my body, causing my digestion to go awry. And until I addressed that, did I really understand that I could not be my best self from the inside, that was not in that, that can be reflected on the outside. Now for, you know, some of the things we discussed, we discussed about food and we discussed

17:30about the nervous system. Like what do you think is most important? Do you think it's a combo of both or do you think, you know, if we really want to start looking our best and feeling our best, you know, working on the inside out, should we start, you know, looking at what we're actually putting into our bodies and should we start really thinking about, you know, different types of products we're using, one we're using, and how we're using them. Like what is some of the advice that you can give women who are new to this or have been using the same routine over and over and over again, and they're looking at the mirror and they're just not happy with themselves. No, I would say, strip it back. We are in a society of over consumption. It's more, more, more, more exercise, more products, more food, more, more, more, more. And if you really take a second and strip it back, write it all down in terms of what you're putting on your face, what are you putting on your hair, what are you putting in your body? How are you moving?

18:30So there's a couple of things that, how are you sleeping? We have all this data and we don't really know what to do with it, right? And so then we follow this bad diet, we follow this, you know, this influencer and we're trying all these different things and things, things are something so heavy working and some things may not be working. And for me, for my experience, it took me a hot minute to strip it all back and say, what am I actually doing on a daily basis? Where do I feel good? Where do I, where don't I feel good? I've got a busy lifestyle, I've got two kids, you know, it's, I'm working full time, but yet I still just didn't feel centered. I was always chasing. And only when I really stopped and took a look from within, did I realize that I was just causing more dysregulation of my nervous system. And until I can balance that, I was never going to have any results, no cream, no probiotic, you know, no meditation was going to help me until I stopped and said, okay, what it actually works?

19:31When do I feel good? When don't I feel good? And using the information of my own data, I start to understand that my best self is someone that sleeps eight hours, someone that takes the probiotic, someone that limits their coffee intake to maybe two cups a day, mac firm before, all before 2 p.m. that exercises at least three times a week, move with my body three times a week. And really is an intentional of what I'm putting on my body in terms of skincare and hair care products and what I'm putting in my body in terms of food. So stripping away the overly processed foods was sort of the key for me to recognize how do I feel and look my best self. And I can honestly stay, stay see at 51, I feel better now than I have in the last 20 years. But we were in it, raising kids, raising a family, having a high pressure job, I didn't really feel like I had the time to stop and take a look, take notice until things started showing up, I couldn't ignore it anymore where my joints were in pain, had a frozen shoulder,

20:34I was losing a ton of hair, my skin was consistently red and irritated. Everything I felt, I put on my body felt like it was burning from the inside out. So again, your gut whispers, your skin in your hair screen. That you created products now and you have a whole line of products. Was this what really inspires you? It was what you went through to really start creating these products for other women. Absolutely. You know, like I said earlier, I went to an I made the Cretrida Ninja, and I spent some time there and really I'm starting to learn more about the philosophy of I made some of the ingredients, the prep the rituals and I can immediately connect to my upbringing in terms of things that my grandmother and my mother were teaching me and when I was growing up. And so when I started changing my, what I was doing, my skin in here, I saw a huge impact and people would ask me, friends would ask me, and I started to realize that, wow, you know, if people are asking me, then maybe other people are struggling with the same issues

21:35that I have, because I couldn't fathom it. There's so many products out there. You know, everybody's going to find this solution. It's just, you know, it's just me that had this problem. I was the only one. And it came to pass where one woman said to me, whatever you're doing, your skin in your hair lady, bottle it up because I'd buy it. And I'm like, oh, never even thought of that. And so I've had a long career in building brands. I've worked for some of the top companies in the Rolex, from PepsiCo, Capose Consumer Brands, and my background is in, you know, food innovation and marketing. And so I've been marketing brands for these $1 billion brands for the last 20 odd years. And I never thought about doing it for myself. Right. That's amazing. That's amazing. So tell us a little about the products that you sell. Thank you. So I'm so proud of the products that I sell. I sell a scalps serum, the luscious lock flowering hair serum. It helps promote a healthy environment for denser, fuller hair and stimulate new hair ghosts. And when you use daily, it's made with rice water, fermented rice water, which is a really

22:40important ingredient because it's very hydrating and it's very quick absorbing. So it doesn't make your hair feel, your scalp will oily or greasy. You can use it every day and live your life. And no one even knows on your scalp. It's got great ingredients like rosemary, salt, tomato, ashwanda, biotene, coffee. I also use a peptide in there to really help stimulate. So I tried to bring the wisdom of Ayurveda ingredients like ashwanda and rosemary and also marinate with modern skincare ingredients because that's really where the beauty happens. We all don't have a year to see hair growth. We lose steam when it takes that long. So I tried to bring those two things together knowing that I'm trying to serve a population that feels like they need to see progress in order to stick with the ritual. I also have a three step skincare product, a routine, a face serum, the timeless beauty face serum, made with turmeric as well as buckwheat. Cucu oil and peptides and hyaluronic acid is really to help reduce the look of dark spots

23:43and brighten your skin. You immediately see your skin brighten and refresh within a week of using the product. I have a face moisturizer, the youthful bounce is actually water-based with aloe vera, ashwanda, green tea, chamomile, nice cinamide and squalling. It's really meant to calm your skin down, calm any inflammation, any redness and really helps strengthen the moisture barrier and create back the elasticity back into your skin. And finally, a face oil, which is my favorite product, is actually where I started the business. It has made it seven different IAV thick oils. It is a light thin slip oil that just blends beautifully onto your skin. I actually started incorporating it into my concealer to drive more hydration into some of my makeup. It's such a great product. I can't say enough wonderful things about it. It is truly life-changing. I have a number of people that I have clients that have purchased tell me within weeks, people are asking them what have they done to their skin and their hair because they're seeing a difference. And I've recently launched a hair gloss serum, the Shakti Hair Gloss Serum four specifically

24:47your ends of your hair and your mid-links. It's really helped strengthen your hair as well as reduce any breakage. And I also have a ghee-based lip balm that is made with ghee, which is a clarified butter that's been reduced with any other impurities. And I have peptides in it as well as a saffron and squallene to not only hydrate your lips but to heal your lips. So you see that your lips, especially in the winter time, I'm Canadian. So with a lot of cold weather up here, that a lot of lip balms today, they hydrate your lips, but they actually dry them out over time. So you're just applying more and more and more. And so my lip balm that our ghee glow lip balm is really helped to heal your lips. So within a few uses, you actually start to see your lips heal. You see the line starts to reduce in your lips as well as really help reduce the look of chaplains. And bring a picture back. I love that. Now, where can people find you? Thank you. So you can find me online at www.chestmaskin.com, CHASKIN.com, as well as on Instagram and

25:54TikTok and Facebook at Chestmaskin. I love that. Now, for more conversation today, if you wanted people to walk away and remember a couple of things that are really important, what would be one or two things that you want people to remember from this conversation today? Yes. So the first thing I want people to remember is that beauty is health. It's not a separate category from your health. And that if you are treating your health, you are treating your skin and your scalp. The other thing I want people to remember is that interconnectedness between your gut and your nervous system and the impact it has on your skin and your hair. And if your gut and your nervous system are out of balance, the first place it shows up is your skin and your hair. So if your skin and your hair are having your reaction, you need to look deeply and see what is your nervous system and your gut telling you. Because no matter what you put on your skin or what you put on your hair, if you don't address the root cause, you won't see success.

26:55I love that. I love that. Now, it turns out that the real beauty was never about the next miracle product. It was about balance, wisdom and care for ourselves from the inside out, something that the ancient world understood more before we did. Now, Mangala, I reminded us today that the answers that we were chasing might not be found in something new, but in something beautifully old. And Mangala, I just want to thank you so much for coming on the show and being here. And before we go, tell listeners once again where they can find you and find your products. Thank you so much, Jay. See for having me. It was a great, great time. So you can find me on my website at www.chessmaskin.com. Or you can find me on Instagram at chessmaskin, Facebook and TikTok at chessmaskin. I really want to say before we go is the one thing that made me so excited about having you on the show is that I love the idea that I'm going to be doing. You know, you really stress to people that we always think of beauty and we always think

27:59about putting things on our face and doing this and everything outwardly. And you kind of reminded us that we have to take a step back and say what's going on inside of us? What is causing these reactions or causing us to have these problems? If our face looks pale and our skin doesn't look bright or our scalp is dry or we are experiencing all different types of issues, a lot of times it's you are actually saying all the time. It's because of something going on inside, you know, in our gut, inside our bodies. And we really need to take time to figure out and understand our body and what our body really needs. And I think you really got that message across today. And that's what I really loved about your message is that it wasn't about products, products, products. It was about really focusing on the inside of us. And I think a lot of people lose track. We always get so focused on the social media and what everybody is saying and everybody has cross information. But what you, your message is really saying is that look inside because everything inside

29:02of us and that's medically proven also that, you know, when things are going wrong on the outside, we need to look inside, you know, and what's going on inside is going to show outwardly. And you know, that was the one main thing that you stressed today. And I think that is a valuable lesson for people to really realize, you know, because sometimes we shut the light bulb off and we forget. But really, I think he brought the light bulb back on really bright by sharing with people and making a reminder people that it's so important because these are little clues. Everything, you know, dry skin, our skin being pale, you know, rashes, acne, all these different things. It's because there's something going on within us. And it's our job to figure out, you know, what's going on and then figure out the proper care to help our body, you know, get what it needs that it's deficient in and that in to really, you know, to really be careful of what we're putting our body, the foods, the products we put in our body, you know, everything goes right through our pores.

30:03So we really have to take consideration of how we treat our bodies, our bodies should be put on a pedestal. And I think sometimes we don't do that. And you reminded us that we need to do that in more ways than one. So I want to thank you so much for sharing that message with us and for taking the time out to share your wisdom with us and your product. So thank you so much for being here. And I appreciate you. And, you know, and for everybody, you know, who who learned, you know, something from this episode, you know, and, you know, if this shifted how you think about your skin or how you share about your thinking about how you think about your wellbeing, share it with a woman in your life who needs to hear it. And once again, thank you so much for being on the show. Thank you.