Desert Island Survival Product #3: Raw Honey for Healing, Luminous Skin, and Yums

I'm currently working my way through herbalism courses aplenty and testing different skin care products and techniques. My skin looks its best when I'm playing with homemade soaps, toners, and serums, but you don't even need that much for all of your skin care needs. In life, less is more. I've covered Baking Soda and Coconut Oil, now let's look at all the uses for honey! Like the previous two, it may be all you need if you were suddenly stranded on a tiny tropical island in the South Pacific.

Cell proliferating Calendula petals and honey on sprouted wheat toast. Calendula tastes richly nutty.

Make sure you only use honey that is pure, raw, and/or unpasteurized. Pasteurized honey is boiled at high temperatures that kills all of the beneficial nutrients and enzymes in this super food!

1.) Face Wash: Honey is an anti-microbial, it's an ideal blemish protecting wash. Use about a tablespoon. Massage into your skin as you normally would, rinse.

2.) Moisturizer: Honey is a humectant. It super-moisturizes your skin by pulling moisture from the air and distributes moisture from the outer layers toward the inner layers of your skin.

3.) Anti-Ager: Humectants make skin flexible and pliable. The result: less wrinkles. Honey contains antioxidant vitamins and minerals like Vitamin C and manganese which fight aging free radicals in your body.

4.) Skin Protector: The humectant properties of honey also help protect skin from environmental damage, like everyday pollution we're exposed to from being outside.

5.) Face Scrub: We're cheating here, but mix with some ground herbs and/or oatmeal for a healing, moisturizing, exfoliating face and body scrub.

6.) Face Mask: Don't want to wash with honey daily? Try a mask instead. Apply, let it sit, then rinse off. You'll get all the same benefits. Try this if you're having a break-out to kill it dead.

7.) Internal Healer: Increase anti-aging, anti-microbial factors internally by healing at least a tablespoon of unheated honey a day. It's amazing at preventing colds and other illnesses.

8.) Pain Prevention: Mix your honey with lots of cinnamon, turmeric, and maybe some black pepper and garlic if you're adventurous. Take at least a healing tablespoon a day. We've tested it in class and it's a powerful anti-inflammatory pain aid. Try it the night before, wake up pain free!

9.) Cold Prevention: Honey kills the microbes in your body as well as in your face. Try the mix above and definitely throw in that garlic. You can try other anti-microbial herbs like lavender. Take daily during your cold-prone seasons.

10.) Hair Lightener: One reason honey is anti-microbial is because it contains natural hydrogen peroxide! Honey makes a wonderful mild natural hair lightener. Mix with cinnamon and olive oil (natural peroxide boosters) and apply where wanted on your hair. Apply about 10-15 times (different days) to gradually lighten your hair to the desired level.

11.) Cough Syrup: Mixed with infused cold-fighting berries like elderberry and herbs. Take to sooth your sore throat during a cold. See: Elderberry cough syrup

12.) Allergy Fighter: Use caution if you're very allergic to pollen, but consuming local honey and/or bee pollen can help you adjust to and be less affected by your local allergens.

13.) Food: Honey is delicious in your tea, coffee, as a syrup replacement or sweetener.

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Never Expires: Honey is a special desert island survival product because it lasts forever. When the universe expands until it is no more and the stars have all died, honey will still be here. The ratio of sugar to water molecules in honey makes it impossible for bacteria or mold to grow in your honey. They've found honey in ancient Pharaoh's tombs, still perfectly eatable! It may crystalize, but you can still eat it! Honey is a prized treasure for a reason! Its use predates written history. Before the first known civilization settled in the fertile crescent, people used honey. Honey is eternal!

As for the vegan/honey and ethical dilemma... I never understood why having keepers care for our friends, the bees, is a bad thing? Especially when they're endangered. Even my most militant ethical-vegan friends all use honey.

Seek some local honey (supports your community and it's created with local flora, which is good for your immune system), rub it all over yourself like a crazy person, and enjoy. Yes, if you have a lover and they come home and see you with honey dripping from your face you look like Hannibal Lector when he skinned and wore a cop's face. It's okay. Your skin will be so plump, firm, and radiant afterwards that it's worth it to look psycho.

Got any other questions or tips for desert island products and/or honey? Let's discuss in the comments.

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