There are two main grooming techniques:
• Pressure grooming

• Superficial grooming

Each method addresses a specific cutaneous problem, but most of the work is done using pressure grooming techniques.

Pressure strokes are used to unfold the folds in your skin by crushing them.

If you put some pressure on the folds with your nail or fingertip, you open them up and destroy their foundation.

Apply pressure on one spot for one to five seconds, move away a bit and start over.

You want to open or crush any hardened structure you meet.

Exert all the force you can without hurting yourself.

This action may leave nail marks on your skin, but they should fade out in a few minutes.

If they don't, reduce the pressure you put on your finger.

Most pressure strokes are short in duration; lasting less than five seconds.
Short pressure strokes are the most used grooming gesture.
With them, you can repeatedly crush and compress any skin defect or fold.
You can perform hundreds of short pressure strokes on a very small skin area.
You rely on the information that comes from your figertip and from the skin location you are grooming to direct your efforts.

You only resort to long pressure strokes when you feel that your nail or fingertip is positioned on a weak spot of the skin structure that you are trying to crush.
As soon as you realize that you've found such a spot; don't move!
Freeze your position, while maintaining the pressure.
Keep on pressing.
You will feel your nail penetrating your skin, while the cutaneous feature you are grooming gives in.
Only end your pressure stroke when no more unfolding occurs.

Align your fingers, excluding the thumb, so that your nails form a line.

Gently rake your skin with your nails, using a back and forth motion, while applying a very delicate pressure mostly during the pulling phase.

Your nails should only pass a few times over the same section of skin.

Move along and cover your whole body.

In hard to reach places, you'll have to groom using one single finger.

Your entire body should be groomed daily.

However, your skin is supposed to tell you itself where it needs to be groomed.

Itches, prickles, pruritus, twinges, pangs, aches and pains are all increasingly rude orders to groom specific places.

Ignoring such signals has put you in the state you're in.

You should also groom a region because it shows visible marks, spots, lesions, holes, bumps or because it has aesthetically deteriorated.

You can use any finger you wish.

The index finger on your writing hand is usually the most sensitive.

However, you will often find the need to use several fingers at once to cover large surfaces.

I also recommend using both hands anytime you can.

The second hand can mimic the other, or it can help the grooming hand by stretching and stabilizing the skin.

Each finger feels differently.

Your grooming finger should be your most responsive; your other fingers being less sensitive, in varying amounts.

When you groom, try to vary your habits and alternate the fingers you use.

You generally want to work with your most sensitive digit, but for orientation, strength and fatigue reasons, you may get better results by using another one.

Some fingers are stronger than others.

Your thumb has the most power, followed by your middle finger.

Each person is different, but here is a simple chart.

Your thumb may not be very agile nor sensitive, but it is the strength champion.

When you need power to groom hardened locations, use your strongest fingers.

Strokes are repetitious gestures.

They can be divided into three phases;

1• The finger strikes the skin,

2• The nail grooms the skin in some manner,

3• The finger returns to its initial position.

Each grooming stroke usually lasts between one and ten seconds.

These movements have to be done over and over to get any result.

In many situations, the area you are grooming is very small; such as a fold crossing.

Your nail should pass over it repeatedly for a while.

Once your hand is well positioned, all you have to move is the tip of your fingers(s).

The nail then performs most of the sensory signal reception and all the grooming work alone.

Even occasional fingertip contacts with the skin relay mounds of information.

Any part of the flesh will do.

It's amazing how much grooming you can do without using your nail.

Often, just pressing your fingertip on a folded area will flatten and open it up.

It is very easy to wound your skin while grooming.

Putting just a little too much pressure may result in a small lesion, abrasion or scratch.

Sometimes, you may even get to the point where the skin will bleed and not realize it until later.

Harming your skin won't help it.

Control the force you exert on your skin with great care, mostly when exploring new grooming techniques or when working on less familiar areas of your body.

Grooming, when performed correctly, should be a rejuvenating experience for your skin, with few after effects.

Plan your work over a long period.

Each region of your skin will respond differently to your grooming.

If an area reacts badly to your treatment, stop grooming there until it heals.

Grooming has the amazing ability to restore your skin's healthy condition.

All the folds on your body can be unfolded.

Even the worst problems seem reversible.