How to Do an Evening Reset Routine with Red Light Stretches, Gua Sha & Scalp Massage

Creating a dedicated evening reset routine is one of the most effective ways to signal to your nervous system that it’s time to wind down. After a long day of screen time, sitting, and constant mental stimulation, taking 15 to 20 minutes to slow down helps release physical tension from your head, neck, and shoulders so you can enjoy deeper, more restorative sleep.

In this guide, I’m walking you through my simple, three-part bedtime routine: pairing red light therapy with gentle upper body stretching, relieving facial tension with Gua Sha, and grounding your evening with a relaxing scalp massage. The goal of this complete routine is to help you relieve tension in the areas where we tend to store it most—our shoulders, neck, scalp, and face.

Beyond just relaxing your mind, this is also a practical way to support your natural beauty routine overnight. By combining red light, facial work, and scalp care, you’re not only winding down for sleep—you’re actively nourishing your skin, hair, and overall glow.

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Why This Nighttime Reset Works: The Beauty & Wellness Benefits

I built this specific combination to target both physical stress and beauty care at the same time:

• Eases Deep-Seated Physical Tension: Upper body stretches and gentle neck movements melt away tightness built up from sitting, typing, or looking down at screens all day. Doing this under red light helps ease deep aches, release tight muscles, and bring your body into an even deeper state of relaxation. If you want to dive deeper, read my guide on the 5 Benefits of Red Light Therapy, or watch my video on My Honest Thoughts about Red Light Therapy.
  
• Red Light for Collagen & Skin Vitality: Red light therapy helps stimulate collagen production, smooth fine lines, and support healthy cellular renewal—all while keeping your room low-stimulation so your mind can prepare for sleep.
  
• Facial Gua Sha for Wrinkle Prevention & Drainage: Sweeping a smooth Gua Sha stone along your face encourages blood circulation, promotes lymphatic drainage, reduces nighttime puffiness, releases jaw clenching, and softens expression lines.
  
• Scalp Massage for Hair Health & Face Lifting: Massaging your scalp stimulates microcirculation to your hair follicles to support healthy hair growth while delivering a deeply grounding sensation that calms your nervous system.

Everything Is Interconnected

It is all connected—the fascia and muscles in your scalp directly connect to and support your facial muscles and neck. Releasing tension in your scalp and neck actually helps lift your facial features and smooth out face wrinkles. By pairing all three steps together in one 15 to 20-minute flow, you give your body a complete physical, mental, and aesthetic reset before bed.

Phase 1: 10-Minute Red Light Upper Body Stretches

Setting up your environment before bed is everything. Overhead lights are way too bright for late at night—they suppress melatonin and trick your brain into thinking it’s still daytime. Switching off those overheads and turning on a warm red light immediately signals to your nervous system that work mode is officially over.

I always focus on gentle upper body stretches during this step. Between sitting at desks, typing on laptops, and looking down at our phones, most of us carry so much chronic tightness in our neck, shoulders, and chest. Spending 10 minutes gently opening up your chest and releasing your neck helps reverse that daily desk slump, allowing you to breathe deeper and relax completely.

Why 10 minutes? When it comes to red light therapy, around 10 to 20 minutes is really the sweet spot to get the max benefits. It gives your body enough time to absorb those light wavelengths—helping ease muscle aches, boost cellular energy, and improve blood flow—without overstimulating you right before sleep. I personally use a table top red light panel, and I’ve been using mine for years and I love it.

3 Key Stretches for Upper Body Tension

While there are many ways to open up the upper body, these three specific movements make the biggest difference in melting away daily strain:

• Upper Trap & Neck Release: Reach both hands behind your lower back and clasp your right wrist with your left hand. Gently pull your right arm down and slightly across your back while tilting your left ear toward your left shoulder and angling your chin down. You’ll feel a deep, targeted release right down the side of your neck and into the top of your shoulder knot. Hold for several deep breaths, then switch sides.
  
• Chest Opener Butterfly Wings: Interlace your hands behind your head, with your elbows out. Inhale as you draw your elbows back wide to open up through your chest and collarbones, reversing the tension and tightness in your chest. Take a few deep breaths, exhaling the tension from that area, and gently release when coming down.
  
• Seated Cat-Cow: Sitting in a cross legged position, tall, inhale as you arch your spine slightly, lifting your chest and opening your throat. Exhale as you gently round through your spine, tucking your chin toward your chest and spreading your shoulder blades apart to release your entire upper back. You can do this 3-5 times or however many feels right to you.

(If you want to follow along with the exact exercises for a full 10 minute stretch, the full step-by-step breakdown is in my Full Evening Reset Video.)

Phase 2: 5-Minute Facial Gua Sha

Once your neck and shoulders are open and relaxed, it’s time to move on to a 5-minute facial Gua Sha routine. Throughout the day, we hold so much unconscious stress in our jaw, brow, and facial muscles.

Gua Sha is one of my absolute favorite practices because it works on both a surface and deep muscular level. Gentle sweeping movements flush out stagnant, stuck lymphatic fluid that builds up overnight or during long workdays, instantly reducing facial puffiness.

At the same time, the light friction from the stone boosts blood circulation, bringing fresh oxygen and nutrients to your skin for a natural glow. Just like we stretch our bodies, our facial muscles need physical release—regular Gua Sha helps tone, tighten, and lift the face while softening expression lines caused by daily stress.

The Most Important Rule: Open Your Lymphatic Pathways First

Before sweeping your face, the most critical step is clearing the pathway down your neck. The main drainage points (the “terminus”) for your face sit right at your collarbones.

If you jump straight to your cheeks or jawline without prepping your neck first, that excess fluid has nowhere to drain! By clearing your neck channels first, you create an open path so all that built-up facial fluid can flow out effortlessly.

How to Open Your Lymphatic Pathways (The 10-10-10 Method)

Before touching your face, use this quick 3-step prep to clear the main highway:

1. 10 Sweeps at Collarbone: Gently press your fingers right above your collarbone 10 times to wake up the main drainage pathway.
2. 10 Sweeps Behind Ear: Placing your fingers in a V shape to the front and back of the ear, Sweep with an up and down motion to activate the cervical lymph nodes. (I also like to press 10 times around this area after the sweeping motion to make sure its really open)
3. 10 Downward Sweeps: Using your hands your going to gently glide your hand from beneath your ear and jaw, and down the neck to your collabone10 times to open the channel.

The Full Facial Gua Sha Routine

1. Prep & Apply Oil: Apply a few generous drops of your favorite facial oil across your face, jaw, and neck so your stone glides smoothly without tugging your skin. ( I always do my skincare immediately after my red light and then add the oil on top of that).
2. Open the Neck Pathways: Complete the 10-10-10 Method above on both sides of your neck to clear the drainage routes.
3. Sculpt Jawline: Place the notched edge of your stone at the center of your chin and sweep outward along your jawline toward your earlobe to release jaw clenching.
4. Cheekbones & Mid-Face: Sweep flat across your cheeks, starting near your nose and moving outward toward your hairline to lift the mid-face and relieve cheek tension.
5. Brow & Forehead: Sweep upward from your brow bone toward your hairline, then outward across your forehead to smooth expression lines and brow tension.
6. The Final Flush (10 Downward Sweeps): Finish your facial routine by taking the tool from behind your ear straight down the sides of your neck to your collarbone 10 final times to complete the full lymphatic flush.

This is a very general Gua Sha steps, I show you all the exact steps I do in my full evening reset routine video. I show you how to do each move, which sides of the guasha to use for what and how to angle it.

Phase 3: 5-Minute Scalp Massage

Now we’re onto the very last part of our evening reset: the scalp massage. This step is going to make you feel so sleepy, deeply relaxed, and completely calm right before bed.

Most people overlook the scalp when building an anti-aging or beauty routine, but it is actually one of the most crucial areas to target.

The Scalp-to-Face Connection (Your Natural Face Lift)

Your scalp and face share the exact same connective tissue layer. Think of your scalp as the physical anchor for your forehead and brow. When the muscles across your scalp get tight and constricted from daily stress, they pull down on your face—contributing to heavy brows, forehead wrinkles, and sagging around the eyes.

If you want to keep your face looking lifted, smooth, and rested, massaging your scalp is the secret. Releasing tension at the top of your head physically loosens the downward pull on your upper face, giving you a natural, lifted look.

Relief for Headaches & Mental Fatigue

Beyond the lifting benefits, holding tightness in your scalp constricts local blood vessels and tightens the delicate fascia around your skull. This restricted blood flow is a major trigger for dull tension headaches, brain fog, and a lack of mental focus by the end of the day.

Massaging your scalp instantly boosts blood circulation, bringing a fresh surge of oxygen to your brain and hair follicles while melting away built-up stress so you can drift off to sleep easily.

The 3-Step Scalp Massage Routine

Grab your favorite hair brush (an Aveda paddle brush or bamboo paddle brush works amazingly here) and follow these three simple steps:

1. Meridian Tracing (Front to Back — 5x Each)

Following your scalp meridians, brush your hair from the front hairline all the way down to the back of the neck, making sure the bristles press firmly against your scalp.

• Center Line: Start right at the center line of your scalp, sweeping straight back 5 times.
• Side Lines: Move slightly over to the side lines, sweeping from the front hairline, past the top of the scalp, and down the back of your head 5 times.
• Outer Sides: Move to the outer sides, brushing from the front hairline, curving around the back of the ear, and gliding straight down your neck. Repeat 5 times on each side.

2. Circular Scalp Flushing (Base to Crown Circles — 5x)

Now we’re going to work from the base up to release remaining fascial tension.

• Start at the base of your skull, sweeping upward, then brush outward toward the sides (it might look a little messy, but that’s okay!).
• Move around your head in a complete circle, sweeping and brushing to complete 5 full circles all the way around.

3. Scalp Press & Micro-Circles

Take your brush cushion and gently press it straight into your scalp, making small, soft circular motions to release built-up pressure.

• I start at the front center hair line and press from the front to back, following the meridian lines. I continue doing this on the sides towards my back and the sides to the back.
• You can do this as many times as you like. But after a long routine like this one round over your entire scalp will suffice, and you will def start to feel sleepy now.

If you want to see a visual demonstration, on how I position the brush and trace these lines, I have the full evening reset routine video here.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why do you use a stainless steel Gua Sha tool instead of jade or rose quartz?

I love using a stainless steel Gua Sha tool for a few big reasons! First, it’s non-porous, making it super hygienic and easy to sanitize between uses without harboring bacteria. Stainless steel is also incredibly durable—if you drop it on your bathroom tiles, it won’t shatter like traditional jade or quartz stones! Plus, it naturally stays cool to the touch, which feels amazing on tired skin and helps instantly soothe morning or evening facial puffiness.

Why do you use an Aveda paddle brush for scalp massage?

A high-quality paddle brush (like the Aveda paddle brush or a bamboo paddle brush) features a wide cushion and flexible, ball-tipped bristles that distribute pressure evenly across your head. Instead of scraping or pulling your hair, the soft cushion allows you to press straight into your scalp to release deep fascial tension without causing breakage. It gives you maximum coverage and that deep, soothing spa-like pressure!

How often should you do this evening reset routine?

Because this routine relies on gentle bodywork, light stretching, and low-intensity red light rather than harsh skin treatments, it is safe and beneficial to do every single night:

• Daily for Stress & Sleep: Practicing the full 15 to 20-minute flow nightly gives your body a consistent sensory cue that it’s time to sleep, helping regulate your circadian rhythm and nervous system over time.
• As Needed for Tension: If you’re short on time, you don’t have to do all three phases every night. On busy evenings, pick 5 minutes of targeted Gua Sha or 10 minutes of red light stretching to target wherever you’re holding the most stress.
• Consistency Over Duration: Doing a quick 5-minute version every night is far more effective for skin elasticity, facial tension, and sleep quality than doing a long session once a week!

What facial oil do you use for Gua Sha?

I love using a blended Vitamin E oil or pure moringa oil! You always need a good facial oil or slip agent so your Gua Sha tool glides smoothly across your skin without tugging or causing fine lines. If you are prone to breakouts like I am, opt for lightweight, non-comedogenic oils like these. You only need a few drops to create a smooth surface so the tool moves effortlessly. I like to be super generous with it, and let it absorb fully in my skin afterwards.

When should I do this routine in my nighttime skincare sequence?

Timing is key here! You want your skin completely bare and clean under the red light during Phase 1 so the light therapy can penetrate your skin directly without any barrier. Once your red light session is complete, apply your full nighttime skincare routine, ending with your Vitamin E or moringa oil right before you begin your Phase 2 Gua Sha! Finish with Phase 3 (scalp massage) right before you settle into bed.

Conclusion

We’ve now completed our full evening reset routine! By bridging upper body tension relief, lymphatic facial Gua Sha, and scalp circulation, your neck pathways are completely open, your face is lifted, and your mind is calm.

That being said—please don’t feel pressure to do every single step every single night! I definitely don’t always have the time or energy for a full 20-minute routine before bed.

I often break this routine up based on my hair wash schedule—doing the oil-based scalp massage on nights right before I wash my hair, or just picking one or two phases whenever I’m in the mood for a quick reset.

Whether you do all three steps or just spend 5 minutes on your neck and scalp, taking even a tiny moment to unwind will do wonders for your sleep, your mood, and your skin!