Don’t be afraid to fly in the face of the consesus of accepted wisdom…
I feel that its been only in the last few weeks that I’ve come to truly love SR shaving. I get better results, with less irritation and more satisfaction than I ever did with cartridges or electrics. I feel that my current routine is perfect (for me) and I don’t see any reason for significant further changes.
Don’t get me wrong, reading and asking questions on this forum and the wiki were invaluable as I was starting out, I would never have gotten to where I am without this wealth of information. But I think that a lot of my frustration over the past year was that I really didn’t understand just how much your individual and unique beard, disposition and equipment can make “what works for you” so different from the consesus of accepted wisdom.
So anyway, I present for your amusement, comment and ridicule, all the ways that I differ from the norm:
1) a lot of emphasis has been put on heat during beard prep. Long hot showers, hot face rinse, steaming lather. I now wash my face quickly with soap and warm water, rinse it off with COLD water, and whip up some williams mug soap with lukewarm water. Works great for me.
2) learning to shave with two hands? I only hold the blade in my right hand. Works great.
3) Use only the “weight of the blade” when stropping? I am a fanatic about stretching the strop super tight, but I must put at least a pound of downward force on the blade when I strop. Haven’t rolled the edge yet
4) Shave WTG first? I do a single pass only, always against or across the grain.
I hope I don’t come across as trolling, I just wanted to throw this out there to hopefully let some newcomers to this hobby realize that they need to take everything they read with a large grain salt. You may be surprised at what ends up working good for *you*. Have fun, and god bless…:)