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The rope, or lack of it, is good. You did a good job on the sky.

If you tried to lighten your eyes and cheek, I can't tell. There are a ton of ways to do it. Quick and easy.... Well, probably the first way I would do it, doesn't mean the quickest or easiest. I'd make a loose selection starting just above your left eyebrow and all the way around the shaded part of your face, including your right cheek. Feather it 20 to 30px (play with it, 20 to 30 is a good start).

 

Make a Curves adjustment layer. Lighten it in the middle of the histogram, don't make a S-curve. You can make it lighter that you might want and then darken the area later by lowering the opacity of the layer. Just don't blow it out. Say ok. Lower the layer opacity if you think the shaded area is too bright.

 

Ctrl click on the layer mask to re-load the selection. Now make a Hue/Saturation adjustment layer and (probably) lower the saturation. 

When you're done click off the eyeball of the hue/sat layer and reopen the curves window (dbl click on the left icon not the mask). Play with the channels that are behind the RGB. You might find that you didn't need the hue/sat level.

 

You can darken some areas by painting on the area with black. (make sure the curves layer is active) Use a soft brush and low brush opacity. Playing is learning.