Blog Posts by Healthy SELF, SELF Magazine

By Jaclyn Emerick, SELF magazine

She plays the privileged and popular, sarcastic and sassy Naomi Clark on the CW's hit revamp of 90210, but the only mean thing about AnnaLynne McCord is her bangin' bod.

Related: Drop A Size The Healthy Way

The real life Beverly Hills beauty may be blessed with a speedy metabolism, but her sexy, fit physique is the result of hard work, self-discipline and dedication to a workout regimen and diet that works for her.

What else works for her? Her wardrobe. Literally. She burns and firms on the go with Reebok's EasyTone shoes and apparel that help you trim from head to toe by creating imbalance and resistance as you move.

AnnaLynne is in NYC for Rights For Women Week, and between UN summits and work with Somaly Mam, a human rights organization she supports that fights the exploitation of girls and women worldwide, she made the time to share her get-slim secrets with SELF, so you too can think and act like one of Hollywood's hottest starlets.

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By Jenny Everett, SELF magazine

In an ongoing effort to drop the infamous "Freshman 15," three college gals are following SELF's Jump Start Diet and blogging about their workout and diet progress every day.
We checked in with our "collegiettes" at HerCampus to see how week three of the program is going. (Missed the first two weeks? Here's some wisdom from week one and some smart eating strategies from week two.)

And now for this week's tips ...

Savor -- and Be Inspired by -- Progress. This week, Appalachian State senior Nikki Roberti stepped on the scale and realized she had lost 7 pounds -- way to go! She credits this to her sleepy metabolism finally waking up.

"I know I have a long way to go (because, let's be serious people. I need to lose more than 15 lbs to be the healthy diva I want to be), but I can already see the future." she says. "And that future does not include any of the health problems obesity can cause... That future includes me walking down the aisle in a beautiful

By Jenny Everett, SELF magazine

A few weeks ago, we launched Healthy SELF's partnership with the Paul Taylor Dance Company and Talenthouse, a premier online platform that provides opportunities for young people to participate with the world's most renowned artists and creative institutions.

Related: The Best New Moves For Hot Legs and Abs

Together, we are providing a chance for dancers to show off their skills to win a scholarship at The Taylor School - Summer Dance Intensive. Throughout this two-month contest, we'll feature weekly spotlights on the Paul Taylor dancers to encourage and inspire you as they share their own personal secrets on how to get and keep that dancer's body. Click here for more information on the contest.

Related: 4 Sneaky Ways to Drink More Water

For our latest installment, we spoke to Paul Taylor dancer Parisa Khobdeh, 30, about what she does to get her legs in prime dancing shape.

"What we do is really athletic and technical. I need leg strength to, say,

By Jenny Everett, SELF magazine

Recently, we launched a series of blogs highlighting advice from our friends behind Lose It!, the diet book based on the popular calorie counting app.

Related: 4 Sneaky Ways to Drink More Water

So far, we've learned our Lose It! Type, 3 Ways to Burn Calories at Work and How Friends Can Make or Break Your Weight-Loss Success.

Today, the Lose It! crew shares how to bust through weight-loss plateaus and overcome setbacks.

Pitfall No. 1: Bugs in Your System

When you hit a plateau, your first order of business is to take a hard look at whether your calorie-tracking system is accurate. Did you know that some of the nutritional information on packaged foods and restaurant menus is wrong? A study by scientists at Tufts University and published in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association in 2010 found that fast-food meals -- especially those advertised as healthier, low-calorie options -- contained an average 18 percent more calories than the figures

By Jenny Everett, SELF magazine

Yesterday was Ash Wednesday, which marks the start of the 40-day Christian custom known as Lent.

Related: How to Drop A Size The Healthy Way

If you've ever observed Lent or know someone who has, you're probably familiar with the practice of "giving something up," such as chocolate or chips. But some women who don't even observe the holiday from a religious standpoint use Lent as motivation to change their habits, "giving up" things like carbs, sweets, alcohol, etc.

We asked Mary Hartley, director of nutrition for Calorie Count, if it's smart to use Lent as a springboard for dieting.

"Anytime is a good time to clean up your act," says Hartley. "Lent is a great reminder to take affirmative action."

Related: Superfoods For Glowing Skin

In the spirit of Lent, she recommends giving up the foods that tempt you the most or the habits that are most disconcerting.

"The point is not to give up something that doesn't matter and call it a sacrifice," says

By Jenny Everett, SELF magazine

Ever since we were kids watching Popeye down cans of spinach, it has been ingrained in our brains that that this leafy green is a must-eat superfood.

Related: Superfoods For Glowing Skin

"One cup of spinach has just 10 calories, but supplies a wide range of nutrients like calcium, iron, magnesium and potassium," say registered dietitians Willow Jarosh and Stephanie Clarke, contributing editors at SELF and co-founders of C&J Nutrition. "It's also packed with vitamin A, which helps protect your cells (including skin cells) from free radical damage."

Translation: Spinach = glowing skin!

Related: Drop A Size The Healthy Way

Plus, the good-for-you-veggie delivers vitamin K (a key nutrient for normal blood clotting) and folate (key for cell growth and maintenance, and preventing neural tube defects if you're pregnant).

The trick to maximizing these benefits is to eat your spinach with a source of vitamin C, which will help with absorption. Here are three

By Jenny Everett, SELF magazine

Back in January, Healthy SELF revealed The 3 Worst Fad Diets of 2011 -- specifically wagging our finger at the hCG Diet, which calls for 500 calories a day, daily injections of hCG (the hormone your body cranks out when you're pregnant) and little if any exercise.

Disturbingly, according to an article in Monday's New York Times, the diet continues to gain followers:

"Women... are streaming into doctors' offices and weight-loss clinics, paying upward of $1,000 a month for a consultation, a supply of the hormone and the syringes needed to deliver it."

Related: 9 Easy Moves to Try At The Gym

Clearly, this diet sounds unhealthy, and may even border on anorexia. To find out the truth about the risks, we spoke to Eric Braverman, MD, a Clinical Assistant Professor of Integrative Medicine in Neurological Surgery at New York Presbyterian Hospital and bestselling author of Younger (Sexier) You.

While he doesn't recommend it, Bravernan treats several patients

This morning, SELF met Sara Haines, contributing correspondent for the TODAY show at the launch of their new website, TODAY.com. Haines shared her fitness and diet secrets and, as always, was remarkably energetic and lively at such an early hour.

Related: Minka Kelly's No-Deprivation Diet

Lucky for Haines, her day starts "late" at 8:30a, when she gets to work preparing for the fourth hour with Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb. The early morning anchors don't have it as easy- they're always in the office before the sun rises! Haines' workout routine has shifted from her college basketball and volleyball days at Smith College to early morning workouts and "bonus" evening basketball games or yoga classes.

My obsession right now is training in the morning," says Haines. Her new favorite thing is sitting on a balance disk (like this one from J Fit) at her desk during the day. "It's the things you do above and beyond your workout that make the biggest difference," she says.

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