Nutrition Corner

11 Unhealthy Foods to Ditch From Your Diet: While all foods -- in moderation -- can have a place in our diets, too many low-nutrient foods can take a toll on your health. Here's what to cut back on.

Need More Energy? Try These 5 Foods Full of Vitamin B12: Vitamin B12 is an important player in keeping your engine running and your energy levels up. Find out which foods can increase your intake naturally.

Recipe for The Day

Cucumber Chickpea Salad with Feta & Lemon: This cucumber chickpea salad with feta and lemon is tangy and refreshing. You can enjoy it on its own or toss it with greens for an easy lunch or dinner. We love the grassy flavor of dill, but another fresh herb like oregano, parsley or chives will work well in its place.

Lifestyle & Fitness Focus

5 Healthy Ways to Have More Energy:

• Eat for energy: Diet can play a huge role in your energy levels, especially if you’re eating too much sugar and processed foods. While you don’t necessarily have to revamp or totally restrict your entire diet, simply starting by being mindful of what you’re eating can go a long way.

• Get regular exercise: When your energy is lacking, exercise is probably the last thing you feel like doing. but physical activity is, perhaps counterintuitively, essential for combatting low energy.

• Learn how to manage your stress levels: Stress is an essential mechanism for survival—but at a certain point being in a constant state of stress (called chronic stress) can have detrimental effects on your health and well-being. In addition to its impact on your heart, blood pressure, and sleep, stress can cause your energy to plummet, even if you’re sleeping and eating just fine.

• Stay properly hydrated: Drinking enough water everyday is the most essential thing you can do for your body—and it can also make a big impact on your energy.

• Cut your coffee intake: Many people turn to a cup of coffee or other sources of caffeine for a quick energy boost, but coffee is less helpful for energy than people think. While modest coffee consumption (think: one to three cups per day) is associated with some great short- and long-term health benefits, including direct and indirect boosts in energy, too much can actually rob you of energy.

4 Stress Relieving Foods to Try to Relieve Stress

• Green Leafy Vegetables: It's tempting to reach for a cheeseburger when you're stressed, but go green at lunch instead. Green leafy vegetables like spinach contain folate, which produces dopamine, a pleasure-inducing brain chemical, helping you keep calm.

• Seaweed: Sushi lovers, you're in luck. That seaweed wrapped around your spicy tuna roll has added benefits for relieving stress. Seaweed is rich in iodine and one of the few sources of this important mineral.

• Avocado: Consuming regular portions of avocado might help shut down stress eating by filling your belly and making you feel more satisfied.

• Beets: Beets are high in folate, a vitamin that can play a role in relieving stress.

5 Exercises for Posture Improvement

• Bridge Pose With One-Arm Reach: Lie face up on the floor with knees bent and feet flat on the floor. Place hands on thighs or straight down at sides. Press into feet, engage glutes, and slowly lift hips up off the floor into a glute bridge until knees and hips are in line. Balancing in a glute bridge, extend left arm overhead until left elbow is next to left ear, using glutes to stabilize your pelvis and spine. Hold for five breaths and switch arms.

• Isometric Abdominal Press: Lie face up on the floor with knees bent and feet flat on the floor. Exhale and engage abdominals to keep ribs and pelvis stable. Place right hand on right knee and left hand behind head with elbow in by your temple. At the same time: Lift left shoulder off floor, lift right foot off floor (bringing it into tabletop position). Press right hand into right knee until you feel active engagement in abdominal muscles. Hold for five seconds then switch sides. Repeat five to 10 times.

• Bent-Knee Supine Twist (Thoracic Rotation): Lie face up on the floor with knees bent and feet flat on the floor. Bring right knee toward chest. Using left hand as a guide, roll and drop the right knee across and over toward the left side of your body and let the left knee fall out and over onto the floor. Extend right arm straight out on the floor to the right at shoulder height and turn head to the right (if that feels comfortable). Hold for five breaths, making sure to breathe fully and deeply into the mid- and upper back. Release and repeat on the opposite side.

• Quadruped Hip Abduction: Start on your hands and knees with toes on floor, heels up, knees aligned under hips, and wrists aligned under shoulders. Place right hand behind your head and lift head into hand. Without tipping the pelvis or rounding the spine, hover left knee no more than an inch off the floor, engage left glute, and slowly lift left knee out to the side five to 10 times. Switch sides and repeat.

• Hip Hinge With Thoracic Rotation: Stand with feet hip-width apart. Keeping knees bent, hinge forward from hips until your torso is almost parallel with the floor (think of sending hips back as you hinge torso forward). Make sure abdominals are lifted and engaged and neck is aligned with spine. Place hands on shins or straight down in front. Inhale deeply and rotate to the right, opening chest to the right and lifting the right arm straight up toward the ceiling (as if you’re drawing a semicircle in the air to your right). Focus on twisting gently from the center of your back (your thoracic spine) instead of tilting or using your hips too much. Exhale and return right arm to center. Repeat on the left side, continuing to alternate sides five to eight times each.

3 Best Bodyweight Ab Exercises for an Amazing Six Pack

• Bicycle Crunches: Bicycle crunches are a dynamic and effective exercise for engaging both your rectus abdominis and oblique muscles.

• Planks: Planks are a fundamental bodyweight exercise that provides a solid foundation for core strength. To perform planks with proper technique and form

• Leg Raises: Leg raises are a fantastic bodyweight exercise for strengthening the lower abdominal muscles.

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