No. 6: Get Enough Sleep
You'll sleep when you're dead, right? Or at least when you're dead tired. Sounds like a plan, except that a lack of zzzs impairs your body's ability to heal itself and lowers brain function. Studies show that people who get only five hours of sleep can exhibit the motor skills of someone who drank two alcoholic beverages. Staying up late also screws up cortisol levels, putting you more at risk for diabetes and obesity, and research also indicates that a good night's shut-eye can reduce your risk for breast cancer.

Secrets to success: Try to hit the sack by 10 p.m. and get eight hours of rest. If you go to bed at 10 and wake up by 6, your body will get its optimal levels of healthy hormone fluctuations, says Horner. But if 10 p.m. is just crazy talk, the next best thing is to go to bed by midnight and get up at 8. "Melatonin, our sleep hormone, spikes between midnight and 1 a.m., so you don't want to be awake then," she says. It's a very powerful antioxidant and anti-inflammatory; it decreases the amount of estrogen your body produces, and it stimulates your immune system.

If you're a night owl, Horner says, naturally train your body by going to bed 15 minutes earlier each week. And if you toss and turn once you're under the covers, don't self-medicate with over-the-counter remedies, which can leave you with a morning hangover effect (in which case, you shouldn't operate heavy machinery -- like your car). Instead, dim the lights a half-hour before bedtime and turn down the heat. Low light signals your brain that it's time to sleep, and cooler air promotes the small body temperature drop that occurs when you slumber.

If all else fails and you don't get your eight hours, make it up. "I'm a good napper," Stewart says, echoing the well-proven advice of other efficient people who slip in sleep. "I can take a 15-minute nap and feel infinitely better." But anything longer than about 20 minutes can be too much of a good thing. "A nap that's too long or too late in the day can interfere with your nighttime sleep," Moore says.

No. 7: Put Down the Sugar and Carbs, and Trounce Trans Fats
Experts agree that these are the big three -- the axis of evil that leaves us chubby and cranky. Along with spiking insulin levels and packing on pounds, sugar inflames cells and "makes skin more sensitive to sun damage and premature aging," says New York City and Miami dermatologist Dr. Fredric Brandt. Beyond the way we look and feel, there's also our future health to consider. Women who have higher insulin levels from consuming mass amounts of sugar also have a more than 280 percent higher risk of developing breast cancer, Horner warns. And trans fats promote inflammation and the production of free radicals that contribute to chronic disorders like dementia, Alzheimer's, arthritis, heart disease, cancer, premature aging, and the list goes on.

Secrets to success: In the grocery store, read package labels and pass on any food that names sugar as one of its first three ingredients, says Somer. "I don't care if its sucrose, high-fructose corn syrup, brown sugar, or honey -- it's all sugar," she says. She also rejects anything with saturated or trans fats, which may be listed as partially hydrogenated vegetable oils. "If a food has one gram or more of combined saturated and trans fats per 100 calories, I put it back," she states. "I want to get my trans-fat consumption down to zero."

Remember to crunch the numbers on the labels. Legally, a product like crackers can claim to have zero trans fats if it has less than half a gram per serving, which might be listed as three crackers. "But if you eat three servings -- nine crackers -- which people often do, you're getting too many trans fats," Combe says. Also consider a food's color. Breads, rice, and pasta made from whole grains are often tan or brown and are digested more slowly than their refined white counterparts, which the body processes as sugar almost immediately, causing insulin spikes. "Just replace every white food you eat with something brown," Brandt says.