Julianne Hough is celebrating her best friend, Nina Dobrev, on her birthday – by sharing photos of the duo in their swimsuits. In a new social media post the dancer-slash-actress shows off her incredible body in a bathing suit alongside her Vampire Diaries pal. “Today marks another year around the sun for one of the brightest lights!” she captioned the series of instagram snaps. How do both of the stars approach self-care? Celebwell rounded up their top tips.
“I love to make every moment a luxury experience,” Hough told Women’s Health. “Whether it’s in the bathtub and having bubbles and meditation music playing and my crystals and whatever it is, or I’m in the shower and I’m just rushing out through the day, at least I know that I’m being taken care of in the best way possible.”
Hough is also a fan of regular body scans. What is a body scan? She explained to Pure Wow that it is a form of guided meditation practice that has you lie down, stay aware of your breath, and mindfully soften each part of your body, from head to toe. “I love meditating and doing energy work,” she said. “It really helps me get out of my head and into my body.”
“I love making sure my environment is like, candles lit or incense burning, just to create the experience and get my mindset in a really calming way, so I can self-regulate before I get crazy again with work stuff,” Hough told Women’s Health .
“Pilates, yoga, working out with a trainer,” are a few of Hough’s workouts. She likes to maintain variety with exercise because “it keeps everything fresh and helps me fuel my body’s different needs,” she told Shape. “Recovery is also a second workout to me,” she added. “We always think about the fact that we have to push, push, push, but without that recovery, it leads to burnout. It’s about that balance. I think we haven’t focused enough on recovery in the athletic or the artistic athlete (dancers).”
“Just like my weight, the timing fluctuates [laughs]. I try to go to bed at ten and on good nights, I am able to. For the most part, I crawl into bed at ten and watch a TV show or a movie and fall asleep by 11:30 p.m. or midnight. Not bad, but it could be better,” Dobrev told The Cut about bedtime. “I also sleep with a sound machine. Sound machines are my secret weapon because they drown out any noise and keep you in this even-keeled environment that’s peaceful and chill.”
Nina has another “trick” up her sleeve when it comes to sleep. “Chamomile tea,” she said. “Those are my tricks. I don’t count sheep or anything.” Numerous studies have shown that a variety of teas may boost your immune system, fight off inflammation, and even ward off cancer and heart disease.
“To unwind at night,” Nina might watch something on Netflix. “Or I’ll read. I recently finished Cat Marnell’s How to Murder Your Life,” she told Harper’s Bazaar. Why should you read at night? One Harvard study published in Social Science & Medicine found that people who read books regularly had a 20% lower risk of dying over the next 12 years compared with people who weren’t readers or who read periodicals.
Nina’s health hack for not looking tired? “I was on a vampire show for a very, very long time, so we shot at night and [I] didn’t sleep very much,” she told Vogue. “One thing that I learned recently is that dark circles appear because you’re dehydrated, so it’s important to drink a lot of water.”