A couple of years ago I had a client who trained with me two days a week and with another trainer one day a week.  I gave her cardio 'homework' that she completed.  We talked about nutrition during our workouts and it all made sense to her.  After one month, however, she shared her frustration with me:  "Why am I not losing any weight?"

I asked her if she had changed her diet:  "No."  I asked her if she had stopped drinking Coke:  "No. We're going out of town this weekend....I'll cut back after our vacation."  or "I have houseguests" or "The kids like the cookies and ice cream and they can't finish them all" were her excuses.

A couple of weeks later she still hadn't lost weight.  After our session, I told her, "You know that what you eat is 80% of this, right?"

She looked at me as if antlers had grown out of my head.

The next time I saw her she was a changed woman.  "I'm ready," she told me.

"Mary," (not her real name), "I've been waiting for you to say that this entire time."

Two months later she was thrilled to tell me she'd lost 20 pounds.  "You were right," she said.  "As soon as I got the food in order, the weight came off."

"The diet starts Monday," "I'm going to get back into shape after vacation," and "Next year I'm going to start exercising," all fall into the same category:  they are clues to the obstacles you're creating for yourself from living the life you want to live.  The truth is, the day that all of this will be easy never comes.  It will not be any easier on Monday or after vacation or next year than it is today - but something inside you knows your life will be richer if it's a healthy one.  So why not start now?  For some ideas on getting started, see the previous post "One small change."

Happy New Year!