Losing weight and keeping fit and healthy requires more than arriving at your local fitness centre or health club. The ability to lose weight requires a state of mind and one that you have to persevere with. Diet plans and fitness workouts are only a tool which you can utilize to get rid of excess weight and become healthier, but by themselves, in the box, they don't achieve anything.

There is always a dramatic growth in the membership of health clubs and gyms, at the beginning of January. Everyone starts the New Year with a new resolution to lose a few pounds after stuffing themselves over the festive period. Each year the health clubs try to understand why they have such a problem holding on to members and then to make sure that they keep coming back after the novelty has worn off. The answer can be found in appreciating what triggers a customer to sign up to a gym in the first instance.

The answer is plain to see, you sign-up to a health club or gym to lose a few pounds and make yourself healthier. You don't become a member of the health club to buy a diet, or to be sold any other health services or products. Health is about individuals and their aspirations and not about putting cash into the till.

Sure, you will benefit from some guidance on what to do and you need a schedule of how to go about it. You may benefit from a particular diet type and you may benefit from vitamins and healthy food types, but it is all too easy to become snowed down by all of the number-crunching planning of an exercise or diet program. It is possible that focusing too much on the details can and will result in losing sight of your original motivation and in the process, set you up for failure.

In place of thinking positively about losing weight and getting fit, which is the reason that you began, you may start to worry that all of the calorie counting, reps, and heart rate tracking are too much to deal with. The numbers take over and you start to lose sight of your targets. At this point it becomes more of a job than a hobby and instead of being a means of stress release the whole thing becomes very stressful! You may even be tempted to stop exercising and dieting as a result.

Yes, you are going to have some bad days, it would be silly to think that you won't. It's hard work getting into shape. It takes determination and discipline. But most of all, you need to be able to look through those dark days when it all seems pointless, and remember what you are trying to achieve. Whatever you do, you should not get too worked up about hitting all the numbers on the charts all of the time.

The biggest challenge for anyone who is going to lose weight or get fit is to be able to follow through. In order to keep on going, you have to be a Weight Loss LIFER!

The term 'lifer' comes from the military where it is a phrase for 'a person who has been in the military a long time or plans to stay in long enough to retire'. These are individuals who are in it for the long haul. If you are serious about losing weight or improving your fitness, then you have to be Weight Loss Lifer. Are you a Weight Loss Lifer?

A Weight Loss Lifer is fully aware that there will be potholes to go through; that there may even be really bleak times up ahead, but they get through them or they go around them. It may require support from others, but whatever it takes, it gets done. They understand that losing weight is so much more than the result of a single day, or a single week. It is the total of everything that you have done to date.

You may not be a lifer today, but you won't ever become one if you don't make changes now! New Year's Resolutions are good because they are a great excuse for deciding upon a lifestyle change. On the other hand they are bad because few individuals expect to keep their resolutions for very long and quit at the first sign of failure. If you didn't quit on your weight loss resolution then you would still be loosing weight. You would already be a Weight Loss Lifer.

Everyone is an individual. We are all different. You cannot just purchase a diet plan or an exercise regime and "guarantee the results." It just doesn't happen like that. Each one of us needs to fit the diet or exercise plan to match our own needs. You can buy different diet types and plans or exercise plans but what you can't buy, is the mindset of a Lifer.

Do not get over-whelmed with the details of losing weight or getting fit. Make exercising and healthy eating a high priority in your life but make sure that it is not the only thing in your life. Be aware of the long term picture and make sure that you keep focused. Bad days happen, but they are much easier to get over if you are a real Weight Loss Lifer.