I have been involved in the fitness industry for twenty years, I have help many people achieve their weights loss goals, within that twenty years I have also seen the mistakes people make trying to loose the weight. Despite the fact that we are all individuals the mistakes seems to be common.

Many people become over weight (fat) because of their life style habit, in order to loose weight you need to change some habits, keeping it off requires that you continue with the new habits, Deciding not to change your life style, your chances of loosing weight and keeping it off are not good.

Mistake No. 1: Lack of planning, not taking the time to plan your meals and your exercise time, this is a critical mistake most people make. Think about your day if you are at work are you able to obtain the right food, have you planned your schedule to exercise.

Mistake No. 2: Not being consistent with your exercises. Exercise increases your metabolism. Exercising one day one week and three days the next, followed by missing a whole week will do very little to achieving your weight loss and keeping it off. This must become a habit something you do without have to think about it, like brushing your teeth everyday, you do clean your teeth everyday, don’t you?

Mistake No. 3: Following the latest diet craze, remember loosing weight requires a life style change, a “diet” has a start and an end. Low carb high protein diets are the latest diet craze, this diet has some merit I use this method with many of my clients but this cannot be used as your new habit, it can be used to kick start slow metabolism (see: kick start your metabolism ). Low carb also known as ketogenic deplete the healthy glycogen (the storage form of glucose) stores in your muscles and liver. When your glycogen stores are depleted, you also dehydrate, causing your body loose water, so most of your weight loose comes from water. Glycogen depletion causes you to fatigue, making you feel sluggish which will affect your exercises, which is not good for your metabolism, that’s why you cannot stay on this as a life style change.

Mistake No. 4: Not weight training, yes that goes for all you woman too, tone your muscles with weights, muscles gives you shape, muscles burns more calories, you take your muscles with you 24 hours a day, you can’t take the treadmill with you every where.There are so many other health benefits to weight training so why wouldn’t you. Tone your muscles with 4 or 5 weight sessions a week, muscles supercharge your metabolism.

Mistake No. 5: Paying to much attention to the scale, expecting to drop quickly, being discouraged when it doesn’t. I have seen people give up after a few weeks all because the scale has not moved as much as they had hoped. You didn’t get fat in a few weeks that toke time, right? Fast weight loss is not permanent, pay more attention to your body fat % not the scale, your goal is to loose fat and get muscle tone, not loose weight.

Mistake No. 6: Incorporate "intervals" into most of your aerobic sessions, fat burning zone in my opinion is a myth, you’re always burning calories which is a mixture of fat and carbohydrates. Lower intensity aerobics tends to burn a little more fat, some one toke this to mean you loose more weight, if you are burning carbs or fat you’re burning calories. Mixed it up with your cardio, walk, run, jog in intervals.

Mistake No.7: Never skip breakfast, after a good night sleep the last meal you probably had was dinner the night before, if you skip breakfast and eat at lunch that means your body went without food for at least 16 hours if not more, that’s starvation. Your body will be in a state of catabolism, eating muscle, muscles burns calories. In starvation mode your body, as a safety mechanism slows down metabolism and hordes fat.

Mistake No.8 : This almost goes hand in hand with number 7, starving, cutting to many calories, pushes the body into conserving calories, it will get rid of the biggest consumer of calories, muscles, the very thing you need to loose fat.

Mistake No. 9: Not getting enough sleep, you do not grow muscle while you are exercising, you are doing the opposite, your breaking it down, the only time your really growing muscle is while your are sleeping. Sleep deprivation slows down your weight loss. Again be consistent with your sleeping time and make sure you get at least 8 hours of sleep.

Mistake No.10: Giving up easy. I have seen this all too often, excuses seem to be the main cause, I couldn’t stick to my routine last week, I had friends from out of town, oh I see, did you brush your teeth last week? Remember loosing weight is a life style change, if something disrupts your routine don’t give up get back into as soon as possible, if you run out of tooth paste do you give up on your teeth too. If you have been following your routine, but are frustrated with your results, mix it up a bit, something your doing, has stopped or it isn’t right for you. If you’re trying to get in your house, but the door won’t open, how long do you stand there turning the door handle, a minute, an hour, a day, maybe you have used the wrong key or something is blocking the door, find out what it is a fix, don’t just give up.