Yes, you can lose weight by going on a diet. Every year millions of people across the world buy into a diet plan. In the forefront of their mind is the thought of permanent weight loss. The reality is short-term weight loss. The main beneficiary of the diet is not the dieter.

The essential ingredient that is missing is the means to effect change, permanent change. What is needed are new habits, slim habits if you like, that can be repeated and practiced to effect that change, not just another restrictive diet.

When a psychologist at UCLA decided to study the effectiveness of diets, she didn't use any half measures. Traci Mann looked at 31 diets over a period of between three and five years. That's a lot of diets! What she found was that in the majority of cases - another study put the figure at 99% - diets do not result in sustained weight loss for the majority of people.

The study found that you can lose between 5 to 10% of your bodyweight on any number of diets, but the weight comes back. The majority of dieters put all the weight back on again - plus some. Going on a diet can actually make you fat. Another study found that only one person in every 100 loses weight permanently - that's a failure rate of 99%!

We now know much more about the way our brain and our body work - in particular how they interact. If we know why things happen to us and the effect they have on us both mentally and physically, we are in a fer better position do do something about it and to devise new behaviors that allow us to make permanent change in our lives. By learning new habits - slim habits - we are now able to change our behaviors and make permanent weight loss possible.

Making change is not difficult, but it helps to have a program that supplies a knowledge base and also a means of offering long-term support. We need help and a formal structure if we are to identify our old behaviors and learn new habits. We have to have a means of taking control of our lives to make long-term change. It needs to be a program of learning and where we can discover our true strength and resolve.

A new, slim and healthy life awaits those who are prepared to come to terms with their behaviors and to make real and lasting change. Learning new habits, new slim habits is the way forward.

Permanent weight loss will make the big weight a thing of the past.

Tags: depression, fitness equipment, diabetes