Weightloss and lifestyle;

Recently, i was conversing with a couple of ladies and they were telling me about the diet they were currently doing in order to lose weight. One important point that i stressed to them was to not look at the diet in terms of a time frame. Rather, look at the diet as a lifestyle change and try to incorporate those changes gradually and to stick with them over the course of the remainder of their lives.
It is common knowledge for anyone who has, is, or plans on competing in a bodybuilding show or follows the lifestyle, that we bodybuilders and weightlifters always gain weight over the winter, or "offseason", and lose weight in order to reveal the muscle mass that we strived for over the summer to look good on the beach or in shorts and a t-shirt. In effect we are yo-yo dieting in a sense, yet we try not to gain too much bad weight in the process. However, we have the disclipine and determination to be able to stop eating all of the limited amount of junk that we put in our diets over the winter months, to be able to do this without too much strain placed on our bodies.
If you aren't a bodybuilder or weightlifter in the same sense as explained above and you are out to look better and feel better about yourself and for whatever reason, do not have the means to be able to remove the junk food from your diet on a yearly basis, then the best route for you would be to make gradual changes that last a lifetime. I always refer to the analogy of the tortoise and the hare, slow and steady wins the race and this goes for dieting as well. If you remove the sugar filled foods from your diet too quickly, you will only want them as well as crave them even more, it's just human nature. Also, having experienced this myself, your body will go into something of a withdrawl from removing the sugar from your system and it will make it even more difficult to stay away from those foods.
Take your time, if you have a wedding to go to a year from now, do not wait another day to begin dieting for that goal. Time flies and before you know it the date will be here and the body that you wanted to have won't be!
As i got older i became wiser and began to not eat everything that i wanted over the winter months or offseason, therefore, it made it easier on me when it came time to begin dieting for the summer months. I currently begin in march and remove one undesireable food from my diet every two to three weeks. Allowing my body to adjust to the new diet slowly and without any side effects. If you have more time to leave in between removing foods, than by all means do what is right for you. I will expand on this topic in future entries so please stop back every once in a while!