The Mirror is Your Friend

One more New Year fitness tip: As part of your new healthy eating, more exercise, and weighing yourself daily as I mentioned before, there is one more thing you should do daily and that is to look at yourself in the mirror - naked if possible. The reason this is important is because fat and muscle weigh differently - a little muscle weighs the same as a lot of fat on your body. As you start to tone up with your new healthy lifestyle, you may not notice your weight dropping very quickly because hopefully your fat is being turned into muscle. But you can see changes in your body - good or bad - by simply looking in the mirror. If you have a lot of weight to lose, you may not enjoy this part very much in the beginning but you still need to do it - just as you need to weigh yourself daily.

I have found that a full length mirror in your bathroom or bedroom is perfect for this. If yours is in the bathroom, you will need to take a moment before you shower or bathe (when there is no steam) to just look at yourself - all the way around. The second benefit of this practice is that you will gradually gain body acceptance (no matter what you look like). Body acceptance goes a long way to the mental part of getting into - and staying in shape.

When you reach your goal weight, I'm certain you will actually enjoy the mirror which is good because you need to continue to see yourself each day. As with the scale, you will notice when things are starting to turn for the worst before it gets too far out of control.