Are you one of the many thousands who make New Year's Resolutions? Do you start off with oodles of resolve and commitment only to get to the end of January and throw in the towel? The diet and fitness industries (and oh yes, we're talking huge money making industries!) count on you to fail. Yep, you read that right. They count on you to FAIL. Why? Simple math. Their marketing gurus can then guilt you into buying another diet food or signing up for another gym membership or purchasing another piece of bulky home equipment. All of these are destined to miss the mark as well. One of the things I tell my clients regularly is that the diet industry is not your friend. They are guaranteed to lighten your wallet but fail you in your well-intentioned desire for health. The biggest reason for this is every diet and exercise program is "bookended", meaning that there is a beginning and an end. Once you reach the end (or quit in frustration) you tend to return to the "real world" and all the old habits that got you in trouble in the first place. Lasting change is NOT what the diet industry wants! That would devastate their profit margin.

Reclaiming your health is nothing short of Revolutionary in this day and age. Truly. There are so many forces out there fighting against you! It takes courage and guts to claim your Self. We are lulled into oblivion by sales pitches, television, fake surgically-created celebrity bodies, quick fix promises and medications that seem to magically remove personal responsibility (until the side effects kick in). We are sold a load of garbage and told it's food. We are tricked into believing that we don't actually have to DO anything about our health, just take this new medication. Those clever marketing agents have discovered that people don't really want to hear the truth: if you want to attain and maintain health, you have to take an active role. You actually have to take responsibility and make changes that stick for a lifetime, not just until the end of January or until you make it to that high school reunion. You have to swim upstream against the marketing assaults that hit you in the gut at every turn. You have to start listening to what your body needs and break free from the hypnotic drone of the advertisements for no-calorie, no-fat triple chocolate layer cake, no-exercise, eat-all-you-want, lose-20-pounds-in-2-days, fat-flush fantasies. You have to get to that place where the proverbial line in the sand stops moving and you take the first step toward the You you know is in there buried under the cases of Slim Fast, Lean Cuisine and Vitamin Water. The REAL You. The Vibrant You. I won't pull punches, the beginning is difficult. The terrain is fraught with perilous pitfalls and dead ends. It requires moxie and stick-with-it-ness. But you know what? The challenge is worth it. YOU are worth it! I haven't worked with a single person who has made this commitment to care deeply for themselves and regretted it! I have met many people who have woken up out of their couch-glued, prime-time, high-fructose, guilt-induced-sound-bite stupors in wonder, gasping at their new-found sense of vitality. They wonder how they ever allowed themselves to slip into the rivers of snake oil. With new-found strength and determination they spring forward into the adventure called life that stretches out in front of them. Won't you join them?

Here is a radical idea: WAKE UP. TAKE CHARGE. GET REAL.