I think setting goals and planning are my secret weapons. If you don't have a clear picture in your mind on what you want or how you are going to get there, then all the dieting and exercising in the world won't help. I notice when I stopped losing weight, it was because I lost sight of my goal. Once I found it again, I was able to start losing weight again.
Mine would have to be calorie counting and running. Before these two wonderful behaviors entered my life I was plateaued and just feeling so down. Running is getting me into great shape and calorie counting is so much more manageable for me than following a set in stone diet plan.
Deciding I would do a minimum of 10 minutes of exercise per day every day (unless I was too sick to get out of bed) and then doing it. My reasoning was how could I not have time for at least 10 minutes? That conscious commitment to lead a more active life has made a huge difference.
Cutting out sugar, processed foods and sodas (even diet ones). It has made all my bad cravings go away. Now when I get cravings they're for things like cucumbers, lol.
Finding benefits and motivation other than weight loss. It sounds odd, but the main thing that's helped me over the past year is finding exercise/sport I enjoy, and setting goals within that. I know that running helps my weight loss, but I find it easier to focus on a goal like running a 50 minute 10k, or a half marathon, or a full one, than I do on weight loss alone.
Everything has helped, but I think the two that have helped the most weight come off is daily exercise and getting in my water. Which mean replacing the diet sodas with water. I think even the diet sodas were holding me back. But the water intake seems to help a lot. And I was losing by just eating right, but when I added the exercise, I had a much bigger loss.
