but I haven't been able to keep at it consistently.

I lose weight when I eat better foods, count calories and exercise. To be honest it's not even that hard when I am doing it, I just haven't been able to make it past two or three months doing it before something knocks me off my game and I just tumble backwards until all my hard work is gone or I gain weight.

But I also notice I've had a hard time with building other habits I've wanted to cultivate for a while now, like meditating every night or practicing guitar every few days. I just end up not doing it...

What do you all suggest? How did you guys build habits and keep them going?

I just do it. I was told by my doctor that it takes 6 weeks to build a habit up but only 72 hours to destroy it. I have no interest in torturing myself 6 weeks at a time over and over and over and over again, so I never give myself more than a 24 hour break. If I keep putting today off for tomorrow, tomorrow will never come.

I could've written this. It's a cycle of self sabotage isn't it? You work so hard and feel so good and then some unforseen stress hits me and I revert. The question "I know what I need to do, why can't I just stick to it?" plays in my mind every day of my life. Why do I allow myself to fail? And look at all the good habits that I've incorporated into my life like not drinking soda, eating more fresh fruits and vegetables, exercising daily, incorporating healthy snacks, avoiding processed foods, even with these good habits in place I still fail somehow.

I've started to get really angry about this. I look at people who don't have weight problems and I can't figure out how they stay so skinny. I'm almost certain I eat less than they do. I feel like I'm playing the numbers game but still losing. Do I seriously have to stop eating all foods?

Sorry for the rant, I'm totally annoyed today because I've been eating too much the last couple of days and I registered a 1lb loss on the scale. I'm SO ANNOYED that I don't seem to have any control of what's going on, I mean what is that????

That's really interesting about the 72 hours. It makes a lot of sense.

After writing this post I took a long hard look at the goals I have been wanting to accomplish and the kind of person I wish I was, at least as far as healthy habits go. Ideally I'd like to count calories everyday, eat all my meals at the table without distractions, brush my teeth after every meal, exercise 6 days a week with an active rest day and meditate each night.

So, obviously that's too much to do at once. I've built some healthy habits. I can identify healthy food. I know which foods are loaded with calories and which aren't. I drink water now. :P I do stretches and stuff, but I haven't been able to stick to a work out routine or a good eating plan.

I broke it down into mini-goals. Essentially the smallest steps I could take to reach this goals, and then I kind of stacked them on each other so that every 30ish days I'm building on a new habit.

It looks something like this:
June-July: count calories and exercise 10 minutes every day.
July-August: eat every meal at the table, brush teeth after each meal, do yoga for 10-20 minutes twice a week.
August-September: Meditate every day, walk 30 minutes 3 times per week.
September-October: Start the Couch to 5k Program, find exciting and active things to do on rest days.
October-November: Run 2x per week, eat a veggie with every meal
November-December: Add in strength training two times per week for 15 minutes.

Then after that I decided I could just continue with that and really keep those habits going. It's going to be tough but I'm hoping that by tackling a new habit each month I won't really give myself time to think about the last habit I built because I'll be powering onto a new habit. I chose things that I'll be doing daily, for the most part, because I read that it's easier to keep up daily habits than ones you only do a few times per week.

So essentially at the end of the year I should be doing what I think would be ideal for me to lose weight and gain strength.

It's just a rough draft, but I realized my biggest issue lately hasn't been with knowledge of what to do but with building those actions into solid habits. I usually set goals like this: "Tomorrow I'm going to count calories, eat 5 servings of veggies, eat at the table every time, drink tons of water, exercise for 40 minutes and meditate before bed!" Then I'm all pumped up and I might manage to do it for a day, or even a week, but then I burn out. I used to see those goals as simple things I should just be able to do, but I have to realize I am generally sedentary, I eat veggies but I don't think about it usually, I rarely eat at the table and my ability to meditate for more than 5 minutes is pretty bad.

I'm asking a lot of myself. I learned what one has to do to lose weight successfully in the long term but I never learned how one gets to the point where they're doing that stuff consistently. I think it's really about know how to build habits, which I've never been very good at. There is an actually science behind it, I believe, and before now I've never really looked into it but I think it could me view my plan to lose weight in a different light. I mean, you can have as many exercise plans and meal plans as you want but if you can't follow them consistently they aren't going to work.

Sorry if that's long but I feel I might've had an epiphany this evening. :P

I have always been the same way, this is the longest I've been able to stick with anything diet/exercise related. Some days, especially if my weight fluctuates back up, the only thing that keeps me going is the fear of failing yet again. I've been trying (key word: trying) to stay really positive and optimistic, when things happen I try to roll with the punches rather than just giving up and running out for some junk food.

Don't worry about ranting, every body has to do it sometimes.

I don't have much advice. Today I'm the heaviest I've ever been in my entire life and I know what I need to do to get it to go away but for some reason I always slip up and fail. I hope I'm giving it my best shot by continuing to try and to research every avenue. Before today I never gave habit building a serious thought and now I wonder if it's not a gigantic puzzle piece that's been missing this whole time. I've heard my whole life that you have to 'take small steps' and 'set small goals' but I think I just realized what that actually means.

It's ridiculous because if I had a dollar for every time I read one of those statements, well it'd be in the hundreds, but I never gave it the time of day and it might be what I needed to hear.

Anyways, keep your chin up and keep trying. If you're not trying you're quitting and if you've given up on yourself nothing can help you out.

I did the same thing for years, especially with working out. And working out seems to be the deciding factor of how I eat...I know that seems odd. But if I'm exercising regularly, I can eat clean and controled pretty easily, but a few days away and my eating habits slip too.

I finally found a workout I love. After years slaving away in the gym, I started running outseide. Seriously I loved it sooooo much, and that was it. That just set the ball in motion for everything else. I wanted to eat well to fule my body and my runs.And I noticed weight lost meant I ran faster (less weight to carry!) I'm pregnant now and not running, so yes my eating has gone back to its old ways. But I am sure that I will ahve no issue losing the weight with running.

I wasnt perfect while running but if I went a little off, like went out to eat and over ate I was back on track the next meal. My want to perfect my running was greater tahn my craving to eat poorly. Ovbiously weightloss on its own has never been enough of a motivator, but running was.
The includes over eating at night. Morning runs suck when you over eat right before bed

I think that's what you need to examine. Most people *know* how to lose weight--it's the application of that knowledge that is difficult.

What is that "something" that knocks you out of the game and why does it cause you to tumble down?

Really interesting thoughts, walrus.

mememe has a good point. Can you pinpoint what stressor or event or whatever happened at the very moment you got off-track? How did you respond? It's really important to understand this, and it's going to be different for everyone.

One of the most significant things I did last year when I started to lose weight again was seriously examine where things went wrong in my previous attempts. I knew what worked, but I needed to really dig down on what derailed my efforts. It's not a time for judgment or blame. I identified my biggest risk triggers and brainstormed different responses. A lot of times the triggers are unavoidable - in my case, health-related/feeling unwell - but that doesn't mean our responses can't be changed.

To be honest I still struggle with the same triggers (like getting takeout when I don't feel well). But being aware of them helps me hold them in check - you don't have to make the best choice every time, just most of the time.

I want to give you a standing ovation thewalrus!!! Sounds like you have a GREAT game plan! It is all in the baby steps. After all, the best way to move a mountain is pebble by pebble.

I know for me, it started off slowly. I don't remember my time frame but my schedule was along the lines of:

Eat more veggies in the day
Drink more water
Take daily vitamins
Cut back carbs
Add in cardio at least 3 times a week
Start calorie counting
Add in strength training at least 2 times a week
Start the Couch to 5K program

I just did one at a time and once I was good and ready, I moved on to the next goal. It was easier than trying to do it all at once and it slowly built my habits up. Now, if I don't count every bite or do my daily exercise, I go stir crazy. If you told me a year ago that would happen, I would have NEVER believed you! It takes time, it take patience, it takes determination, but I KNOW you can do it!!!!

Thanks for all the responses!

Honestly, that something that knocks me off my game can be any stressful situation. I don't think it's the something that is the actual problem. I can't help being sick, having a bad day, starting my period...most stressors are out of my control.

What I think happens is that I start trying to build habits that are too big for me and then when anything goes wrong those habits that are too big to have 'stuck' are the first to go. Also, when I said two or three months, I may have been exaggerating. When I look back I usually make it more like a month before something pushes me off the wagon.

I think I need to focus really hard on getting habits to stick before I try to take the next step. If I'm doing the smallest baby steps possible them when stressful situation X, Y or Z happens I won't drop my habits. It's hard to talk myself out of 10 minutes of exercise a day, or logging my meals before eating them. They are tiny. On the other hand, it's easy to talk myself out of exercising for 45 minutes and eating each meal at the table with no distractions, making sure there's veggies in each meals, brushing my teeth each time and avoiding the television.

I just never understood the nature of habit before now, really, but I think I'm learning.