I agree with futuresurferchick also!

There will always be missteps. The difference between those who lose the weight and work to keep it off and those who don't is what you do after the missteps.

There will be weeks you don't lose, days when you eat crap and think WTF (not that I have any personal experience with that today---no those are NOT chocolate cake crumbs on my shirt)....but don't ever think for a minute that perfection is required or even desired. It is what you do MOST of the time that counts and how you pick yourself up one more time and crawl when you need to crawl and run when you can run and you'll get there. And once you get there, you keep going.

I really like the analogy to weight loss being like a job. I think that is what has kept me going this time around - I'm not really giving myself a choice about it, and since I write EVERYTHING I eat in my little purple book, even if I go off plan, it keeps me committed to staying with it. I have to go to work, even if I don't wanna, because I have to pay rent. I have to pay rent so that I don't have to move into a box. I have to lose weight because I don't want to be sick from being overweight. I have to work out because I want to be able to run AWAY if I ever have to. :) There's just no choice about it at this point.