As much as many of us who are over-weight do not like to admit, it is our past and current eating habits that have us looking the way we do today. We need to make many small changes to our eating and drinking habits to reach our healthy weight. It is a long term vision with many short term goals.

Understanding weight lose takes time but it is important to know that you need to consume less energy than you use in order to lose the extra kilos. The best way to ensure that you are burning more kilojoules than you consume each day is to focus one day at a time on small changes.

1) Start by keeping a food diary. It will make you aware of how much you are eating and drinking. By recording your daily intake of both meals and drinks you will be able to keep track of your calorie intake and see where to cut back.

2) Try swapping certain foods. If you like to snack on a marsbar, change this snack to a healthy snack like 8 medium strawberries instead as it could save you about 70 calories and add to your daily fibre intake.

3) Learn to read food labels. By reading food labels you will be able to work out your calorie intake and swap different brands. For example, you could save 50 calories by just changing your breakfast cereal, or save 100 calories by changing form sour cream to salsa.

4) Enjoy 5-6 meals/snacks per day as eating more often curbs your appetite and boosts your energy and improves your metabolism. The reason your metabolism is improved is that the process of digestion itself burns kilojoules.

5) Exercise will be required to lose weight and keep it off. It is via exercise that you will improve your muscle tone and trim centimetres from your figure. Without exercise your weight loss comes from lean muscle tissue. Exercise will also improve your metabolic rate. When you introduce exercise to your daily routine, start slowly. 3 x 10 minutes is better than no exercise at all. Also note that exercise comes in all forms, housework, gardening, playing with the children, walking the dog.

6) Drink 8 glasses of water a day as water suppress the appetite and helps the body metabolize stored fat. Water also helps rid the body waste and during weight loss there is a lot more body waste to excrete. If you are hungry always drink a glass of water first and wait ten minutes, you may have mistaken thirst for hunger.

7) Ask your friends and family to support you. Share your goals, talk about your goals and with support you too can start small changes that will lead to a healthier life style and weight loss.