REAL ways to lose weight:

If your new years resolution was the same old 'lose ten pounds by February' but somehow you've managed to spend at least £10 on chocolate digestives before the end of the first week, you're not alone. To lose weight or to get healthy is the most popular new years resolution, coming before improving your finances and spending more time with the family. Is this really what we've become? A culture where we eat our socks off and spend more time on the couch than should be humanly possible all through December only to say: "Oh, it's fine I'll lose it all again in January?" To be so completely infatuated with ourselves that every year we vow to make ourselves superficially "better/fitter/hotter?"

Personally, I think our resolutions should mean more to us than just a number on the scales. We should all make a general resolution to ourselves to eat right and treat our body with the respect it deserves: that means being healthy and happy all year round, not just the dreaded January. By last Christmas day, I was the slimmest I'd ever been! Not because I'd starved myself and deprived myself of christmas treats, but because I'd woken up every single morning of December (yes, even christmas day) and gone for a run. In fact, it was almost easier at christmas being surrounded by temptations as they were everywhere all the time. If I wanted something I could have it, which makes it less desirable.

I have no objection to self-confidence, in fact I am an advocate of it, however shouldn't we be increasing our confidence in ways that change us as people? Shouldn't we be focusing on ourselves or others internally more than externally? Now I'm not saying that we all need to go and become Buddhist monks or start meditating instead of turning up to work! Even something as small as changing our new years resolution to something a little bit more positive, a little bit less self-focused and a bit more creative would be a leap in the right direction.