Do it Yourself

The weight struggle became more than just an inconvenience for Eli when he went to college. "Once I was alone, I got to 15 freshmen and kept gaining 15 pounds for the past 12 years," he tells Reader’s Digest. "On top of that, I also gained 'baby weight' by eating competitively with my wife during both of her pregnancies." Finally, Eli, now 32, realized that to lose weight he had to want it for himself and no one else. Only then did the kilos begin to disappear. "I saw a photo of myself and suddenly I realized that I was no longer the person I wanted to be," he explains. “In that moment of clarity, I realized that I had tried for so long to diet for other people, when in reality I needed to diet for myself. When I saw that photo, I said to myself: "I will never be that person again." I haven't looked back. " Eli says that the motto that helped him become a weight loss before and after success story, and to lose a total of 170 pounds, was: "Tomorrow you will appreciate the decisions you make today." He says, "A healthy lifestyle is not about learning to enjoy healthy foods more, but about developing your resistance to eating foods that will harm you in the long run." Here are 15 more weight loss mantras to add to your daily routine if long-term diet success is your goal.