Welcome to Diet and Fitness Podcast, a free audio podcast sponsored by Diet.com. This is your fit, fun, and fabulous host, Lady Diet, ready to give you the skinny on the latest diet fitness health tips and news.

As dieters, we’ve all heard plenty about what you should do in order to lose weight and get fit. Eat well, exercise more… right? If only it were that simple. You’ve got to learn what you shouldn’t do, too. Listen up, because this week I’m putting my foot down and hitting you right upside the head with the top 5 things that won’t make you lose any weight.

1. Excuses. Well the reeeason I couldn’t work out today was because my foooot hurt. And then it was raaaaining and I couldn’t go for my jog. And how could I have cooked a healthy meal when I had to bring the kids to their decoupage class. Please stop the whining. I know it’s really easy to make an excuse about why you can’t exercise or eat healthy. If it was hard to find excuses, no one would make them. But come on, healthy people don’t have more time in their day or fewer things to do than the rest of us. So stop making excuses and start making moooves.

2. Berating yourself. If your idea of a pep talk is telling yourself that you are a failure or that you’re lazy or that you’ll never lose all this weight… well that isn’t much of a pep talk at all. Your body isn’t the only thing that needs to be on board for your weight loss. You need to get your head in the game too.

3. Complaining. Complaining out loud is demanding that others share your negative mind space. Complaining to yourself is demanding that YOU share your own negative mind space. Either way, no one wins. YES, exercise can be exhausting, and YES, sometimes you won’t feel like doing it even though you should. But keep this weight-loss tip in mind: complaining won’t burn a single calorie.

4. Procrastinating. If complaining doesn’t burn calories, you can be sure that procrastinating won’t either. The dieter who insists that tomorrow is a better day to get things done wakes up tomorrow with their paunch intact. So give yourself the gift of the present.

5. Sticking to the easy stuff. Your body needs to be challenged in order for you to make any progress in your fitness goals. If your idea of “working out” is going to the gym and leisurely walking on the treadmill for 15 minutes, then you can’t expect to see any drastic results. You only reap benefits by changing up your routine and challenging yourself to keep it intense.

So that’s what’s up. You can do any of these 5 things as much as you want. Really, as much as you want. As long as you know that you won’t lose weight or gain insight as a result. Strike these missteps from your fitness routine, and you’ll be toeing the line to weight loss success.

If you have any comments or suggestions about today’s podcast or any fun health diet or fitness tip, please feel free to email me at ladydietpodcast@diet.com.

Stay healthy, stay fit and stay focused with Diet.com... this is Lady Diet signing off!