An extremely important part of your fitness program is being able to measure your progress.

Body fat testing is not painful, nor is it expensive. You can get it done at most any gym or fitness center.

Simply ask if they have an expert who can measure body composition.

It's also a good idea to take before and after photos and post them somewhere you'll see them every day.

But most importantly, measure 5 - 10 different aspects of your progress.

My most successful clients measure everything in their life that's effected by their weight loss, normally on a simple scale from 1 - 10, such as:

- their daily energy level

- their attitude

- the way they feel when they look in the mirror

- the way they fit into their clothes

- the compliments they get from people

- their level of mental focus

- their waist, hips, and thigh measurements

- their body weight

- their body-fat level

- their endurance in their workouts

- etc, etc, etc...

Make a long list of ways you can measure your progress - but be sure to include things that are truly important to YOU. If having loads of energy is important to you, than you should be measuring your energy level every day to see if your diet and/or workout routine are doing their job.

On the other hand, if you already have a lot of daily energy, than you might not want to measure that - you might prefer to measure other things that are more important to you at the stage of life your currently at.

Take time to design your list, then chart your progress in a daily journal every day for each of the categories on your list. Then take an average for the whole day, and write that average at the top of your page.