As you're preparing to begin changes in your eating habits, keep a journal of all the foods you eat during the day and at what time you eat them. This will accomplish the following:

• Identify the foods that you presently eat that can stay in your diet.
• Identify the foods in your diet that cannot stay. Note, however, that you don't have to eliminate them. Instead, have them as a special occasion, or at least less frequently.
• Show you what times of the day you're most likely to encounter temptation. This will help you to prepare for resisting those temptations.
• Identify changes that can be made to your eating habits that take little effort such as substituting diet soda for the sugary version you now enjoy or switching from sugar in your coffee to a sugar-free substitute.

It's important to understand that changing your eating habits does not mean that you have to deprive yourself. By carefully identifying the foods in your diet that can stay, go, or simply be altered to a degree, you'll be able to create a healthy, yet flexible, weight loss plan for yourself.