I had a professor in high school who used to always say "It takes 19 days to make or break a habit." When it comes to exercise, I think it takes a lot less time. In fact, a spinning class instructor once told me that if you force yourself to the gym for three days in a row, you'll WANT to come back the fourth day, and the fifth day, and so on.

But still, I will admit to falling off the exercise bandwagon many times. You may know what I'm talking about. I go to the gym, religiously, for a week or two and then other things get in the way. 

My solution to this "committment" problem came to me only very recently. As an avid fitness book, magazine, and blog reader, I'd heard this bit of advice before, but never thought it was for me: exercise in the morning, get it out of the way. Numerous polls will show that those that exercise in the morning are less likely to skip their workouts than those that exercise in the evening. And it makes perfect sense of course. If you wait to exercise til the end of the day, you're already drained, or something may have come up that you have to do instead, or maybe you feel that you have so many other things to do that night, you just don't have time. This happened to me ALL the time.

It's not that I hadn't tried to be a morning workout person before. I set my alarm early many times only to shut it off: yeah, I could get up right now, but why should I when I could sleep for two more hours?

So what made my habit stick this time? I coupled the "AM workout" advice with another bit of advice I'd always read in magazines: work out with a buddy. SImple enough. I can't just shut off my alarm anymore, I have to now shut off my alarm, AND text my work out buddy to tell her I'm ditching her. My committment to exercise is now also a committment to my friend, and I'm less likely to break a committment to a friend. Now I'm not saying it never happens. If I've already ditched my buddy once that week, I'm less likely to do it again that same week. Leaving me only to skip one workout a week, where maybe before I skipped, well, all of them.

One of my favorite bloggers, Leo Babauta of Zen Habits, recently wrote a post called "The One Deadly Sin of Changing Habits." Here, he gives advice on how to form a habit:

Just start. Not feeling like doing the habit today? Tell yourself all you have to do is take the 1st step. Usually the 2nd step will follow, but if not, at the very least you got started. And that’s what matters most.

Now please don't all go running off to the campus gyms in the mornings with your workout buddies. Afterall, one of the things I like about working out in the mornings is that the gyms are less crowded. No I'm just kidding. Kind of. Do what works best for you for creating your exercise habit.

I read a tweet the other day that said something along the lines of "If you're buying light soy milk, you may have a problem." Guess who buys light soy milk? That's right. This girl.

So I began to think about the other things that I buy. 0% fat greek yogurt. Fat free cottage cheese. I mean, these are foods that are already healthy to begin with, and yet I'm buying low fat and fat free versions of them?

After reading Ann Louise Gittleman's Fat Flush Plan (I decided not to do the plan because you can't do intense exercise while on it and I'm training for a half marathon), I realized that I have a fat phobia. And my guess is, you might have one too.  

In her book, Gittleman writes about hidden factors of why people can't lose weight. One of them is the fear of eating fat. "Eating fat to get thin flies in the face of reason, of everything you've heard about the dangers of fat," she writes,"You're not alone in your fear of eating fat. An estimated 80 percent of Americans eat a diet deficient in essential fatty acids."

The problem with us fatophobes is that we need fat to regulate our body functions. Water retention, sodium balance, and fat metabolism are all regulated by fat, Gittleman writes. By eating the right fats, she says, "you'll end fat cravings, feel full, have more energy, and lose weight."

But don't take this as me saying I'm off to McDonald's to get some fatty food. For one thing, it's No Fast Food February. For another thing, I'd rather sit in my house and starve then go out in the knee deep and blinding snow. Most importantly, fat needs to be in moderation. Fat has more calories per gram than carbohydrates or protein, that's why most diets are low in fat. Nonetheless, some fat is necessary. Steer clear of trans fat, though, watch saturated fat, and make sure to incorporate omega-3 fat (found in fish, almonds, etc.).

Eat fat. Get skinny. Okay I hate the word skinny. Get healthy instead.