Each month Energy interviews women who have made amazing fitness transformations. And time and again, we’re struck by the common themes among their stories about what it takes to get fit for a lifetime. The women we profile for our success stories are women like you. They aren’t paid to stay in shape. They do it because it makes them feel better physically and mentally. They have jobs or families, or both. They struggle with the same stuff we all do—fitting fitness into a busy schedule, eating healthy on the run, battling the I-could-never from themselves and the what-are-you-thinking-have-some-pizza from others. Read on for their secrets to overcoming the challenges and just doing it..

1. Do it your way

Some do yoga, some kick box, some work out alone at home, some work out with a friend or trainer at the gym. The point is: they each needed to find what worked best for them and then do it their way.

For Tamra Frye, committing to the Body-for-LIFE Challenge (a 12-week nutrition, training and supplementation program) together with her husband, and having a trainer who she knew would be waiting for her at the gym every morning, were key factors in her finally sticking with a fitness program—and becoming a Body-for-LIFE co-champion—after years of start and stop attempts.

"I could have read it out of a book, but I’m just not motivated enough to do that," Tamra says. "If I was supposed to do 12 reps, I’d just do 10, if I was supposed to do 50 pounds, I’d just do 40, so I needed other people to help motivate me and between Pam and Richard I had that."

Lorinde Williams the 61-year-old Body-for-LIFE Challenge runner-up and bodybuilder who began lifting weights for the first time at age 59, on the other hand, didn’t want to wait around for anyone else to start a new program. "For me I went on my own because I’ve done the friend thing and they always have something else to do or don’t want to do it," Lorinde says. "I thought, `I’m so into this, I need to go do this on my own.’"

Doing it your way also applies to finding the foods that work best for you. "I abhor the term diet," says reader model Julie Minsky Barroukh. "I prefer to call it eating right. Find foods that are healthy that you really like. Don’t fake it or force it. It’s OK not to like every bit of health food. Some of it is really gross." 

2. Set goals

A crucial component to these women’s successes was having a goal to aim for. That made the difference between just saying they were going to do something and actually doing it. 

"I’d never had a goal before," Tamra says. "Before I’d just kind of go to the gym, but I wasn’t really focused. If you can just set a goal and stay focused for 12 weeks, then you will feel so much better about yourself, you won’t ever want to go back. And once you’ve achieved your goal, it’s very easy to maintain."

Body-for-LIFE champion Amy Freeze-Arbuckle agrees. "If you can set up these little mini time periods, then it all becomes manageable, instead of saying, `Today I’m going to change my life drastically forever and never be able to have fun again.’"

Julie stresses the importance of setting meaningful and achievable goals. "You don’t want to set unrealistic goals for yourself. It’s not just about lifting heavy weights, nor doing Stairmaster until your legs go numb. Take it one step at a time so you don’t get overwhelmed right away." 

3. Work from the inside out

These women will tell you, you have to work your mind as much as your body. 

"Have faith in yourself," Tamra says. "It’s got to be all mental at first. Sometimes I would just tell myself, `today I will see some sort of results, even if it’s just going one more minute on the treadmill. I can do it.’"

"For two years I tried to complete the Challenge many times and failed at it," reader-model Jamie Ramirez says. "Now I see it’s probably because I just didn’t have the mindset." She completed the Challenge in April of 2002 and has gone on to complete several more. "Before, everything I did I put my husband and kids first and if there was anything leftover for myself, then I would put that into me … which there wasn’t. I had to become kind of selfish. I used to think working out was a waste of time. Now I know it’s very important, not just for my body, but my inner self. My whole way of thinking is different."

4. Educate yourself

For many of these women, educating themselves—either on their own or with the help of a trainer—helped them to make changes in their workouts, eating and lifestyle that led to the results that had always eluded them in the past.

"I was under the assumption that you starve to lose," Tamra says. When Tamra’s trainer told her she needed to eat more, Tamra grudgingly followed her advice. "I started eating more and the weight started coming off. You need to eat to lose. I needed to get enough protein so my body could work to lose the weight."

"I never strength trained before," Amy says. "I always believed that long aerobic sessions were the key to losing weight and that lifting weights would make me look like a guy or something. That is such a misconception. Most women really get hooked on it because you notice your body gets tighter, and you feel stronger. And changing your body composition from fat to muscle has such a powerful long-term benefit for your health."

5. Have a plan

Each woman’s commitment to herself means scheduling her workouts into her day as she would any other appointment or meeting that can’t be missed and having a plan for when and what she’s going to eat. 

"I can have 10,000 excuses why I shouldn’t go to the gym, but you just have to get in that routine, and once you get into that routine, it’s so much easier," Tamra says.

"One of the keys was I decided, `OK, this is the regular time,’" Julie says. "I tell people if you want to schedule a meeting with me, it’s not happening between 8:00 and 9:30 in the morning. Just like you brush your teeth in the morning, you brush your teeth at night—this must become part of your life."

6. Be patient

Our success story women almost always say the first few weeks of their new program are by far the hardest, in part, because—although they’re feeling better and have more energy—they aren’t seeing any results in the mirror or on the scale. But commitment and patience pay off. By about the sixth week, they usually start to see changes and by week 12, they see a significant decrease in body fat and clothes size. 

"I think a lot of people don’t see something right away and they’re discouraged," Tamra says. "If they would just hang in there—give it an extra day, give it an extra week, when you want to quit." Tamra also points out that because you’re looking at yourself in the mirror every day, you might not see subtle changes. 

Amy believes the 12-week committal period is key. "If you can stick it out for 12 weeks it will pay off tenfold."

Julie agrees. "We live in a society that’s fast-paced and [based on] immediate gratification. This is something that’s not immediate gratification. This is something that you have to believe down the road you’re going to get the payoff. But you have to put in the work. There are no two ways about it."

7. Use tricks and treats

Many of these women use tricks and treats to help keep themselves on track—and have fun while they’re at it. 

Reader-model Sherri Hansel promised herself that if she finished the 12-week Challenge, she’d buy new clothes with the money she saved by cutting out junk food. "I figured I was spending 10 dollars every week on junk food, so at the end I had $120 to go spend on clothes." She also uses visual motivation. "In every cupboard I have food in, and in my refrigerator, I have pictures of girls in shap. I’ll go in to grab a cookie and I’m like, `oh no, she looks good; look at her abs.’"

One of the tricks Julie uses to motivate herself on those mornings when it’s especially hard to get out of bed is telling herself she’ll go to the gym and just do some floor stretching. "This accomplishes two things: 1) you can at least tell yourself `I went to the gym’ so the next day you haven’t broken your streak and 2) maybe, just maybe, if you’re already at the gym, you might re-motivate and get yourself to do something!"

8. Think of the payoff

All of our success story women say the confidence, improved self-image and increased energy that resulted from being fit and healthy translated into better work, family and social lives. 

Julie says lethargy was one of her biggest stumbling blocks to fitness in the past, but once she started exercising, she felt much better. "Sometimes you’re sapped of energy to the point that you don’t realize that once you start exercising you’ll have more energy. Exercise is a natural antidepressant. It’s quite miraculous what it does." 

"It just made me a better person inside and out, physically and mentally," Tamra says. "I gained my life back, my self-esteem and respect of others, as well as myself."

"It gives you more of a vision of what power you have as an individual," Amy says. "Once you start to see some of these goals come to fruition then it kind of becomes limitless. You realize you could be even better than you thought you could be."