"The main stumbling block for people trying to transform their life and feel and look fantastic is nearly always motivation. Uniquely, among the other fitness systems available, the real DEAL Living system utilises the best available methods to overcome this".

The final part of the DEAL system is Living. Living is concerned with concerned with what is going on inside your head; your outlook to life, beliefs and ultimately your motivation to succeed. This is a primary cause of long term failure for people trying to transform their lives and therefore important!

Some key aspects of living include your motivation (the driving force to continue), procrastination (a restraining force to delay action), a positive attitude, living in the now and the law of attraction (a helpful belief system). Motivation to take the necessary actions to transform your life is the main issue to be addressed. Without this you will not even get started or continue when the going gets tough.

The word procrastination comes from the Latin words pro (for) and cras (tomorrow) and literally means leaving something for tomorrow or postponing something that you know should be done. Procrastination in transforming your life can be overcome in a number of ways, perhaps the most important way is by clarifying what you really want and planning for success. This involves the following stages.

Think about what you really want from your life transformation and make a list. Focus on outcomes (e.g. attracting partners) and NOT the ways to achieve them (e.g. losing weight). Each outcome can be made into an objective.

Write a simple objective statement on a piece of paper for each outcome e.g. I want to attract more potential partners and this will mean that .... (list the benefits). Spend some time each day visualising how your objective will change your life for the better and pin it up in your home where you will see it every day to remind you.

List each of the ways you can achieve your objective and quantify success for each one. Create a goal for each by adding a desired start and (if appropriate) estimated end date. For example, you might quantify success in losing weight as losing 10 Kg in 6 months, starting next Monday - this is your weight loss goal. Some of your goals may need to be split down further into milestones. For example, you may like to split the weight loss goal into 5 milestones; after one month 2 Kg weight loss, after two months 4 Kg and so on.

Make a list of the tasks necessary for each goal. For example, losing weight can be specifically achieved by detoxing your body, eating more healthily, exercising more often and incorporating more fun activities into your lifestyle. Prioritise each task and shuffle the task timing around, within the goal start and end dates, until you believe that your goal can be achieved. If you don't believe that your goal is achievable within the timescale simply change your start and end dates or try to find more effective tasks.

Buy a large wall calendar with one month on each page and boxes under each day to add comments. Enter your task start and end dates in the appropriate boxes and hang this up in your home where you can check it each day. Buy a block of post it notes and make a new to do list every day. Cross out each task on the calendar and note paper as you complete it and celebrate by treating yourself to a reward! For example, you might want to rent a film and take an evening off to watch it and relax.

Be flexible about when you start and finish your tasks and keep your objective vision achievable and relevant, especially for longer term objectives where your personal situation will probably change over time.

All of these stages benefit from professional guidance. For example, guidance on how to visualise your objectives more clearly and set achievable effective goals in weight loss and health improvements. You can obtain this guidance from a quality fitness publication. Our fitness e-book and health guidelines e-posters contain specific information to enable you to quickly set effective fitness and health goals. Alternatively, you can also talk to a certified personal trainer for guidance.

Other important points for overcoming procrastination include analysing how you use your time and looking for ways to make more time for important tasks, being creative about how you use your time and developing an action oriented attitude (e.g. just do it, don't wait for all the facts or seek perfectionism).

If you choose to focus on all the great things about your life and are grateful for them you will have a positive attitude. Studies have proven that a positive attitude will improve your health and help you to feel and look fantastic! Some suggestions to make it easier to develop a positive attitude include:

Develop strong friendship networks with other positive people and spend more time socialising in clubs and societies and helping other people (with no expectation of automatically being helped in return). As you become more positive you will attract more people and your network will grow even faster. Just knowing more people will open new doors in your life that you never dreamt would be opened ....

Create a mission or clear purpose in your life (e.g. to be the best at something or help a poor community) and visualise the outcome of this in your mind every day!

Reserve 20 minutes, preferably daily, to take time out and be by yourself, your thoughts about how great your life is and your vision of how great it will be! You might like to put some music on and lock yourself away in a room or simply go somewhere quiet in the countryside (or even your back garden!) and simply listen to the sounds of nature. Ideally, learn how to meditate.

Try to expand your comfort zone and keep your routines flexible by taking one new approach to doing things every day. For example, take a different route home, try a new type of food and visit a new park or beach.

Spend more time bringing out your child side - doing things just for fun, flirting, playing and laughing. Spend less time being an adult - criticising, judging, evaluating and being serious!

Make sure that you have good quality sleep. For most people this means 8 hours of deep slumber. It is easier to achieve this if your bedroom is kept in total darkness (if necessary purchase some exterior blinds), your caffeine drink intake is limited to 2 cups a day, you finish your last meal at least 2 hours before going to bed and you set aside time to chill out before going to bed (e.g. read a good fiction book and/or relax with some music).

Living in the now means being fully present in what is going on around you now, not worrying about next week or even tomorrow but enjoying living right now! Enjoying your life is just like happiness because both involve choice - choosing to be happy and choosing to enjoy yourself no matter what happens or might happen all around you.

The law of attraction is a belief system that brings many of the other aspects together in an approach to living that helps you to achieve any goal. In brief, if you focus on and strongly believe that you will be able to achieve something (or conversely suffer from something), you will do. For example, if you know that you will be able to run a marathon and you put all your energy and focus into doing so, you will be able to run it. Conversely, if you continuously worry about developing a health problem and put all your energy into thinking about the consequences you will develop it.

Every thought that passes your mind, everything you dream of, every feeling and every desire are the bricks and mortar with which you construct your home in the universe.

The law of attraction stresses the importance of positive thinking and immediately replacing any negative thoughts with positive ones, the ideas of knowing what you really want, perseverance (e.g. carry on regardless of negative responses or obstacles), patience, commitment, confidence, mental focus and belief in your success.

Once you have clearly identified what you really want, a simple technique can be used to increase the strength of your belief in achieving it. This is drawn from NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) and known as pacing and leading.

If you make affirmative statements (pace) about your current beliefs, you can use these to lead your mind into accepting new affirmative statements (new beliefs). For example, you might repeat the following affirmations out loud:

1. I know that 2+2=4.
2. I know that I am living on planet Earth.
3. I know that there is a Power which can perform miracles.
4. I know that this Power cannot fail, it is always successful.
5. I know that I am focusing on this Power now.
6. I know that I am growing more and more confident.
7. I know that the Miracle Power creates the change I desire to see.
8. I know that this Power fulfils my wish in a perfectly Divine way.
9. I know that I will soon see the changes I have chosen to effect.

Some other important aspects in using the law of attraction for your benefit include:

• Start out with easy desires and build up to more difficult ones to achieve. When you have gained confidence in achieving easy desires it will be much easier to achieve more difficult desires.
• Be very conscious of everything you say and think because you might just get what you ask for whether you really want it or not!
• Always try to be positive no matter what happens because your positive vibrations will be radiated into the universe and if something negative happens to you they will attract a solution.
• Be excited and enthusiastic about your vision of what you are going to achieve as often as possible. Imagine what kind of great feelings you will have when you achieve your vision!