It is easy to gain weight, but to lose weight is another story. It is kind of like a credit card, really easy to charge up the bill but when the time comes to pay it off — well, it’s not quite so easy. For example, those fast food burgers after midnight slide right down the ol’ hatch, just as easy as charging up a new plasma TV. And just like paying off that purchase, trying to get those burgers and fries off the hips is much harder — although, it’s not impossible. As a matter of fact, people lose weight every day. They will also be the first ones to tell you that it requires a change in lifestyle that includes: fitness, nutrition and community.

One of the first steps in being healthy is changing how you spend your time, which will include getting rid of some bad habits. For many, this will mean no more snacking on potato chips, popcorn or soda. For others, it means quitting smoking or consuming alcohol; and still others will have to do all three. Either way, Ryan recently found a website called Joes Goals and this is a good place to start if you’re trying to break a bad habit. He also wrote about the best workout websites that combine technology and fitness. Both these articles are great and I hope they will come in handy.

However, there’s another website dedicated to helping their community to lose weight and feel great – SparkPeople.

SparkPeople’s motto is “Lose Weight. Get Fit. Look and Feel Great!” and they have really done a fantastic job at developing a site that has multiple tools and features to help you achieve your weight loss goal! It has everything from:

• expert advice
• blogs
• weight calculators
• fitness videos
• meal planning
• custom workouts based on your goals

SparkPeople is a HUGE website so I suggest checking out the Getting Started Guide to learn how to use the site.

After you sign up, you will see the main area with three primary tools:

• Nutrition Tracker – create a menu and shopping list based on your goals.
• Fitness Tracker – create a workout based on your goals.
• Weigh-In – calculate your calorie and nutrient needs based on your weight loss.

Each of these tools is a link to various options and features. For example, when you click on the Fitness Tracker, you can view an auto-generated workout based on your goals. One of the nice features with SparkPeople is you can also watch a demo on how to do each exercise.

There is also a section where you can modify an auto-generated workout or create one from scratch.

Notice the screen shot above is just showing the exercise options based on “crunches”.  There is a plethora of exercise options based on selections, such as: upper body, lower body and core. Furthermore, each of those areas have beginner and advanced sections.

For those who are looking for expert tips and video workouts for the home or gym, SparkPeople has a free video section as well.

I have only skimmed the surface of what the SparkPeople website has to offer you on losing weight and feeling great. I have not yet started to get into the: blog, message board, receipes, teams and other SparkPeople tools; you can even create your own Sparks web page.

If you use SparkPeople and have a favorite section that I did not mention, please let us know. Also, if you use a different site to help you lose weight, share with us in the comments.

Image credit: N!el from Flickr