I don't consider myself to be any sort of weight loss guru... but I will say that I'm pretty damn good at predicting whether someone will lose weight when I hear what they're planning to do.  When you talk to them about it, you begin to pick up clues here and there that make you say "This person will succeed", or "This person won't lose a pound and will probably gain a few."

One of the indicators I use is listening to their reasons for losing weight.  I usually hear one of two phrases from people.  It's either "I really need to lose weight" or "I want to lose weight".  In my experience, people who need to lose weight rarely do.  People who want to lose weight are much more successful.

There are all sorts of things that people need, but that doesn't mean we want them.  And in general, people are very bad at doing things they need to if they don't want to as well.  People who need to lose weight generally think that because someone else told them so.  Either it was a doctor, spouse, friends, or maybe family.  However, people who say they need to lose weight more than likely haven't convinced themselves of that fact.  So they embark on a weight loss plan for someone else... and are thus doomed to failure.

Weight loss is a personal struggle.  Yes, it is very important to have support from other people.  But in the end, its about every day choices that you are going to have to make.  So you have to be doing it for personal reasons.  You have to want to lose weight.

One of the worst things you can do is try to lose weight for the wrong reasons.  I know many people will disagree with me on this (no weight loss plan is every misguided by some reasoning), but I feel strongly about it.  The reason I say this, is because many times a failed weight loss plan ends up with net weight gain, and it also makes the person less likely to try again since they've failed once before.

So before you try to lose weight, stop and think about why you're doing it.  Do you want to lose weight, or does someone else want you to lose weight.  If its the latter, and not the former, then you need to think about why that is.