You can read every fitness magazine and website out there, you can try this supplement and that weight-loss pill, and you can even go to the gym from time to time. But, are your goals clear? More specifically, do you REALLY know what it is you want in terms of your fitness?

I think the concept of wanting something, as opposed to having or doing something that you'd like, is an interesting one. The phrase generally tends to be tossed about quite carelessly; "I want a new car," "I want to lose 20 pounds, "I want to go on vacation." However, if these things (or the different things that you claim to want) are truly -- absolutely and without question -- what you want, you would have them. And so would I. Want is a very, very strong word, one that requires a great deal of time, effort, and dedication to effectuate. Look, I'm just as guilty as the next person of claiming to want things that I know may never materialize, so please don't think I'm waxing philosophical here from atop an ivory tower. My only reason for mentioning all of this is to make it clear that reading health magazines, taking diet pills, occasionally eating healthy, and going to the gym now and again simply may not be enough to get the body you claim to want. The body you would like to have? Perhaps. But not the one you want.

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Here's the situation: You were caught up at work, and then had to drop off your dry cleaning, pick-up junior from baseball practice, make him dinner, bring him to his friend's house before their favorite TV show starts, and now you're finally on your way to the gym ... and it closes in a half an hour.

You rush in, and the gym employee is quick to tell you that they are closing soon, clearly hoping that you'll turn around and leave. But you don't. You change into your workout clothes, but -- oh wait -- you forgot your iPod in the car. Shoot. So, you run back out to your car to get it, only to then realize that you left your keys in the gym. Tick-tock, tick-tock. Back into the gym you go, grab your keys, and then it's outside to your car and grab your iPod (which turns out to be out of battery anyway -- son of a ... !!!). Then, you race back inside the gym, throw your keys in your locker, slam it shut, and then finally make your way over to the machines. Just as your about to step foot on a treadmill, one of the employees gets on the P.A. and announces: "Attention members, the time is now 9:45pm. The gym will be closing in 15 minutes." 15 freakin' minutes!!!

What do you do?

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Something occurred to me yesterday while I was at the gym. I wouldn't exactly call what came to me an epiphany, but it still served as somewhat of an awakening. As the sweat cascaded down my face while I completed a set of squats, I noticed that I was only one of a handful of people in the weight room who was actually working out at that very moment.

What were the other 30 or so people doing? Sitting down. It's not that they weren't working out; they were just taking a break in between sets. What's the problem with that?. No problem at all -- it's important to take a short break to allow your muscles to recuperate. However, when the total time you spend taking a break exceeds the amount of time you spend working out, then you have a problem.

Think of it this way: Let's say you go to the gym for an hour. And during that hour, you perform a total of 15 sets (for the sake of discussion, we'll assume that's three sets of five different exercises). Now, if you perform 10 to 12 reps per set, it probably takes about 30 seconds to finish a set. If you do the math, you're looking at a total of about 450 seconds (or about seven and a half minutes) spent actually working out. That means the remaining amount of time in your hour-long workout (about 52 minutes) is spent inactively.

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Have you ever driven across the great plains? It's a beautiful landscape, for sure, but no matter how far you drive, it never seems to change. Mile after mile, all that surrounds you is the same flat prairie, in some cases without as much as a small hill to change the scenery. Well, if you haven't changed your workouts, your results will flatten out just the same, causing you to reach a similar plateau.

Just like you would need to take a different driving route to see new scenery, you have to change your workout in order to continue seeing new results.

While it's not always necessary to make major changes to your workout to bust through a plateau, you must make change of some kind. Otherwise, your body will continue to maintain your current level of fitness but never go much further than that.

The tricky part is, the more experienced a lifter you are, the more dramatic the change you make usually has to be. While altering rep counts, increasing or decreasing the speed of lifts, or reducing rest time in between sets may work for some people, it may not be enough of a change for people who've been pumping iron for several months or years.

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Many people work hard to have their bodies ready for beach season. But, once Labor Day rolls past and the colder, baggy-clothes-wearing months arrive, many exercise programs tend to go into hibernation until spring.

This year, however, we're going to make sure that we stay healthy and fit year round. Not only is this better for your health and wellness, but it will make fitting into your bathing suit next summer that much easier. To make this inter-seasonal fitness a possibility, it's going to take a little lot of work. Diet: clean. Stress: less. And -- what we'll focus on here -- exercise: difficult. Alright, we've already wasted enough time. Let's get to that workout, shall we?

Start first with a five-minute warm-up on a treadmill or stationary bike (or just walk around your neighborhood). Once that five minutes is up, it's time to kick things into high gear.

Do two sets of 12 repetitions of squat thrusts, resting 30 seconds in between sets. Once you've finished your 12th rep of your second set, jump right onto a treadmill (or, if you're outdoors, just start running). Run for 90 seconds at a very high speed (almost a sprint), and then slow down to a moderately-paced jog for three minutes. Repeat this process three times and then rest for two minutes.

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Tired of being the guy on the beach who gets sand kicked in his face? Years ago, you could have bought the Charles Atlas dynamic tension muscle-building system to help you fight back. These days, adding some muscle to your frame requires far less effort (outside the gym, anyway).

No longer do you have to mail a check or money order, wait six to eight weeks for a package to arrive, only to then realize that your order was accidentally switched with a woman in Appleton, Wisconsin who ordered a new bird feeder (but let me tell you, that lady is jacked now!!)

Instead, there are hundreds of reputable magazines and websites a person can turn to for some weight room guidance. Needless to say, seek out publications and wellness sites that are most applicable to your particular fitness goals. To that end, and since the goal -- insofar as this particular post goes -- is to bulk up, you're already at the right place, my friend. Try the following quick-tips on for size ... literally.

Don't skip breakfast. Fill up on fruit, some whole-grain carbs, protein, and healthy fats. For a quick fix, try mixing a chocolate protein shake with some steel cut oats and a tablespoon of natural peanut butter.

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As the saying goes, every fighter has a plan until he gets hit. When it comes to getting fit, that same logic often applies. Many people have he best of intentions, but when the physical effort, time crunch, and tests to their willpower become too much, those intentions sometimes fall flat on the canvas.

That all being said, it is still necessary to have some sort of plan. Whether or not that strategy is sound, well, that's another story. Nevertheless, in almost all cases, eating right and performing regular exercise will benefit you. That much is not in question. What is in question, however, is whether or not your plan is providing you with the maximum results.

Making that determination, however, is seldom ever easy. One of the main reasons for the difficulty is the surfeit of conflicting fitness information that is passed along magazines, peer-reviewed journals, websites, and the locker rooms of gyms and health clubs. When trying to come up with an example, the "working out in the morning before breakfast" debate was first to come to mind.

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They say you never get a second chance to make a first impression. Not exactly on the level of "Why are we here?" or even "If a tree falls in the woods ...?" for that matter, but a thought worth pondering nonetheless. But what is so important about a first impression, anyway? Why isn't the second, third, and fiftieth impression just as important? As best as I can tell, they are.

Let's say you run into someone you went to high school with years ago, and no longer are they the brace-faced, out of shape, ratty haired, pimply-faced kid you remember them being. In fact, they look incredible. While it is true that your first impression of them remains, if this hottie is suddenly giving you the time of day, chances are you'll gladly replace your first impression of them for the new one.

OK, with that said, let's pretend for a second that you're the one whose looking to make a new impression. Maybe your high school reunion is coming up and you would love to replace your former classmates' first impression of you with a new one. If a large part of this opinion-changing process involves shaping up your body, these exercises will surely help put the 'press' in the newer (and better) impression you make.

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Even with the best of intentions, efforts at becoming healthier are frequently curtailed by injury, unsatisfactory results, plain boredom, or a little something known as fitness burnout. Rushing headlong into a diet and exercise program can be likened to when a halfback who doesn't use his blockers. And, in many cases, the amount of progress made is about the same (not to mention a similar degree of pain). This is why it is sometimes better to ease your way in and take small steps at the start.

Focusing first on exercise, some newbies tend to be overzealous, working out on every single machine in the gym, lifting far more weight than they can handle, and doing cardio at an intensity level that would make an Olympian beg for a break. While there's certainly nothing wrong with pushing yourself, a better approach -- especially when you're just starting out -- is to make incremental steps over time.

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It's 9:30 in the morning. If you wake up at 7:00 every day, you've now been churning and burning for a solid two and a half hours. Shower: check. Shave: check. Get dressed: check. Eat breakfast: check. Drive to work: check. Log on: check. Begin task number one of 1,000: check. Respond to 25 emails: check. Leave first meeting of the day: check. And that just about brings you to where you are now at 9:30. If you're already feeling like you need a nap, it's clearly for good reason.

What are the chances that your boss will let you curl up under your desk for twenty minutes to catch some Z's? Well, if you happen to work for any of the growing number of companies in the U.S. that are allowing employees to take power naps, your chances are actually quite good.

Newsweek reports that 37 percent of Americans nap during the day, citing a survey by the National Sleep Foundation. What's more, about a third of people surveyed stated that their employer permitted naps, and that more than a quarter said they would sleep at work if they were allowed to. While this may seem counterproductive to improving employee output, it actually offers both employees and employers long-term benefits.

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Burning calories doesn't always require a grueling session in the weight room or a hike across a difficult trail. As a matter of fact, even as you sit and read this right now, you're burning calories (albeit, not all too many). The process of burning calories during everyday tasks is known as Non-exercise Activity Thermogenesis (NEAT).

That all being said, this doesn't mean that you can ditch your workout and replace it with bird watching. Well, you can -- I just wouldn't advise it if your goal is to lose weight. It's here that I take some issue with what some so-called fitness experts are suggesting these days. Case in point, I recently came across an article in ... you know what, I'll leave the name of the magazine out of it. Let's just call it the Popular Family Magazine for the sake of discussion. Anyway, in said Popular Family Magazine, an article listed 20 ways to drop some pounds. So far, so good, right? Indeed; that is, until I saw that backyard barbecuing was recommended as a way to burn calories.

Does the concept of NEAT apply here? In all fairness, yes it does. According to FitDay.com, a 135-pound woman burns 86 calories per hour while cooking. However, you're only fooling yourself if you think cooking some burgers and hot dogs constitutes an effective means of weight loss. Plus, let's not forget that the whole point of preparing and cooking food is to eat it. So, after you've burned your measly 43 calories (I've never heard of a hamburger taking an hour to cook, so I've cut it down to calories burned in a half hour) calories while grilling, you then negate them entirely by consuming about 420 calories with the burger or about 300 calories with the hot dog.

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You're eating healthy, you're getting enough sleep, and you're going to the damn gym ALL. THE. TIME. Why, then, is the weight still not coming off? Good question. Hopefully I can help you figure out the answer.

Based on all your healthy behaviors, my guess is that you're either not eating as well as you think you are, or you're not getting the most of your workouts. More likely than not, it's the latter, so that's what will be addressed. Don't get me wrong, exercise of any kind is a very good thing. Just because you're not stripping away the fat doesn't mean that you're not obtaining any health benefits from your workout. But you want more, don't you? You want the health benefits AND the defined midsection, right? It's perfectly OK if you do. You can have both, so long as you are willing to do -- and not do -- what it takes. That means maximizing your time spent in the gym.

It also means avoiding these five gym blunders, which may be holding you back from your reaching your fitness goals.

1. You're Too Distracted. There's something called the mind-muscle connection, and as new age as it may sound, it's a very real (and researched) construct. By focusing on your body as you work it, visualizing each muscle as they're used, you will always maintain proper form and will find results come quicker. Try making this connection while you're talking on your cell phone and perusing through a trashy celebrity gossip magazine as you do halfhearted sets of leg extensions. Not going to happen.

2. You're Too Flat. No, this is not a middle-school crack on smaller chested women; rather, you're too flat because you never, ever put the treadmill on any kind of incline. To mimic the resistance of solid ground, you should at least set the incline on the treadmill to level 2. Remember, unlike the treadmill, the earth doesn't move under your feet (despite what Carole King might have claimed). So, it's important to place the machine at an incline to compensate for the luxury of having it move your feet for you. Again, 2 should be the very minimum setting. For even greater results, set the incline even higher.

It can sometimes be rather difficult to live a healthy lifestyle. Between work, school, kids, and -- oh yeah, how about having a social life -- setting aside time to exercise or even fix a healthy meal usually seems like an impossibility.

That's why making these healthier changes in your life shouldn't be based on rash, drastic decisions. The "Crash Diet" is the perfect example of this very mistake. Not only is this approach to weight loss unhealthy, but it can actually lead to long-term weight gain. The same goes for an exercise program. If you're new to resistance training, for example, you would do well to ease your way into a routine, rather than jump into a program that would make most professional bodybuilders sleep in. The point is that the best approach to health and wellness it to take things slowly at first.

Taking on fifteen new changes to how you go about your daily life may not be realistic, and carries a high risk of attrition. Two changes, however, is probably something we all can manage. To that end, here are two changes that may be enough to get you looking and feeling better.

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Getting fit shouldn't require knowing any fancy terms, acronyms, or even a secret handshake. All that should be necessary is the desire to build a healthier body and mind. But, flip through just about any magazine or visit any fitness website and you're bound to come across information that doesn't make any sense to a fitness newbie. And yes, this website (and the author of this post) are just as guilty of offering somewhat more advanced content from time to time.

To help clarify, and to help create a better balance with my posts for people at more advanced fitness levels, I began what I call Gym Lingo columns. Usually I try to make sense of some common gym vocabulary -- from the types of sets to an assortment of common terms and phrases that make up the fitness lexicon -- but this time around I thought I'd focus on a very common acronym that, to someone who's never heard it before and/or don't know what it means, may need some explanation. So, I thought that the better fit would be to include it here in Fit Factor.

RPE. What do these three letters stand for? Rate of Perceived Exertion. The name, when no longer in acronym form, does a good job of clearing up what this fitness term is all about. A special RPE scale is typically referred to when someone wants to gauge their intensity level. With one being the lowest (meaning that the least amount of effort is being exerted) and ten being the highest (the maximum amount of effort is being exerted). Knowing where you fall on this RPE scale will help you figure out if you are working out hard enough or if you need to kick things into higher gear.

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How long does it take McDonald's to make a hamburger? My guess is around 30 or 40 seconds. How long does it take to make a healthy meal at home? Much longer, right? Not quite, says Keri Glassman, registered dietitian and part of the Women's Health magazine team. Glassman suggests the following ten easy food flips to help you prepare healthier meals in a jiffy.

1. SWAP THE MAYO (or the sour cream). Instead use nonfat Greek yogurt as a much healthier, low-fat substitution. In addition to being much lighter in the calorie department, nonfat Greek yogurt is high in protein, calcium, and also contains digestion-aiding probiotics.

2. PUREE. Freeze your favorite fruits and vegetables and then days or even months later you can puree them in large batches. In a matter of seconds you can have a healthy and tasty snack. For kids, Glassman suggests purchasing the containers that ice cream manufacturers usually use to make push-pops and filling it with a fruit puree.

3. INCREASE VOLUME. Make your meals bigger without adding any calories. Trust me, it's easier than it sounds. For some easy ways to do this, click here.

4. GO FOR CHICKEN STOCK. Using the low-sodium version, add chicken stock to mashed potatoes or mashed cauliflower instead of butter or cream. You can also use chicken stock when you steam vegetables for added flavor rather than using butter or oil.

5. CONDIMENTS. Steer clear of those high in fat and sugar and instead opt for herbs, spices, and even low-sodium soy sauce, lemon juice, brown mustard, vinegars, and salsa.

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