Have you ever noticed Facebook articles, food marketers and local newscasts are always telling you what’s good, what’s bad, or what you should and shouldn’t eat? Well, some of those things are just nonsense, so here are the 5 largest weight loss beliefs that keep people from making weight loss progress.

Myth #1: Yogurt Is Good For You

Where did that come from? But more importantly, have you looked at the label on your yogurt to see how much sugar is in there?

See that 19 grams of sugar on the back of yogurt container? Consider the American Heart Association recommends 24 grams for a daily dose for women. This has more sugar in it than some Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream – so you think this is healthy? Really? It isn’t. Most yogurt is nothing more than a less tasty ice cream.

Myth #2: Peanut Butter Is A Healthy Protein Snack

Well, it does have some protein in it, but lets take a look at a label just for fun.

Do you see that 75% of the calories from this “natural” peanut butter come from fat? There is some protein in it, but there sure is a lot of fat. So when it comes to a snack, this may not be the one you want.

Myth #3: Breakfast Is The Most Important Meal of the Day – Eat Breakfast Like A King.

I love breakfast, but your body needs to burn these calories just as much as it does all the other meals you eat.

More than 860 calories in this one meal, uses up a lot of your 2000 calories for the day. In fact, based on a 2000 calorie diet for men, you would only have 1140 calories left for lunch and dinner.

Myth #4: Protein Bars Are Good and Potatoes are Bad (a twofer)

It is amazing what we’ve been sold. Here you have a potato – something that nourished the poor in Ireland for years, and has a lot of great natural fiber and nutrition, and then a “protein bar,” that has been made up just to sell you something.

It’s hard to imagine that a protein bar is “bad” – it sounds good. For years the poor potato has been abused by weight loss books everywhere. But which fills you up? So think about this – someone is trying to sell you something.

The nutrition in one medium potato. This doesn’t look so bad – in fact, it looks like a healthy choice for a meal

This is the Atkins Peanut Butter Granola Bar – now- ask yourself, if you ate one of these which would last you longer for satiety?

Myth #5: Salads Are A Great Way to Lose Weight

If you’ve ever checked the calorie content of most salads, you’ll see they are worse than a lot of other meals. Sometimes it’s the dressing, sometimes it’s the things that are placed in the salad. But salads are a vehicle for a lot of bad calories.  Here is the TGIF Chicken Pecan Crusted Salad:

At 1080 calories, this one salad seems healthy – but is over half the calories that an adult male burns in a day.