Burn more calories than your body consumes and you lose weight; burn more calories than your body consumes and you gain weight. Another way to say that is this: consume less calories than your body burns and you lose weight; consume more calories than your body burns and you gain weight.
The way to use your body's metabolism to lose weight, then, is twofold: Consume less calories than you burn (as in dieting); Burn more calories than you consume (as in exercising);
The average body's metabolic rate, and the rate at which the Percentage Daily Values of the nutrients on a food's nutrition label are based, is 2000 calories per day.
Your body burns a certain number of calories per day just by virtue of you being alive ? I other words, no exercise necessary. The process of breathing, for example, burns calories. As does the circulating of blood. All forms of burning calories based on nothing other than the act of being alive make up what's called you Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR). Interestingly enough, a person's BMR makes up about 60% of the calories their bodies burn in a given day. The remaining 10% of the calories burned in a day are burned by what's called Dietary Thermongenesis, comprising the heat-producing acts of eating and internally processing food.
It is entirely possible to boost your body's natural metabolism, in other words: burn more calories in a shorter period of time, or burn calories faster. Strength training (as in lifting weights) is one way to achieve remarkable effects. When you lift weights, the muscles tear and must be repaired by the body's natural healing processes. Those processes require the body burn more calories. The body with a bigger muscle mass burns more at rest calories in any given span of time. As a general rule, we burn 50 extra calories a day for each extra pound of muscle.
Beyond weight training, the other tried-and-true method for boosting your metabolism is simply remaining active. The mere act of moving around burns calories, so logically the more you move around the more calories you burn. Take walks on your breaks at work. Park one or two streets over. Tidy up around the house while you chat on the phone. None of these require a gym membership or an unscheduleable block of time. A little bit over a long time adds up to a lot.
Lastly, there are dietary measures you can take to help boost your metabolism. Caffeinated beverages (green tea being one of the healthier choices) and spicy foods have both been shown to increase the body's metabolic rate. Also, if you start having more frequent smaller meals rather than jus 2 or 3 large ones (?grazing? throughout the day, so to speak), your metabolism will be in a constant state of activity breaking down and processing your many small meals.
Gaining a basic knowledge of how the body uses energy would certainly be beneficial in learning how to increase your metabolism. The energy needed to perform every single bodily function, even just staying alive, is taken from burning the calories from the food we eat. This process is known as metabolism and is measured according to your basal metabolic rate (BMR). To burn more calories for energy you need to have a higher metabolic rate.
Learning how to increase metabolism is probably the ideal starting point for people looking to lose weight. To achieve this we should consider combining an effective exercise regime with a healthy eating plan. The important fact to remember is that muscle cells are much more metabolically active than fat cells and so require more calories to be burned to maintain. If you do not notice any immediate weight loss when you start exercising and eating healthy try not to get too despondent. Your body is likely to begin building more lean muscle mass, significantly increasing your metabolism, while also burning more body fat. I would suggest you forget about constantly stepping on your bathroom scales just simply look at yourself in the mirror to notice results. Recording your body mass index (BMI) on a regular basis would also show that you are making progress.
Exercise
The importance of diet and exercise should not be underestimated when learning how to increase your metabolism to achieve your weight loss goals. Simple activities such as playing with your children, using the stairs and not the elevator, or walking the dog can all have a positive effect. Exercising will not only help you to build lean body mass (which is essential to increase metabolism), but will also help to reduce stress, therefore boosting your self confidence and well being.
The ideal plan to burn excess body fat and build lean muscle mass is to include regular cardiovascular exercise with resistance or weight training. Aerobic exercise will work your heart and lungs and help to burn body fat. Including interval training during your cardio workouts will really start to boost your metabolism. As an example, if you enjoy running, sprint for 30 seconds and then lightly jog for say 60 seconds and repeat for 20 minutes. This will be really beneficial in raising your metabolism.
Cardio exercise is great for burning fat but to develop lean muscle you will also need to include some weight, or resistance training. Remember, the higher your muscle mass the faster your metabolism will be. After a weight training workout your body will burn more calories which are needed for muscle recovery and repair. With regular exercise you will need to watch your diet, for your body will need essential nutrients and proteins for growth and recovery.
Foods
Complex carbohydrates (such as cereals, wholemeal bread), fibrous carbohydrates (such as fresh fruit, vegetables), protein (such as tuna, salmon, chicken breast) and healthy fats (such as olives, nuts) are all foods that are essential for muscle growth and to increase metabolism. Some herbs and green tea are reported to have some benefits but capsaicin (found in red chillies and peppers) and vitamin C are known to help speed metabolism and burn fat.
It is important that you increase the protein content of your diet for muscle repair and recovery when performing regular vigorous exercise. An almost certain way to increase your metabolism is to eat six small meals a day. If you try to eat every two to three hours your energy levels and metabolism will remain high. The worse thing you can do is skip meals, especially breakfast, for this will certainly cause your metabolism to slow down.
Although every individuals metabolic rate differs, it is possible to increase your metabolism by taking action. Achieving permanent fat loss is possible by learning how to increase your metabolism and this will need regular exercise and a healthy diet. Your primary goal may be fat loss and a more lean body, but the self confidence and quality of life you will gain is worth more than gold.
Both Johny Rider & Stuart Ward are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.
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