In my last articles, I wrote about snacks and smoothies that will help to lose weight. Since many readers thought that was helpful, I decided to follow up with an article about speeding up your metabolism. You don’t necessarily need to read the first one (although it might help), but if you’re curious about losing weight, this would be a good place to start.
What is speed up metabolism?
Your metabolism is like the engine of your car. The faster the engine runs, the faster your car can drive, and likewise for your body; the faster your metabolism is, the faster you’ll burn calories (which equals weight loss). And since everybody wants to lose weight as fast as possible without starving themselves or spending hours at the gym every day, the question is: how can you speed up your metabolism?
Before we get to that, let’s talk about calories. Calories are a measurement of energy in food. Our bodies use this energy to fuel movement, breathing, heart function, and other bodily processes. If you eat more calories than you burn through exercising or just being alive in general, then those extra calories will be stored as fat in your body. To lose weight, this is what needs to happen: eat fewer calories than you burn so your body has no choice but to start burning excess fat for energy instead. But by speeding up his metabolism, one can increase their body’s capacity for burning calories so they can lose weight faster with much less effort involved. However…
It’s easy to speed up your metabolism.
Just eat more! Not exactly, but kind of. Your body’s metabolism is just the rate at which it uses energy. When you eat can have a dramatic impact on how quickly your body burns calories. For instance, eating six meals throughout the day will keep your metabolism high compared to having two or three bigger meals because every time you eat it starts all over again, giving your body more opportunities to burn those calories. Also, eating foods with a higher thermic effect (like protein) requires more energy for digestion and therefore speeds up metabolic rate more than carbs or fat do. The “easiest” way to do this is by making sure that 50% of what you eat are protein-based.
You should also eat more often—instead of having three larger meals, try to make six smaller meals throughout the day. That way you don’t get overly hungry and are less tempted to overeat because you need to eat every couple hours anyway. Try putting together a schedule for yourself involving when, what, and how much you’ll eat every day so that mealtime will be less of an issue. This can help with other things too, like portion control—if you just have one big lunch instead of 6 small ones, it will be easier not to overdo it on food quantity. It’s all about controlling your environment so that it helps rather than hurts your goals. Plus there many snacks you can take in-between meals that’ll help boost metabolism. For example, trail mix with dried fruit and nuts is a great combination of carbs and protein to keep your energy high throughout the day. And things like apples or peanut butter are always easy snacks to grab.
If you have high-metabolism you burn calories at a higher rate than those with low-metabolism so it might seem unfair for you that this article is about speeding up your metabolism—you’re probably already burning enough as it is! But even if it takes more time, don’t give up on trying to speed up your metabolism just because there might not be much you can do. It’s true that some people are born with naturally fast metabolisms (meaning they have smaller bodies with very high metabolisms), but metabolism is something anyone can change. Even if you don’t become a “super-fast” metabolism, it’s important to always be improving yourself because that’s the only way you grow as a person. And now that summer (and your goal body) is coming up fast, it’s time to put those plans into action!
Our bodies are like cars; they need regular checkups and tune ups to stay running smoothly. Metabolism-boosting exercises do just what they sound like—they improve the effectiveness of your current metabolic rate so you burn calories faster than before. When you think about increasing muscle mass, most people immediately focus on weights or other traditional forms of resistance training… But did you know that cardio can help?
When you increase your heart rate and blood circulation, more oxygen and nutrients are sent to your muscles and this in turn burns away fat even faster (cardio increases the demand for energy so your body has to break down more of its fat stores to meet that increased need). So it’s not just about weight training; both forms of exercise work together in a healthy lifestyle. The key is finding what works best for you. If you’re mainly an outdoor person, running around outside will be easy because you enjoy being active—so go ahead and give it a try! And if indoor exercising sounds better to you, there are plenty of ways for that too. Just get on the treadmill or hop into an aerobics class (whichever you prefer) and you’ll be well on your way to that beach body.
Strength training at the gym or home can be very effective too, but it’s best if you try to focus on strength training many different muscles rather than just one big group because working out all of them will burn more calories overall which helps with weight loss. And don’t be afraid to take it easy at first—strength training is stressful for your body so don’t overdo it during those first few times until your muscles become used to the work load. If lifting weights isn’t something you’re interested in, machines are always available too. Or just use your own body weight! Things like push-ups and squats aren’t only great workouts, but they’re also great ways to lose weight because your own body becomes your “weight” so it’s an efficient workout without even needing any special equipment. And you can always put things like milk jugs or bags of flour in your backpack to up the intensity when you need a challenge. The possibilities are endless!
If you want a toned and defined look for summer, there are a few key areas on your body that deserve some extra work— abs, butt, and arms . Each of these areas requires targeted exercises to work them specifically since they each have their own separate muscle groups (abs have upper and lower abdominal muscles while both the arms and glutes [butt] have the same muscle pattern on either side). Doing sit-ups, crunches, planks, squats, hip raises, leg lifts, lunges, and tricep dips are all great exercises to work each of these specific areas… But remember that you have to keep it interesting or else you’ll get bored! After doing 5 or 10 reps of the same thing over and over again for an hour your body goes into auto-pilot mode so don’t be afraid to switch things up.
If you’re new to working out then start by just adding more movement into your everyday life; take the stairs instead of the elevator at work and park further away from building entrances whenever possible (this adds up throughout the day!) Then begin incorporating one two additional workouts a week like walking in the morning, jogging in the evening, or taking a dance class. And try to have fun—if you’re not having fun while exercising then it’s not worth doing! So go get sweaty and remember… If everybody says you look tired, say “so what?” because summer is coming soon and your body will be ready for bikini season before you know it!
Gina is a famous blogger who works as an assistant manager at the Petit Four Cakery. By day, she manages the bakery and by night, she has another job running her cooking blog where she shares her own recipes.