If you’re reading this post,
chances are that you’ve tried – at least
once in your life – to boost your metabolism.
Perhaps (like most of us) you
weren’t quite certain what a metabolism
was, and perhaps (again, like most of us) you probably
didn’t quite know all that you needed to know in order to accomplish your goals.
Maybe you started a rigorous
exercise program of jogging and muscle toning.
Or maybe you started eating
several small portions a day, rather than three large traditional meal-sized
portions. Or maybe you started taking
all kinds of supplements that promised to boost your metabolism. The thing is, is that all of these methods can
indeed work. Really: exercise, eating strategically, and ensuring that your body has catabolism-friendly supplements are
but three of many generally good ideas.
So what’s the problem?
The problem is that many of us
have no real scientific understanding
of what, how, or why these methods boost metabolism.
Some of us, in fact, don’t
really even know if they work; we just think that they do. For example, a person may start a vigorous
exercise program that includes significant aerobic cardiovascular movement, such
as jogging or cycling. And indeed, after
a week, that person may notice a drop in weight.
Yet is this due to a boosted
metabolism? Maybe; maybe not. Could it be due to water loss through
perspiration that hasn’t been adequately replenished? Maybe or maybe not. The point here is that many people – at risk
to their health and wellness – don’t
quite understand the tips, strategies, and techniques of boosting their
metabolism. And that’s what we’re going
to rectify in this post.
we’re going to look at the popular, easy, fun
(yes, believe it or not), and successful ways to boost your metabolism.
We’ve taken these 11 key ideas
and broken them down into 3 broad categories:
1. Exercise
2. Lifestyle
3. Diet
As you go through each of the
11 key points, you’ll certainly note
that there is some overlap between them.
For example, it’s hard to imagine that
introducing exercise into your life isn’t, in many ways, a lifestyle choice. Similarly, integrating
all kinds of metabolism boosting foods into
your diet is surely going to influence how you spend your time (probably less time in fast food line-ups, for one!). So with this being
said, please don’t get bogged down in the categories; they are merely provided
here to help organize these points, and to help you easily refer to them in the
future. The important thing for you to do is understand each of the points, and
evaluate how you can responsibly integrate them into your life.
1) Exercise
It’s going to be old news for
you to be reminded that exercising is a bit part of boosting your
metabolism and burning up calories.
Unless you’re born with one of
those unusually active metabolisms which allows you to, almost freakishly, eat thousands
of calories a day without weight-gain consequences, you’re like the vast
majority of us who need to give your metabolisms a bit of a kick through
exercising.
Now, you might think that
cardiovascular (aerobic) exercise is an important part of boosting your metabolism;
and you’d be right! Provided that, of
course, your qualified doctor confirms that you’re able to start a program of
cardiovascular exercise, this is indeed the place to start. Increasing heart rate, blood circulation, body temperature, and oxygen intake/carbon
dioxide exchange all send messages to the system to initiative catabolism
(breaking down cells and using them for energy) We focus upon these added activities next.
Build Muscle
Many people – particularly some
women – are very wary about undertaking any exercise regimen that can lead to
muscle building. The old perception was
that muscle building leads to muscle bulking, and before long, gorging forearm
veins and other unwanted results. This is, frankly, not the case. Provided that women aren’t supporting their
workouts with specific muscle-building supplements, there is no need to be concerned;
because building lean muscle won’t make them
bulk up. Still, however, the question remains: why would women
(and, of course, men) who want to boost their
metabolism focus on muscle building? Isn’t cardiovascular exercising the only
thing that matters?
Again, the answer is: No! In addition to a healthy and responsible
cardiovascular program, muscle building is an exceptionally powerful way to
boost metabolism.
How? Because a pound of muscle burns more calories
than a pound of fat. And what does this
mean? It means (and get ready to stare
in awe) that if you have more
muscle on your body – anywhere
on your body – you will simply
burn more calories as a result.
Of course, as you can infer, if
you build muscle and then leave it alone, over time, the muscle fibers will
weaken and you’ll lose that wonderful
calorie-burning factory. But that’s no problem, because all you need to do is
build and maintain healthy muscle. It
may sound daunting; especially if at the moment you perceive yourself to have
much more fat than muscle.
Yet the important thing for you
to remember is that once you start building muscle – through any kind of
strength training– your body will itself start burning more calories. It has
to; even while you sleep, or go to a movie, or read a book. It’s like putting your calorie-burning
(catabolism) program on auto- pilot.
So don’t let a little (or even
a lot) of extra flab, at the moment, deter you from believing that muscle
building is important. Yes, you should
enjoy cardiovascular exercise too, because that’s ultimately how your body is
going to burn existing fat.
Interval Training
The basic weight loss nuts and
bolts behind cardiovascular exercise
(or any kind of exercise, really) is, as you know, a matter of catabolism.
Essentially, if you can
engineer your body to require more energy, your body will comply by breaking
cells down to deliver it; and that process (metabolism) burns calories. Simple, right? So based on that logic, something called
interval training neatly fits in with the overall plan. Interval training is simply a adding high-
energy burning component to your exercise plan on an infrequent, or interval,
basis.
For example, you may be at a stage where you
can jog for 20 minutes every other
day, and thus put your heart into a cardiovascular
zone during this time.
This, obviously, is going to
help you boost your metabolism and thus burn calories/energy. Yet you can actually burn disproportionately
more calories if, during that 20 minute jog, you add a 30 second or 1 minute
sprint. The metabolism-boosting benefits
that you enjoy as a result of interval training are primarily due to the fact
that your body, suddenly, needs to find more energy.
So remember: your goal with
interval training is to give your body a
healthy jolt where it suddenly says to itself:
“Whoa! We need more energy here
FAST, this person has increased
their heart rate from 180 beats per minute to 190 beats
per minute! Let’s go to any available cell, like those
fat cells down at the waist, and break them down via catabolism so
that this person can get the energy that they
need!”
If you simply increase your
speed and stay there, while your body may, overall burn some more calories, it
won’t get that jolt.
Also bear in mind that interval
training can indeed last longer than 30 seconds or a minute.
Some experts suggest that you
can use interval training for 30-40 minutes, depending on your state of health
and what your overall exercise regimen looks like.
The reason we’re focusing on 30
seconds to 1 minute is simply to give you a clear understanding that interval
training is a kind of mini training within a training program. And, as always, don’t overdo it with your
interval training. Your goal here is to
become healthier and stronger, and lose weight in that process.
Variety
They say that variety is the
spice of life, and this is indeed quite
true. But despite this awareness, many
people don’t spice up their exercise program;
which is surprising, since doing so often leads to
valuable metabolism-boosting benefits.
There are a few easy ways to
add variety to your exercise program.
We’ve already talked about interval training, which is one way to shift your body’s metabolic engine into higher
gear.
Other effective ways are to
break up a longer routine into smaller parts. For example, instead of committing to 1x1 hour
workout a
day, it can be
metabolism-boosting to split this up into 2x30 minute workouts; or even, on
some occasions, 3x20 minute workouts. Furthermore,
you can add variety into your daily exercise routine without formally
exercising.
All of these tips provide two
metabolism-boosting benefits.
·
Firstly, as you can easily see, they can
make exercising more
fun. While, indeed, it’s
important to have an exercise routine, you don’t want to have a boring exercise
routine (because then your chances of stopping are that much greater!).
·
The second important benefit of variety in
your exercise
program leads us back to the
interval training concept.
When you add variety to your
workout, your body cannot get
into a groove.
Naturally, the overall state of
your health (which can be
influenced by genetics and
other factors outside of your control)
will play a role in how
efficiently your body runs.
But regardless of how your body
is put together, who what
genetic influences you have to
deal with, your body really likes
you, and wants to do things as
efficiently as it possibly can.
Therefore, when you start
exercising, you body can start to develop
a kind of expectation of energy output. It’s not doing this to be lazy; it’s doing this because, quite sincerely, it
wants to help! If your body starts to predict that you need a certain
amount of energy to complete a certain task
(such as jog for 20 minutes),
then it will start to achieve
that energy output more efficiently.
And as a result, you may find
yourself very out of breath or tired as your body strives to meet this
increased demand.
Naturally, of course,
catabolism will be involved, and your body metabolism will increase. But over time, say a month or so, your body
will simply become more efficient. It
will have become stronger, and will be able to supply your energy needs much
more efficiently; you may not even break a sweat!
Now, as far as you and I are
concerned, we know that a speedy metabolism
is a good thing in our weight loss efforts.
But your body doesn’t make this
evaluation. And so it won’t turn on its metabolism jets because you want it to.
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