Metabolic Boost!

What exactly is metabolism? Metabolism is the amount of energy (calories) your body burns to maintain yourself. Whether you are walking, sitting, sleeping or eating, your body is constantly burning calories. The challenge and biggest question for most people is how to rev up YOUR metabolism.It’s very simple. The fact is, muscle uses more calories to maintain itself than fat. As a result if you are more muscular, you will burn much more calories by just simply sitting or sleeping due to the higher energy demand that muscles need. The more fat you have the fewer calories you burn—it’s that simple! So, how do we rev up the metabolism? First, you have to add exercise to your lifestyle. Exercise naturally increases the amount of calories you burn. Cardio exercises such as walking, running, biking, and circuit training classes will help you not only burn excess calories but also protect you against American’s number 1 killer (heart disease) by keeping your heart and cardiovascular system strong. In addition to cardio, you need to add strength training to your regimen to add lean muscle. Strength training is an essential tool to burning fat. There are many ways to get muscular without getting bulky…in fact getting bulky is much harder and complicated than most people think. If possible, contact a local qualified trainer to teach you the proper techniques and training when lifting weights. Without guidance, you could hurt yourself and end up spending much more money down the road if you don’t learn the basic body mechanics when lifting.As soon as you get your metabolism going, you will naturally burn calories at a faster rate. It may take 3-5 months until your body gets familiarized to burning calories more rapidly, so you have to be patient and persistent. Remember it took many years for you to put on the weight, so a few months of hard work should not be too bad. 10 Tips to Increase Your Metabolism

1. Start the day with a quick 15-20 min cardio session - walking, running, biking, etc.

2. Cut all carbohydrates after 7pm.

3. Eat every 3 hours - keeps the metabolism working all day long (5-6 small meals a day)

4. Don’t skip meals - your body will actually store more fat when skipping a meal because it signals the body that it is starving.

5. Cut out refined sugar from your diet - soda, donuts, candy --- they are only empty calories which fill you up but eventually turn into fat.

6. Limit yourself to a “cheat day” once a week - eat what you like, but as time will pass, you might actually enjoy the healthy diet and if that’s the case eliminate the cheat day.

7. Trade whole milk for skim milk - it contains all the benefits minus the fat.

8. Avoid white flour - stick with whole wheat bread, brown rice, whole wheat pasta, whole wheat pitas (make your calories rich in essential nutrients)

9. Drink water throughout the day - wherever you take your cell phone, take a water bottle.

10. Include some protein with every meal - chicken, fish, lean meat, tofu, protein shakes or protein bars.

So remember: to build an efficient, lean, calorie burning machine you need to keep a close watch on your diet, drink plenty of water, get your cardio in daily and strength train 2-3 times a week. There’s nothing to lose except CALORIES!Make it happen!