|
The rate in which your body burns up calories is known as your metabolic rate. It is the body’s way of using chemical and physical processes in order to break down nutrients from food to produce energy. So how does your metabolic rate affect your weight? Calories Vs Metabolism As we already know your metabolism rate represents the rate in which your body burns up calories. So if you consume 2500 calories a day and you burn 2500 a day you are obviously not going to put any weight on, meaning your weight will generally stay the same. However if you consume 2500 a day but you only burn 2000 a day you will gain weight at the rate of roughly 1lb a week. This is one of the main reasons why one person may be able to eat junk food constantly and not put weight on whereas someone else may eat the same amount of junk food and continually put weight on. If you do have a slow metabolism however there are certain things that you can do as an attempt to speed it up. This is great news for people who are dieting or generally just want a healthier lifestyle as burning calories continually and effectively comes down to understanding what determines your metabolic rate and what you can do to influence it. How to influence and increase your Metabolic Rate The rate your body uses energy to do key processes, the energy your body uses through physical exercise and the energy your body uses to digest food are all factors that will affect your metabolism. If you want to increase this then you will need to eat well and exercise regularly and on top of this you should plan to follow the tips set out below: Add more protein to your diet This will help to stabilise the secretion of insulin into your blood stream, which is a process that can affect your metabolism. To benefit the best you should aim for 70 grams or higher every day. Don’t skip meals You should divide your calorie intake into six different small meals throughout the day. The reason for this is because if you start to skip meals, your body will sense that food is in short supply and as a result it will slow your metabolism down as a way of conserving energy. This means that overtime your body will be slower to use calories as fuel. Exercise three days a week This will basically aid you when it comes to burning calories. With frequent exercise you have the potential of losing an additional 1-2 pounds per month. Get a good night sleep Research has concluded that women who sleep less than four hours have a slower metabolism rate than those who get a full eight hours a night. So make sure you get a good sleeping pattern going and stick to it. Take a walk of an evening The best time to do this is just before dinner, the reason for this is the fact it increases your metabolism rate and keeps it fast for around two to three hours, which means the calories you consume at dinner have less of a chance to affect your weight. This is important for the fact many people’s metabolism slows down towards the end of the day. Each of us have our own metabolism and aspects such as genetics, gender, hormones and body temperature all contribute to this. However on top of this the above will also determine the speed of your metabolism so in order to increase yours start with small changes to your lifestyle and you will start see a big difference to your metabolic rate. Lisa Mills runs two websites, one selling baby gifts and the other promoting childrens gift ideas.
Related Articles -
Diet, metabolic, rate, exercise, top tips, weight loss, dieting, speed up metabolism,
| 
