Carrying out the decision to lose weight is a tough thing to do, especially if you don’t now how to do it. I you never give up you will eventually learn how. Part of mastering this struggle is making and keeping that decision. Another part is learning the list of do's and don’ts, those things that sway you towards fat loss, and those things that sway you away from it.
Metabolism does control weight, this is true. What most people don’t know is that they do in fact have the ability to control and adjust their metabolisms and thereby control their weight. Exercise does speed the metabolism up. The more active your lifestyle the more likely you are to have a quick metabolism and lose weight. It may not be healthy for all of us to get into a highly active lifestyle all at once but it is possible to get there as quickly as you safely can as an individual.
A large part of the battle in fighting fat and a slow metabolic rate is the western world’s view of food as entertainment. In addition to taking on an active lifestyle you will need to stop looking at food consumption as a means of gratification. This is what causes us to be gluttons. Instead of stopping when our hunger is sated we continue on until we are stuffed to get more enjoyment out of it. We also eat the tastiest foods rather than those that are best for us. There are also certain foods that speed metabolism which we will discuss.
Sleep and other lifestyle patterns can help or hinder the rate at which we metabolize foods. An active lifestyle should lead eventually to being able to exercise to exhaustion; this in turn should keep your metabolism quick and your fat content low. By extending oneself to one’s limits you fully utilize the lungs, heart, and muscles and burn fat most efficiently. If you burn a lot of calories you have a quick metabolism. A metabolism set at a certain speed tends to stay at that speed even when the individual is at rest. This is why a person with a slow metabolism can seem to eat nothing and still put on weight. Their metabolism tends to stay at the same speed even when they are not doing the things that keep it at that speed, even when they do get moderate exercise.
Whether in a few weeks or over time, the change in lifestyle and active living must be sharp and definite in the end in order to speed up the metabolism. You must rule your body and your appetites not the other way around. And there will be some definite emotional obstacles as well. Any real change involves growing pains. Your body will miss the weight, you will have to let go of the old and latch on to the new: exercise, diet, rest and healthful living.
Working out once a day and then sitting around the rest of the time just won’t do it. You have to have a lifestyle that is primarily active, where you don’t spend most of the day sitting around. Working out in the morning, eating light meals that don’t slow you down, drinking plenty of water all help to maintain that active lifestyle. Do things manually whenever practical: wash dishes by hand, dust, mow the lawn with a push mower, these things will all help you to be primarily active rather than sedentary. Remember sedentary is related to sediment; you don’t want any more fat to build up because of a slow running metabolism that doesn’t carry that fat away fast enough!
Early risers do have a quicker metabolism as well as those who don’t eat after 6pm. Into bed by 8 or 9pm anyway and you will feel much better, have more energy and tend to feel like being more active. A regular bedtime is crucial to a solid, consistent and healthy routine. Routines are good for you; healthy habits are a shield you can rely on to shore up the active and healthy lifestyle that will keep your metabolism in high gear.
Alcohol is a depressant and will tend to impede sleep, slow you down in the daytime and not make you feel much like being active at all. When your body spends all its time metabolizing alcohol, and not very well at that, it has little time to metabolize fat. And all the time the alcohol itself is turning into more fat.
If you burn off the fat with a speedy metabolism you can keep it off by not taking in any fat. Protein on the other hand burns fat and builds muscle. The muscle itself tends to metabolize fat as well. Start with greens, greens of all kinds, greens with protein. There you have a diet with no animal fats, rich in protein and nutrients. Add no fattening ingredients. If you must have dressing, use lots of vinegar and very little canola oil (a tablespoon at most).
Lean fish (no shrimp or shellfish) is the best way to go with meats. Try fruits first, nuts and berries too. Stay away from all canned goods, which have starches and other ingredients that are both unnatural and extremely difficult to metabolize.
Choose a job that keeps you on your feet 50% to 100% of the time. Take the stairs at work if possible. Workout or job at lunch instead of having a long, heavy meal. Eat a light meal at each break instead, just enough to satisfy your hunger. Have a glass of cold water or two, a multivitamin and a piece of celery for lunch instead, after your workout.
Fat is stored by the combining of 3 fatty acids and a glyceride into one triglyceride or fat cell. Until 3 fatty acids bind in this way they haven’t formed a fat cell. Though fat can’t be burned as energy, tryglicerides can be turned back into glycerides which can be burned as energy. You want your body to burn the right mix of fuel sources to metabolize quickly. You can’t burn all fresh new foods coming into your body or you won’t turn any triglycerides into sugars to be burned and thus lose weight. If you try a starvation diet where you think you might burn exclusively triglycerides turned back into sugars, your body won’t let you get away with it. Thinking you are starving in genuine your body will burn muscle instead, protecting your fat as an energy reserve. You need to burn a reasonable combination of both sources of fuel to properly adjust your metabolism and slowly take weight off. This takes time, patience, determination, knowledge and discipline as you can already see.
There is no spot reducing so pretty much any exercise that causes your body to call on its fat reserves for energy will reduce fat everywhere on your body. Remember not to replace that fat. You may strengthen the muscles beneath the fat on your stomach or elsewhere but this is not the same thing and is not required to simply remove the fat. Just walking 3 miles a day above and beyond what you already do and eating 500 less calories per day can cause you to lose two pounds of fat per week.
You can also speed your metabolism by choosing foods that have few calories yet burn many calories just in the process of metabolizing them. Celery, Potatoes and Cabbage are good examples. The right ingredients in a soup would also make a great example.
Some tools you may use in counting calories burned and calories assimilated include calorie calculators, available for both foods and activities online and in books available from your local public library or bookstore. Information is a big help to speeding metabolism and losing weight. In this way you might learn how that vigorous walking burns more calories than many other forms of exercise.
Strength training with weights is a great way to speed up your metabolism so that you burn more calories 24 hours a day. This is achieved with lower reps and higher weights, above all be safe. Learning to properly read nutrition labels and other diet and exercise information with practice and by increasing your weight loss vocabulary will be of invaluable help.
Considering all of these tips, and putting them into action, you can successfully boost your metabolism and effectively lose weight. Say hello to a healthier you!
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