If you want to jump start your weight loss efforts, you're going to need to focus on your metabolism. For most of us, our metabolisms have either been slowed by yo-yo dieting or even genetics and it can be hard to get them back again. However, it is not impossible to kick start your metabolism once again. You just need to make sure you are using the right techniques.
Many people fall on the theory that caffeine is the easiest method you can use to increase your metabolism. While this is true in the short term, the drawbacks are numerous and it's not good for your body or your heart to take too much caffeine. You can actually end up with caffeine intoxication if you have more than 500mg of caffeine in a day. That's the equivalent of two large cups of coffee from Starbucks to put that into perspective.
Instead of relying on external ways to increase your metabolism, it's time to look inward. First, let's talk about blood sugar. If your blood sugar is out of whack, your metabolism is too. Your body is spending too much time processing the wrong kind of foods and your metabolism suffers for it. If you're constantly throwing your body through feast and famine when it comes to sugar, chances are your levels are far out of whack.
To fix this, you need to make sure that you are getting the right balance of proteins, carbs and fats. This gives your body the chance to actually start burning fat instead of working on handling all the sugar that you've thrown at it. Keep in mind however, that you do need some sugar in your diet to keep functioning properly.
Next, you're going to want to build lean muscle mass. It simply is more effective at raising your metabolism than anything else. You can start doing this by adding in some mild weight lifting into your exercise routine. Even women can benefit from lifting small amounts. As you build muscle mass, don't panic if the numbers on the scale go up a bit. This is perfectly normal since muscle weighs more than fat. It is only temporary and if you keep burning fat, those numbers will come back down.
You can look at it as though you are restructuring your body. You are removing fat, which slows down your metabolism, which lean muscle mass that will raise it. Over the long term, you're retraining your metabolism and getting it to speed up.
By learning how to manage your blood sugar properly and by building more lean muscle mass, you have the perfect recipe for increasing your metabolism. It won't happen overnight, but if you stick with it, you'll be able to burn fat quickly and more efficiently. Don't rely on supplements that make crazy promises and endanger your health. They may work in the short term, but unless you address the issues that caused the slowdown of your metabolism in the first place, you're not fixing the problem.
Photo Credits: 1
Originally posted 2008-06-18 05:02:18. Republished by Old Post Promoter
Related Posts- 6 Ways to Beat Fatigue as you Battle your Weight This post was contributed by Heather Johnson, who writes on the subject of online nursing school. She invites your feedback at heatherjohnson2323 at gmail dot com. If you are interested in contributing a guest post please send me an email at kevin [at] weightladder (dot) com It’s all very well......
- 22lbs in 10 Days -- 1st Weigh In On New Diet All I can say is wow! I didn't want to believe that my newly purchased bathroom scale was reading the proper weight, but my weigh in with Dr Sean Bourke at Jumpstart Medicine proved it to be slightly high. Here is a graph of my weight loss (if you are......
- The Role of Protein in Weight Loss When it comes to the trio of protein, fat and carbs, most people tend to focus on the last two. They are demonized, championed, reviled – you name it. But in this mess, protein is usually forgotten, or lumped into a category where it doesn’t belong. Protein is vital, especially......
- How to Find the Diet That Works For You Once you're ready to take that step and go on a diet, there will literally be thousands of options available to you. There are a myriad of different diets out there and most claim that they have the secret to fast weight loss. It can be very frustrating to keep......
- Wickedly Spooky Halloween Roundup Happy Sunday to all my readers! Today's all about the roundup. As usual we have the Fitness Health Network of which I am a part of so go ahead and browse through the posts. You'll find they have a lot of great things to say. A little further down are......
The plateau is a dieter’s bane and even the best of us can end up at a stage in our weight loss where it seems like nothing works anymore. Even if you have been losing weight for sometime, it is incredibly discouraging to reach that point where you suddenly stop losing weight. This forces many to cut calories even further, but instead of losing weight, they may actually gain instead.
