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| Increase Metabolism Naturally |
Increasing your metabolism beyond its normal rate is the quickest way to succeed in losing excess stored body fat. Permanent fat loss will occur if you increase your metabolism before dieting! It’s a physiological fact that when we lose weight, we also lose protein from our muscles. Unfortunately, a net loss of protein will always decrease the body’s metabolic rate.
As protein is eventually lost from millions of cells, it gradually lowers the total lean body weight. This affects the body composition and lowers the metabolism. Because of this process, we gradually require fewer calories to maintain body weight. If the current energy intake is continued, weight loss will eventually stop. In fact, it’s even possible to slowly regain weight even if a dieter sticks to a very low calorie diet. The problem with dieting alone is that many of the diet plans on the market may cause the metabolism to slow down. A decreased metabolic rate is often the very reason that weight loss suddenly stops. Increasing exercise frequency may not have much effect at this stage. Plus, reducing food intake further often doesn’t help because there is a net loss of protein in the overall muscle mass, and this net loss continues to lower your metabolism even further. This is when the body has adapted to the lower calorie intake.
Increase the metabolism for less chance of water loss
As more protein is lost from the muscles, the more fluid is also lost because protein holds around four times its weight in water. Over the period of a week, about only one pound of the five pounds lost is fat, the rest is mostly water. Protein and its fluid replacement is the main reason that many dieters regain weight after a diet. In other words, the fluid is replaced once the physiology of the body stabilizes. An increase in the metabolism would result in a gain of fluid. Therefore, weight loss would be more gradual. This is one reason for the recommended weight loss of only one to two pounds per week. By increasing your metabolism, you are giving your body a reason to hold onto protein, so that less water is lost.
Why the Speed of Our Metabolic Rate Matters
Even if more exercise is undertaken, a net loss of protein can occur if caloric intake is too low. Remember that dieters reduce their caloric intake. But, since exercise uses extra carbs, the body must break down more protein in order to convert into more carbohydrates. More carbs are needed because an unfit person has an untrained cardiovascular system, and cannot supply enough oxygen for cells to burn fat for energy during exercise. Exercise will increase the metabolism, but the trick for those trying to lose weight is to perform the right exercises for their specific body type, and not to cut too many calories too soon. To lose fat fast, you should prepare the body by increasing your metabolism before cutting calories. This enables your body to establish a major fat burning energy metabolism while regulating the protein metabolism.
An increase metabolism provides many benefits to help maintain continuous and permanent weight loss:
- less exercise would be needed - gain more time for yourself
- less effort when you did exercise - no need to spend hours of exercise to burn sufficient calories!
- less chance of weight regain later
- still enjoy your favorite foods - no more strict dieting
- less time spent preparing low-fat recipes
- save money by not buying the expensive low fat varieties
- experience a higher percentage of fat loss over water loss
- Physical activity: 20-25%
- Thermic effect of food: 10%
- Resting Metabolism: 70%
- Resting Metabolic Rate (RMR)
This is the amount of calories needed to run all essential functions and chemical reactions while in a rested and quiet state. RMR is the largest part of total metabolism and accounts for 65 - 75% of calories burned in a day. If lean weight is lost from the body through increased protein metabolism the RMR decreases. This often happens when people go on a strict diet, the body is forced into what's known as a "negative nitrogen balance" which means more protein is lost than what is replaced due to less protein/energy intake. This imbalance causes a gradual loss in lean weight thus lowering the RMR. - Thermic Effect of Food (TEF)
The body uses energy to digest and absorb the nutrients present in the food we eat. The rate of energy used for the Thermic Effect of Food is about 10%, it can be increased depending on the composition of each meal. For example:
If we overeat the TEF actually increases due to more food to digest, the stomach and intestines have to work harder and longer. It means if we ate an extra 3500 calories (number of calories per pound of fat) we wouldn't actually gain 1 pound of body fat because the TEF has to be accounted for, we would gain less. Calories do count but our body has sophisticated mechanisms to balance energy within the body to enable us hold onto as much energy as possible for a time when starvation may occur! - Physical activity
The amount of energy the body burns during daily activities such as exercise, recreation, work, housework, etc. Daily physical activities account for 20 - 40% of calories burned each day. This part will vary depending on the individual and how active they are each day. A sedentary person will require less calories to maintain weight than a busy worker in a construction site!
It is here where we can have the greatest effect on metabolism. The intensity, frequency and duration of any activity all have an effect on metabolism.
