6 Ways to Naturally Boost Your Metabolism

Your metabolism is like the ever-running battery of your body that helps everything function. It governs your energy and rate of caloric burn and plays a role in how fast you digest food, how much you sleep and how often you get hungry.

It also plays a key role in how well you are able to lose weight. Having a well functioning metabolic system means you will burn more calories at rest than if your metabolic system is underperforming. More calories at rest means fewer you need to burn through exercise and leads to faster weight loss.

Try out these 6 techniques to help look after and boost your metabolic system.

Exercise

This is one of the most important things you can do to maintain your metabolic health. Regular exercise and movement ensures you maintain and improve your metabolic functioning, maximize caloric burn and metabolize and integrate nutrients effectively. When these things are all happening, your metabolism will naturally increase.

Don’t be an active couch potato

If you are already exercising, this is an important component of metabolism functioning, but eliminating sedentary behavior is also a key player. This means getting up and moving once every hour, reducing the amount of time you sit, and choosing to walk to places instead of drive, or take the stairs instead of the elevator. Sitting signals to our metabolism that it is okay to slow down, and done repetitively, it will stay slowed down!

Reduce stimulants

Coffee or caffeine, sugar and alcohol all act as stimulants to the body, which speed up the metabolism before sending it crashing down. This constant yo-yo action on the metabolism eventually causes it to fatigue and stop performing to its maximal capacity resulting in things like metabolic fatigue and metabolic syndrome.

Fast

No, I don’t mean go several days without food, or starve yourself, but the body is meant to have a certain amount of fasting each day to allow for proper digestion, elimination and cleansing of toxins. We typically say this period is from 7 or 8 pm to 7 or 8 am the next day. This time allows for proper digestion etc., but also allows your metabolism to take a rest before revving up for the next day. If possible avoid eating after 8 pm and then have breakfast, approximately 12 hours since your last meal.

Have protein for breakfast (and fewer carbs)

When carbohydrates are broken down, they release glucose, a fuel source for the body and the same thing that causes our blood sugar levels to go up and down. If you start your day with carbohydrates, you are essentially coming out of a fast, where you have low blood sugar and feeding your body something that will spike the blood sugar. This then sets your body up to crave that spike (sugar) all day long. Instead, minimize the carbs and add some portion for breakfast to give you a more sustained energy source.

Look after your gut

The gut is filled with thousands of bacteria, some which are good and some which are bad. Eating a healthy diet that is low in sugar and high in fermented foods helps foster the growth of the good bacteria and reduce the bad bacteria. These good bacteria are what help allow for healthy digestion, a process that is at the root of a healthy and efficient metabolism.

By: Laura Peill – (Check out her blog Chronicles of Passion & Facebook)