Losing weight can be a real challenge, especially if your metabolism has slowed down. But there are things you can do and foods you can eat that can help boost your metabolism, which leads to increased weight loss. Here are just a few easy ways to boost your metabolism.
1. Eat Breakfast
The saying goes that breakfast is the most important meal of the day and the funny thing is it's 100% true. After sleeping all night long, you need to "break" the "fast" and give your body the fuel it needs to get your blood sugar and your metabolism on the right track. Eating a healthy breakfast every day is vital because skipping this all important meal actually slows your metabolism down.
2. Eat More Protein
Protein helps your body maintain more balanced blood sugar levels, which helps eliminate the body's urge to start storing fat. Protein also aids in digestion as well. Studies show that eating lean protein with every meal and even incorporating it with snacks can boost your metabolism twice as much as when you eat carbohydrates alone.
3. Drink the Right Kind of Caffeine
Both coffee and tea have caffeine without all of the calories that soda provides. Caffeine is a stimulant that helps boost your metabolism and it will help give you more energy as well. Green tea is an especially good choice given it's thermogenic, fat burning properties.
4. Add Ginger to Your Diet
Ginger naturally and safely increases your body's temperature, which in turn boosts your metabolism and burns more calories.
5. Make Sure You Get Enough B Vitamins
Vitamin B is required for a healthy metabolism. It also helps you maintain good energy levels, manage stress, and even aids in the synthesis of your DNA. You can take a vitamin supplement or increase your intake of foods rich in vitamin B, such as tuna, turkey, lentils, bananas, and others.
6. Get More Magnesium in Your Diet
Magnesium is often seen as one of the more important minerals that the human body needs because of its ability to facilitate proper protein synthesis and boost metabolism. Magnesium rich foods include a variety of nuts like cashews, almonds, and peanuts, in addition to green vegetables like spinach.
7. Develop a Love for Hot Peppers
Hot peppers contain "capsaicin" which has the ability to double your energy expenditure for up to three hours following a meal that includes hot peppers. Capsaicin is also a natural appetite suppressant, so not only will hot peppers boost your metabolism, they'll also enable you to stave off your hunger for hours as well.
8. Build More Muscle
Muscle burns more calories than fat - plain and simple. So, the more muscle you have the more calories your body will burn at any given time. Added muscle means your metabolism will be more efficient as well, so you'll be burning fat when you're sitting and even when you're sleeping.
9. Do Interval Exercises
Studies have shown that when you burn more calories and boost your metabolism when you do interval exercises. Intervals are when you alternate between a slow to moderate pace with a fast pace. So you can alternate between a few sets of walking at a normal speed for a minute or two and then doing a burst of fast walking or running for 30-60 seconds. That type of interval walking will be more effective than just walking or even running a the same pace for the same amount of time.
These are just a few easy ways to boost your metabolism and lose weight.
