How many times have you heard a person say they are overweight because they have a slow metabolism?
Let’s eliminate this excuse by firing up your metabolism to its full genetic potential. While following your best weight loss program, doesn’t make sense to speed up your metabolism to its greatest genetic potential possible?
There are certain tactics available to improve metabolism. Some are age-old proven therapies of Ayurveda, and lifestyle techniques, while others are nutritional tricks.
Before you read all the metabolism-boosting tricks, let us understand what exactly metabolism is.
Metabolism
In the simplest terms, metabolism is the rate at which your body burns calories (“fuel”). Very few people have a fast metabolism. A faster metabolism will enable you to lose more weight than a person with the same activity level, diet, and weight. There are some factors that you can control and change, and some factors that you can’t.
Age – Metabolic rate decreases 5% each decade, after the age of 40, partly because of decreased muscle mass.
Gender – Men generally burn calories more quickly than women because they have more muscle tissue.
Heredity – You can inherit your metabolic rate from previous generations.
Increase Your Physical Activity – This is no secret, but really works as the muscle mass more is your metabolism! Individuals who exercise regularly burn more calories and have more metabolically active, calorie-burning muscle mass than those who are less active. Simple activities like walking, and swimming boosts metabolism by burning calories, while strength training or YOGA slows the metabolically active muscle loss in aging people. Both of these activities have been shown to improve metabolism immediately after participating in the activity, while the long-term results of strength training help burn even more calories 24 hours a day, even while sleeping.
Protein Consumption – Some evidence suggests there is a slight metabolic boosting power in higher protein diets versus high carb, low protein diets. Please be aware that the vast majority of weight loss results from decreasing calories, and increasing activity, not by changing the percentage of carbs versus protein in your diet. Very high protein diets have been shown to cause potential health challenges. Just make sure you eat a good amount of pulses, dal, paneer, lean meat, etc and reduce your simple rice or roti by 20 %
Get adequate sleep – Getting 7+ hours of sleep each night may affect hormones that regulate body weight and appetite. In a current, rather large, ongoing study, people who slept less, have a tendency to weight more.
Get Ayurveda Detox – Ayurveda has described an important factor of digestion and metabolism in our body as Agni and gives importance to clearing AMA which is called toxins. This is one of the entities created by the body when there is a disruption of hormones and enzymes. Just like fingerprints, this is unique to each individual. The classical seasonal Detox therapies helps to clear ama thus helping to improve metabolism and aid weight loss. We generally see a 14-day detox program not only aids weight loss but improves metabolism and digestion.
Don’t Skip Meals – It is important not to wait more than 5 hours between meals to eat. Waiting longer and skipping them has a tendency to slow your metabolism down and deprive you of crucial energy. It is also important to rev up your metabolism by breaking the fast at breakfast each and every morning to give you energy and prevent binging at later meals. Please note: It is also always important to closely monitor your overall caloric intake.
Weight Loss Superfoods – Certain supplements which contain a stimulus effect can slightly boost your metabolism. Use more of Turmeric, cinnamon, pepper, long pepper flax seeds, chia seeds, pumpkin seeds, Salmon, tuna fish in the food.
The following tips below will help you increase your metabolism to it greatest possible potential. However, regular Ayurveda panchakarma processes act on digestion and then metabolism alone. It is best to go through the cleansing process periodically for faster and better results.
