To rev up your metabolic rate, it is possible to augment the last two components, which methods we will discuss in this newsletter.

There are two ways to fire up your metabolism --

(1) INCREASE YOUR BASAL METABOLIC RATE (BMR)

Before discussing how to increase your BMR, if you have difficulty losing weight or are battling continued weight gain, the first thing you should do is to get a thyroid test. This is a simple blood test for thyroid hormones. If you have undiagnosed hypothyroidism (a slow thyroid) or if your condition is not adequately treated, almost anything you do to raise your metabolism will fail.

Your BMR is influenced by a number of factors --

Most effective way to increase your BMR --

• As mentioned above, ageing results in a decline in lean muscle mass. Therefore, for optimal health and effective weight loss, you ideally want to increase your lean muscle mass and decrease your percentage of body fat. Muscle cells are up to 8 times more metabolically active than fat cells; besides, muscle burns more calories than fat.

• Adding strength training exercises 2-3 times a week will help counteract muscle loss associated with aging. When you have more muscles, your BMR is higher. It is like having a burning furnace throughout the day, even when you are not exercising.
• To achieve permanent weight loss, you want to build lean muscles and lose fat. Since muscle is a much denser tissue than fat, it weighs more. Therefore, with strength training, it is likely that the number on the scale might not move much at all, in fact, it might even go up. However, your clothes will get loser. At this point, the scale can become misleading and discourage you when you are actually doing great. The truth is that it is possible to get smaller and heavier at the same time.
• Your goal is to have a sleek, healthy body of a naturally lean person who can enjoy what they eat. You want to avoid at all costs the frail, sagging body of a chronic dieter who has to measure every morsel of food. Start incorporating strength training into your exercise routine.
  

(2) INCREASE YOUR PHYSICAL ACTIVITY 

• Apart from raising your BMR, increasing your physical activity is another way to boost the metabolic rate. This means having a more active lifestyle which ranges from taking the stairs, mowing the lawn, parking further away from the store and walking, to incorporating some forms of aerobic exercise, such as brisk walking, running, cycling, or swimming.  
• Aerobic exercise increases the heart rate and you burn calories while working out. Aerobic exercise also burns more calories than strength training; however, unlike strength training, the effect wears off soon after you stop exercising. In other words, aerobic exercise is not as effective in raising BMR as strength training. Therefore, a balanced workout should incorporate both aerobic and strength training exercises. 
• For those who choose walking as a workout please be aware that unless you are starting out in relatively poor shape, slow-paced walking on a flat surface might not produce enough benefits for weight loss. Further, after a few weeks of walking, you need to raise the intensity of the exercise by increasing the speed or start walking on an incline. When you do this, you raise your heart rate and you burn more calories.

Caution:

About the Author

Carol Chuang earned a Master of Science degree in Nutrition from Huntington College of Health Sciences. She is a Certified Health Counselor from the Institute for Integrative Nutrition and Columbia University. Carol is a Certified Metabolic Typing Advisor and is also board certified by the American Association of Drugless Practitioners.

 

Apart from having her private practice counseling individual clients, she is also the nutrition and wellness consultant for San Francisco Child Abuse Prevention Council and the APA Family Support Services in San Francisco. She conducts regular workshops for their clients on various topics of nutrition and wellness.