HOW TO BOOST YOUR METABOLISM FOR FAT LOSS

With fat loss, there are a few key things that you must be working on consistently to ensure you can achieve your goal. Such as strength training, calorie intake, walking more, and improving your sleep quality, these are called the ‘what’ factors. Your metabolism on the other hand determines how effectively your body will burn fat.  

The ‘what’ gives you the tools needed to achieve your goals, the ‘how’ equips you with the knowledge to sharpen those tools. So by the end of this, I hope to leave you with 3 tips you can begin to action straight away that will improve the rate at which your body burns fat. 

The amount of exercise you undertake per week, along with your height and weight is used to calculate what we call your BMR (Basal Metabolic Rate). This provides a guide into the amount of calories your body burns at rest for basic daily functions. 

Age and height are factors you won’t have much control over, but the amount of exercise you undertake on a weekly basis will directly impact your bodies BMR. The link here is that as you begin to increase the amount of weekly physical activity, there will be a direct positive impact on your BMR making it more effective at burning calories even when at rest. 

Strength training should always be your main focus where possible. Where this may not always be always accessible, home workouts couples with long periods of low-intensity cardio will still work towards fat loss. Remember even light activity is still better than none at all. 

TEF (Thermic effect of food) is known as the amount of energy used by the body through the process of digestion. Even though you may not feel like your expending energy, this process includes ingestion, digestion, absorption, utilisation, and the storage of food consumed. 

This is why you should be eating smaller but more frequent portions throughout the day, as the more times your digestive system has to work in a day the more energy it will be using up. As long as you are staying within your caloric goal this can account for anywhere between 6 - 10% of your daily energy expenditure. 

For you right now the thought of eating anything more than 2-3 meals a day might seem daunting and even unrealistic, however, this doesn’t have to be full meals. In between meals you can have smaller snacks to help break up your day, whilst still boosting your metabolism. 

Last but by no means any less important is TEA (Thermic effect of activity), which is the amount of energy used up for any planned and unplanned activity. Even if you’re completing all your planned workouts, but spend the rest of your non-active you will still find it difficult to burn that extra body fat. 

Whether that be sitting down in front of the TV, Netflix, or spending hours on your phone in bed, these all lead to a very non-active lifestyle. If you are still far away from leading an active lifestyle, start small and gradually build up. Set an alarm every 2 hours to remind yourself to get up and move for 10 - 15 mins. 

This could start with things as simple as hanging up the washing, cleaning the house, going for a lap around the park, or even some mobility & yoga movements. Depending on the amount of unplanned & planned activity you partake in any day, this can account for 20 - 40% of your total daily expenditure. 

By now I hope you have a better understanding of how each point helps to boost your metabolism, and makes your body more efficient at burning fat. All that’s left now is for you to make it happen!