Many times you come across people who says their metabolism is slow they cant loose weight fast and they gain weight fast as well in there mind if they will eat a little they will gain weight and there are some people who eat a lot but don’t gain weight much this is because of there genes and genes play an important role in metabolism.
What is Metabolism?
It is a catch all term for all the complex series of biochemical processes that convert the calories you consume through food and drink into usable energy so the body can function and keep you alive.
Metabolism is partly genetic and is out of your control. Some are lucky to have fast metabolism so what ever they eat is burned quickly and some are not that lucky but if you take care of what you eat, drink and remain physically active during the day you can improve your metabolism slowly and gradually.
While we refer metabolism as a single entity, it actually consist of three separate components
1. Resting Metabolic Rate (RMR)
2. Activity Energy Expenditure (AEE)
3. Thermic Effect of Food (TEF)
1. Resting Metabolic Rate (RMR) – It is the energy your body burned while your are resting. It accounts to 60 to 70 percent of your total energy expenditure. The factors that influence your RMR are.
Body size which means the larger you are more calories will be required to sustain it. So if you are bigger then higher will be your RMR.
Gender on a average male has higher RMR then a women difference may be around 3 to 4 percent if weather they both are of same weight and height.
Fat Free Mass – More the fat free mass you posses in your body higher will be your RMR. Fat free mass includes more then your muscles in your body as your organs and bones also fall under the fat free mass bracket.
Age – your metabolic rate reduces by 1 -2 % per decade after your cross your twenties. Reason behind that is in most of the cases reduce in physical activities which also lower your body mass.
2. Activity Energy Expenditure (AEE) – AEE is the energy expanded through your activities which can be further divided into your physical activity and NEAT (non exercise activity thermo genesis).
Physical activities include that what ever kind of physical activity you may participate in like gym, running swimming or playing any sport it consist of 10 to 15 percent of calorie expenditure.
Neat it includes your unintentional or subconscious activity like walking maintaining posture standing etc. It is the most important factor that contributes to your metabolism as it can consist of 20 to 50 percent of calorie expenditure.
3. Thermic Effect of Food (TEF) – This is the energy expanded through digesting and storing the food you eat. It accounts of 10% of total calorie intake.
Learn How to Improve Your Metabolism:
1. Build Muscle – As we have learned earlier that you have a higher Resting metabolic rate as if you have higher body mass in you. Higher body mass means your body burns 6 calories to sustain muscle and you will be burning more calories when you are resting and in case of higher body fat you would be burning 2 calories to sustain it.
2. Drink More Water – As we know your body needs water to process calories. There are chances that when you are dehydrated you will burn less calories and metabolism will slow down. This calorie-burning effect may be even greater if you drink cold water, as your body uses energy to heat it up to body temperature.
3. Remain Physically Active – When you are actively participate in any sport or do workout in gym your body fat will be low so you will burn more more calories while resting as well as exercising
4. Do Not Skip Meals – Some people skip meals as a way to lose weight. However, this can negatively impact metabolism. Eating meals that are not filling can have the same effect.
5. Drink Coffee or Green Tea- Caffeine rich drinks increases your capacity to work harder while working out.
6. Increase Your NEAT– time when you are not working out is approx 60 % percent of the day if start increasing your NEAT activities you have the chances that you will loose weight gradually and you do not have to depend on workouts for weight loss.