Metabolism is the reason why one individual can eat an entire bar of chocolate in one sitting and not gain weight, while another individual eats a sliver of chocolate and gains two pounds. Your metabolism's chief job is to burn calories, and if it is working too slowly, even if you are eating an appropriate amount of calories for your body and exercising regularly, you may not lose weight. Luckily, there are several ways to speed up metabolism to get it working for you instead of against you.
Eat Frequent, Small Meals
Your metabolism rests while you are sleeping, and the sooner you start eating in the morning, the sooner your metabolism will begin working again. According to Penn State nutrition professor Barbara Rolls, your metabolism will start working harder as soon as you start eating. Although it may seem contrary to typical weight loss rules, increase your caloric intake by eating breakfast. Your metabolism will start burning those calories and continue at full force throughout the day. Similarly, enjoy small, frequent meals throughout the day rather than one or two large ones. Your metabolism works best when it is burning calories steadily throughout the day, rather than starting and stopping. Even if you are unable to prepare six complete meals per day, tide yourself over in between meals by eating pieces of lean turkey, low-fat cheese and low-fat yogurt.
Eat Protein and Hot Peppers
According to dietitian Jeff Hampl, eating protein throughout the day can burn up to 200 extra calories per day. Avoid high-fat proteins like beef and full-fat cheese. Instead, aim for low-fat or no-fat proteins with no saturated fat, like nonfat yogurt, lean turkey breast, low-fat string cheese, nuts and avocado. Similarly, hot peppers contain capsaicin, which increases metabolism by creating more adrenaline in the body. Although regular hot pepper consumption is not a cure-all for speeding up metabolism, adding hot peppers to your diet every few days can give your metabolism a small edge.
Exercise Throughout the Day
Many individuals do not have time to devote more than an hour per day to exercise, due to busy schedules. Instead of using the entire hour to work out in one chunk, break your exercise up into two or three parts throughout the day. According to Dr. Ethlyn Gail Trapp in Women's Health Magazine, exercising in spurts of short, intense exercise is more helpful in raising metabolic rate than longer, steady periods of exercise. Adding more strength and weight training into your exercise can also raise metabolism. According to Redbook, "strength training can increase your resting metabolic rate anywhere from 6.8 to 7.8 percent." This will not only make losing weight easier for most individuals while exercising, but it will cause more calories to burn off when that individual is sedentary.
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