If you’ve been wondering why it’s too easy for some people to lose weight without starving themselves and why you’re still not losing weight even if you’re not eating that much, then you may want to take a look in your Metabolism. Your metabolism pertains to the collective chemical processes by which your body converts food into energy. It plays a role in weight gain and loss as it influences your body’s need for energy.

Factors Affecting Your Metabolism

There are several factors that can affect your metabolism. These include your Muscle Mass, body size, gender, age, physical activity, environmental factors, diet, drugs, hormones, and genetics.

Muscle Mass: Your muscle requires more energy to function. The more muscle tissue you have, the more energy your body needs. If you want to speed up metabolism, then you may want to consider gaining more muscle mass.

Body Size: The bigger you are, the faster is your basal Metabolic Rate as you have larger internal organs as well as larger fluid volume to maintain.

Gender: Because men tend to be larger than women, they have faster metabolic rate than the latter.

Age: As you age, your metabolism slows down because of the loss of muscle tissue and hormonal and neurological changes.

Physical Activity: Physical activity affects your metabolism as it helps in improving your muscle mass and encourages the body to burn more calories.

Environmental Factors:Extremes in temperature (too cold or too hot) makes the body work harder in order to maintain the normal body temperature. Hence, it affects your metabolism.

Hormones: Your thyroid hormones can directly affect your basal metabolic rate. An abnormal elevation of these hormones can lead to unintentional weight loss and increase in appetite.

Diet: Iodine plays an important role in making the thyroid function well. Insufficient intake of iodine leads to poor thyroid function which consequently, affects your metabolism.

Drugs: There are medications that can affect your metabolism. Caffeine and nicotine, for instance, boost your metabolic rate while antidepressants can slow it down.

Genetics: Your family history as well as genetic disorders can also affect your metabolism.

How to Speed Up Metabolism

You may acquire your mom’s slow metabolism but there are things you can do to improve it. The following are tips on how to fasten your metabolism:

1. Eat your breakfast

There’s a good reason why health and fitness experts strongly suggest that you eat your breakfast. Aside from keeping you from overeating, eating your breakfast also helps in speeding up your metabolism. In a study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology, it shows that those who get their 22-55% of calories from breakfast gained fewer pounds compared to those who rely less on their breakfast for their calorie needs.

If you want to speed up metabolism, start your day right with a good breakfast. Eat foods that take time to digest like lean meats and complex carbohydrates.

2. Get your caffeine fix

If you’re a coffee lover, then you have more reasons to drink your coffee everyday. In a study published in the Journal of Physiology and Behaviour, it revealed that those who drink coffee have improved their metabolic rate by 16% compared to those who drink decaf coffee. This can be due to the fact that caffeine stimulates the central nervous system leading to an increase in heart rate and breathing.

3. Eat more foods high in omega 3

Eating foods like eggs, salmon, tuna, and other good food sources of omega 3 can help boost your metabolism. It’s because omega 3 helps regulate metabolism and reduces resistance to leptin. If you can’t easily find food sources high in omega 3, then you can opt for fish oil supplements instead.

4. Have small, frequent meals in a day
Contrary to what many people believe, eating frequently does not slow down your metabolism; it boosts it instead. Having small, frequent meals per day can help curb your hunger, stabilizes your blood sugar level, and keeps your metabolism running.

To speed up metabolism, you can have six 300-calorie meals spread throughout the day or divide your daily caloric intake to six.

5. Get rid of processed food

If you want a fast metabolism diet, then start getting rid of processed food. These foods are high in trans fat which hampers your body’s ability to burn fat. Trans fat also binds to liver and fat cells which slows down your metabolism. 

6. Hit the gym

Doing strength training exercises even if it’s just a couple of times per week can boost your metabolism as it helps you build more muscle mass. Another way to speed up metabolism while working out is to increase your workout intensity even for just 30 seconds. This is an effective strategy as it makes your mitochondria, your cell’s powerhouse, to work harder to burn energy.

7. Drink green tea

Drinking green tea helps in boosting your metabolism; thanks to its active ingredient called catechin. Catechins help improve fat oxidation as well as thermogenesis. Researchers have found out that those who drink green tea lose more weight than those who don’t.

Another option to take advantage of the health benefits of green tea is to take supplements that contain it. Supplements like Lean Bean pills can help you increase your metabolic rate, burn fat faster, and consequently, help you lose weight. Aside from its green coffee bean and green tea content that boosts your metabolism, it also has grapefruit extract, making it an ideal weight loss supplement to take before meals.

Stop wondering now how you can speed up your metabolism. Try these tips and enjoy the benefits of having a fast metabolism.

Sources:
http://www.livestrong.com/article/442302-what-does-fast-metabolism-mean/
http://www.abc.net.au/health/features/stories/2014/08/21/4070367.htm
http://www.womenshealthmag.com/weight-loss/boost-your-metabolism
http://www.health.com/health/gallery/0,,20306911,00.html