4 Ways to Speed Up Your Metabolism

These days everyone (and their mother) wants to lose weight. And an essential building block to getting to your goal weight is definitely speeding up you're metabolism.

1. Drink Water (and green tea)

Being properly hydrated keeps your body functioning the way it needs to! Drinking water and staying hydrated burns calories; isn't that all you really need to know?! Try to drink about 3L a day. Don't go overboard because you don't want to flush out all the good stuff. Drink a glass of water 30 minutes before every meal (including breakfast)and wait an hour or two after you eat to drink again.

Green Tea is also great for speeding up your metabolism. And adding about 1 tbsp of lemon juice per cup intensifies its effects. One thing to keep in mind is that tea actually dehydrates you. If you drink anything but water, drink the same amount of WATER to make up for it. 

2. Break the Fast

The best way to kickstart your metabolism is to have a healthy, hearty breakfast in the morning. If you wait until 2:30 PM to eat your first meal, your metabolism shuts down and goes into Starvation Mode where is stores all of your fat (isn't that what we're trying to avoid?).

3. HIIT -- High Intensity Interval Training

At this point we've all heard about this type of exercise... and I'm sure your question is, "does it work"? I can see why people would be surprised... instead of spending 50 minutes on the treadmill and 3 hours lifting weights you can get your dream with about 40 minutes of high intensity interval training. Errrmahhgawd its a miracle!! But seriously, plan your workout before you go to the gym and try it out for a few weeks. It works I promise!! (Look forward to seeing my workout routine and how I apply HIIT to my daily routine).

4. Add Certain Foods to Your Diet

Protein - lean meats - has a thermogenic effect, which means you actually burn calories while you eat it (about 30% of the calories to be exact).

Whole Grains make your body go through a longer process to actually breakdown the food, so in the end you're burning more calories -- win win! TIP - check the ingredients and make sure WHOLE grain is in the list. If you see "multi-grain" leave it there, that's a way for companies to save money and make you think you're eating healthy.

Studies show that eating spicy peppers that contain Capsaicin can speed up your metabolic rate (about 8%), prevent blood clots and act as a natural anti-inflammatory, and can make you feel fuller so that you eat less. This does not mean that you should have spicy foods for every meal; however eating peppers once in a while can definitely aid in speeding up your metabolism.

Phew, that was a lot. Well you've read enough so I'll leave you with that -- no clever conclusion.