Know How Your Body Works To Lose Fat And Build Muscle

Your body requires energy throughout the day. When you sleep, shower, work, ex; your body is burning calories at a certain rate. That rate is your metabolism. That rate is determined by what you eat, how often you eat it, and what extra activities (other than eating and sleeping) you do throughout the day.

One of your first goals for your diet is to speed up your metabolism. You need to eat several times a day, every 3 hours or so. This makes your body used to burning calories at a high rate because it knows your going to replenish the calories with 2 to 3 hours. This also perverts overeating in one sitting, which makes your body slow down to be able to process it all (and once it does, it’s more than likely considered most of your food as storage(storage=fat) because you haven’t been moving much since you over ate.)

What you eat has a lot to do with the speed of your metabolism. Your body just like it gets used to certain time frames, it also adapts to eating habits. There are 3 sources of energy for your body; fat, carbohydrates (carbs), and proteins. Fat and Carbohydrates are the kings of calories. Fat is known as a storage calorie, its put in your body as storage for later usage (in case you haven’t eaten in a while, or the world ends and there’s no more food, then your body planned ahead and has fat to be able to burn the make calories so you don’t starve to death). For every one gram of fat there is nine calories. Fat is necessary in a everyday diet, but there are fats that have benefits. Like nuts and fish have a lot of omega-3 fatty acids, but those are good for you and without excess promote weight loss.

Carbs is where it gets a little trickier. There are 2 types of carbs, simple (fast) and complex (slow). Every gram of either carb is worth 4 calories. Simple carbs or fast carbs is sugar. Sugar is immediately turned into usable calories (energy). Sugar is necessary and great for energy you’re going to use soon, but all excess is turned into complex carbs. Complex carbs or slow carbs is fiber and all other carbohydrates. Slow carbs give endurance, gives you “equal” energy throughout the day. Carbs help the most with hunger. Excess slow carbs get turned into fat for storage. Fiber is very necessary and good for you.

Last but not least are proteins. Proteins help with muscle structure and healing. I don’t think excess proteins turn into anything but its never good to abuse. When working out proteins should be the main part of your energy consumption, unless you’re a muscle monster on TV. then you would make slow carbs your mains source of energy (so you can work out all day with constant energy).

The last main metabolism accelerator is working out. Strength training (lifting weights) is the king of accelerators; then cardiovascular training (fast pace moving) in 2nd. 3rd, is stretching. Everything else you do in the day helps too but these are the ones you need to do to get your metabolism like race horse. The main point of working out isn’t speeding up your body (metabolism), its breaking muscle fibers and rebuilding them. When you work out your basically breaking muscle fibers, and when you’re not working out there rebuilding; that process of rebuilding is what makes muscles bigger stronger. You have to let your muscles repair though, so you should never work out the same muscle group twice in a row. While your muscles are repairing you should stretch. Stretching tones the muscle, forms it, and shapes it. And the cardio is great to burn calories, maintain a fast metabolism, and keep you in shape.

Going out to eat just is never healthy. What says low fat is sugar crazy and what is low carb, is full of fat. And what’s fat free and low carb is so processed that it’s not really food. It’s a gelatin with color and flavoring. So keep it natural, organic preferably (but it cost moreL).
Ok so, you’re probably thinking you’ll never see chocolate again. Well, it’s up to you. Cheating is tolerable, just don’t over do it, and don’t cheat often. I try to keep it under one cheat a week. Now when you cheat there are 3 things you have to consider. Is it processed or natural? What time is it? And how much am I going to cheat? If its processed take it real easy, real careful how much you eat (I would keep it under 200 calories) If it’s naturally fat or sugary then you can let go a little more. Make it more like a meal of cheating (like a nice fat hamburger w/ onion rings) A day of cheating is definitely excessive and not recommended if you truly want to achieve results.

What time of day also influences on your cheating. For example, if I want a chocolate bar I would have it as a snack but I wouldn’t eat a meal for 4 hours afterwards instead of 3. (An extra hour “relying” on the bar.) Same rule applies to a cheating meal (eat again 4-5 hours after cheating). I would also make sure that the meal prior and following to the cheat, is the complete opposite (completely low fat, low carb, super healthy). It also helps if you include your workout sometime after the cheat.

It’s also scientifically proven that stress and anger can directly affect your metabolism, immune system and nervous system. That means stress can make you fat, sick, and in pain. So live happy, don’t stress yourself. Take 15 minutes a day to just take deep breaths, relax, and if it doesn’t interfere with relaxing, plan out your day.

Now you’ve got down this far in my paper and your probably a little overwhelmed with info. But you have to believe in yourself and think positively. Look in the mirror, imagine what you want and where you want it, and then make it happen. But in reality, we start seeing some results, or somebody tells them good job with the working out and you tend to think “ok, I’m good” but you have to keep going. You’ll lose track of your goals if you start settling for what you have. But also vice versa, don’t over do it. Too skinny or too muscular is a horrible sight. So diet and exercise according to what your goals are.

Maintenance is easy. Once you’ve reached your goal or you want to take a break without losing what you worked for, you continue with the diet as much as possible. If you do continue dieting your workouts can be shorter (30 minutes or so, if not, then keep workouts at 45 to 60). Do mostly cardio, just to keep the metabolism fast, and burn calories. If your losing muscle or don’t want to lose strength, include a strength training in there; but you don’t have to workout everyday, maybe 2 or 3 times a week. Yoga and stretching are still recommended while in maintenance so you don’t lose flexibility.

As a final comment I also recommend to have sex. Yeah that’s right, lots of sex. Even if it’s self inflicted the benefits can still be cashed in. (I know AWESOME!) The releases of a large number of endorphins in your brain (you know from what!J) cause your body to not only accelerate its metabolic rate but it also releases amino acids and vitamins into your blood stream; the effect is a faster/stronger muscle rebuild.