Ways to increase metabolism?

[ANightDude]

I'm sort of stuck here... I'm not sure exactly what to do. I'm trying to get in shape for college in the next few months (end of August), trying to shed off the last few pounds, etc., and I'm really, really wanting to boost my metabolism. Are there any ways that I can do this?

Some of the ways I'm looking up confuse me to no end. Eat 5-6 small meals a day every 3 hours, some say. Which totally excludes dinner, lunch, and breakfast, which it also advises me to eat, and all this other advice that just loses me.

Has anyone had any experience? Just in terms of losing weight, metabolism, exercise, the works? What can I do and keep doing to make it work faster?

[Ridiculous]

Please be wary of any advice you read about raising metabolism and weight loss; 'metabolism' is a word that can be taken to mean a lot of different things apart from your base energy expenditure (which unfortunately is also known as your basal metabolic rate), even though this is what everyone takes it to mean. In its most basic form metabolism refers to how your body processes nutrients. Stating "eating a bag of raw sugar raises your metabolism" is correct in a way, because plain sugar is metabolised very quickly. Obviously this does not mean it is good weight loss advice.

The 5-6 small meals throughout the day advice is more likely to be effective because it discourages you from snacking rather than because it has any effect on your metabolism. Eating habits do have some effect on your metabolic rate, but that is usually when you are starving and your body is trying to conserve energy - eating more frequently will not have a significant effect on your metabolic rate, unless you were previously starving yourself.

If you want to increase your base energy expenditure then the best way to do it is to put on muscle, as the more mass you have the more energy needs to be used to maintain it. Anything else will either be infeasible, unsafe (such as keeping your body cold, requiring it to spend energy warming you up), or just plain pseudoscience.

[Foxywolf]

I find eating a lot of vegetables helps because I get full faster with less calories. Like I get these bags of frozen veggies and stir fry them with soy sauce (not oil). I also steam them and eat them with salsa sometimes. It usually helps, but its also useful for me that I really like vegetables, so it won't work for someone who despises them.

[dl72]

Exercising in the morning helps boost your metabolism throughout the day. Reduce unnecessary carbs and eat protein in each meal. You can eat 5 or 6 smaller meals instead of 3 large meals. Your bigger meals should be during the day, not dinner since you will be more active during the day.

[thylvin]

To eat many small meals is just one of the ways. But it also depends on what you eat when you eat the small meals. There is this thing called a Green Diet which boosts metabolism, which can only be followed for 2 weeks. No more than that. But it includes allot of green vegetables, white meat (fish or chicken) and so on. The green vegetables contains enzymes that help speed metabolism very quickly.

[flyinhernikes]

3 cups of green tea a day.
and when you sit down wiggle your leg or something so youre not sitting still still if you know what i mean and youre doing everything right by eating little and often

[TwoMethod]

Originally Posted by Ridiculous

Please be wary of any advice you read about raising metabolism and weight loss; 'metabolism' is a word that can be taken to mean a lot of different things apart from your base energy expenditure (which unfortunately is also known as your basal metabolic rate), even though this is what everyone takes it to mean. In its most basic form metabolism refers to how your body processes nutrients. Stating "eating a bag of raw sugar raises your metabolism" is correct in a way, because plain sugar is metabolised very quickly. Obviously this does not mean it is good weight loss advice.

The 5-6 small meals throughout the day advice is more likely to be effective because it discourages you from snacking rather than because it has any effect on your metabolism. Eating habits do have some effect on your metabolic rate, but that is usually when you are starving and your body is trying to conserve energy - eating more frequently will not have a significant effect on your metabolic rate, unless you were previously starving yourself.

If you want to increase your base energy expenditure then the best way to do it is to put on muscle, as the more mass you have the more energy needs to be used to maintain it. Anything else will either be infeasible, unsafe (such as keeping your body cold, requiring it to spend energy warming you up), or just plain pseudoscience.

+1

Forgive me for doing a +1 post, but Ridiculous's advice is really spot on.

(And as an aside, with regards to the keeping your body cold thing, I read a story about a guy who went to the Arctic for four months and lost several stone just because of the temperature regulation effects.)

[vyvance]

Drop soft-drinks and caffeine altogether. While this won't increase your metabolism by itself, it will augment other steps you take. Caffeine is much worse for you than the average person thinks, and really isn't something you want in your body.

[Aquilo]

To get in shape eat healthy and with variation, exercize and sleep well. To eat healthy, eat 3 times a day, drink water (not soft drinks, and not too much fruit juice, since that contains also lots of sugar), enough vegetables and eat tasty stuff and use variation in your meals (If your food tastes bad, you won't keep it up).

[KaraBulut]

The biggest "consumer" in metabolism is muscle. If you want to increase your metabolism, do aerobic exercise (running, walking, swimming), combined with resistance exercise (weight lifting, rowing, etc). Even when you are at rest, muscles consume energy, so people who exercise on a regular basis will maintain a higher metabolism all day- even when they are asleep.

[Lewis]

The only way that I've heard of is eating smaller meals, more frequently throughout the day. So have small meals every 2 hours or so I guess. Healthy meals though, meat and veg only (no pun intended).

[Zer0]

Didn't Bruce Lee have around 5 meals a day? 3 main meals and two healthy snacks, that raised his metabolism i believe.

[Ridiculous]

Originally Posted by Zer0

Didn't Bruce Lee have around 5 meals a day? 3 main meals and two healthy snacks, that raised his metabolism i believe.

Very little to no affect on your metabolism.

If you split your normal 3 meals up and spread them into 5 meals, or have 'planned snacks' rather than grazing between meals, then it usually results in you eating less overall, meaning less energy consumed, meaning less weight gained. Nothing to do with your metabolic processes.

If by some miracle of science you managed to somehow decrease your metabolic efficiency by changing what you eat (which is what people actually mean when they say 'metabolism' in these situations) then the extra energy that you burnt would be less than what you'd consume by going for a 5 minute run. It isn't worth bothering.

[Flow]

Originally Posted by Ridiculous

Please be wary of any advice you read about raising metabolism and weight loss; 'metabolism' is a word that can be taken to mean a lot of different things apart from your base energy expenditure (which unfortunately is also known as your basal metabolic rate), even though this is what everyone takes it to mean. In its most basic form metabolism refers to how your body processes nutrients. Stating "eating a bag of raw sugar raises your metabolism" is correct in a way, because plain sugar is metabolised very quickly. Obviously this does not mean it is good weight loss advice.

The 5-6 small meals throughout the day advice is more likely to be effective because it discourages you from snacking rather than because it has any effect on your metabolism. Eating habits do have some effect on your metabolic rate, but that is usually when you are starving and your body is trying to conserve energy - eating more frequently will not have a significant effect on your metabolic rate, unless you were previously starving yourself.

If you want to increase your base energy expenditure then the best way to do it is to put on muscle, as the more mass you have the more energy needs to be used to maintain it. Anything else will either be infeasible, unsafe (such as keeping your body cold, requiring it to spend energy warming you up), or just plain pseudoscience.

This guy knows his stuff lol.