Fat is like your mother-in-law, you don’t like it, you don’t want it, but you still have to have it. Large amount of body fat is not only unhealthy(except a few), but it also makes you unattractive.
You might have read many articles that claims they have 101 or 1001 ways to burn fats. But, does it ever work. I don’t think so. Instead of knowing 1 million not-so-effective fat burning techniques, you need to know only a few that really works.
All the tricks and tips I’ll be mentioning in this list, I have tried on my own and I have seen results. It is not a guide quick fix guide; using these natural and healthy fat burning techniques, it will take a little time to get their, but you’ll eventually.
Use Food to burn fat
Essential fatty acids
Essential fatty acids are fats that can’t be made by food. The only way to get them is through food. Example, Omega-3 and Omega-6.
Essential fatty acids not only keeps your health healthy, but they are one of the most important foods to increase testosterone level in the body. Increased level of testosterone helps in burning fat.
Eat frequently
Try to eat frequently. If you keep long gaps between meals, it puts your body on starvation mode. The body start using the minimum amount of energy it can survive on. And, that is not good if you want to burn fat.
Anti-calorie food
It takes more energy to digest anti-calorie food than they provide. Suppose, 100 grams of grapefruit provides 10 unit calories, but it will take 20 unit calorie to digest and utilize it. So, the more you eat anti-calorie food the more you burn fat.
Do not eat too much carbs
There is very limited space for storage of carbohydrate, and when you eat too much carbs, your body starts converting carbs into fat. And, this fat is also stored in normal fat cells.
Eat to decrease cortisol
Cortisol is also known as stress hormone. It increases when your stress increase. The level the cortisol is inversely proportional to the level of testosterone. The more cortisol you have the less testosterone will be produced in your body. Dark chocolate, olive oil and oats are some example of foods that decrease cortisol level.
Eat protein
Your body uses lots of energy to synthesis protein. The energy comes from fat stored in the body. Apart from that, protein is also essential for producing testosterone. And, the muscle build by protein helps us to lose fat ever more. We’ll see later.
Exercise to burn fat
Weight Lifting
There is a perception that cardio/aerobic helps in losing fat more than weight lifting. In fact a study done in Harvard says that weight training helps lose burn more fat that aerobic done for the equal amount of time. Do less reps with more weights, that is the mantra. It is seen that strength and weight training burns fat even 3-4 hours after workout.
Walking vs. Running
Many people walk for miles thinking it is very healthy for them. But, it is not true at all and in fact it can be bad for your health too. In is seen that slow walking for a long time can bring down the level of growth hormone, which is very essential to lose fat and build muscles.
An old person or a person with heart issues can go with walking, but except that, it is better to run. A good sprint for a few minutes not only burn fat in great quantity but also helps in increasing the basal metabolic rate.
Test your limits
If you can life 100 pounds easily, then no matter how much times you lift it, it won’t benefit you much.
Always complete the last reps of a set. Those 2-3 reps at the end of a set will benefit you much more than the entire remaining set. It will help producing more growth hormone and burn lots of fat.
Work legs
The logic is simple, the large the muscle the more energy will be spent to use. By that sense, legs have the biggest muscles; quads, hamstrings, calves.
Unless you sprint heavily, only running won’t work on all these muscles. In general, do compound exercises to increase testosterone level and burn fat.
Change lifestyle to decrease fat
Be mobile
This is especially useful if you don’t workout. People with office jobs sit all day at the same place. And, if there is no physical activity, there is no fat loss.
Even if you don’t have space or will to move around, you can just stand.
A research conducted by BBC claimed that people who stand more on weekdays tend to burn more fat and it is a healthy habit. Make it a habit to walk while you talk on phone.
Walk don’t travel
Have you ever met someone who travel by car to the gym to walk on treadmill? Our ancestors were much healthier because they did a lot of physical activity, doing day to day tasks.
Next time to visit a friend or market, go by walk or use a bicycle. These small efforts will sum up to make a huge difference. Don’t use elevator. Go to mall to shop rather than buying stuff online all the time.
Conclusion :: Ways to burn fat
From my experience, I can say, most of the people start a fat burning regime but don’t stick to it for a long time. The reason is simple. They don’t see results. Like, if you are going from point A to Point B, if you keep on seeing milestones after every mile or so. It will keep you motivated, but if there is not a single mile stone, except a few, most of people will get disappointed and demoralized.
The point to be taken here is that you need visual rewards in order to continue with your fat burning journey, till the end. So, your primary goal should not be getting slim, it should be working hard to make a distinguishable change.
And, once you start seeing the results(the milestones), you’ll be filled with more confidence and energy and from there the path of getting slim will be smooth and “relatively” easy.
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