Phone apps, magazines, sports stores and speciality apparatus offer a wide variety of calorie counting gadgets and devices. You can attach them onto your wrist or ankle or simply just carry your phone while you go about your every day life. You will then usually sum up (as this is what I used to do) what you can treat yourself to afterwards. But is this the way forwards or backwards?
Now one size does not fit all, many people fail to realise that just how many calories the body needs in order to stay alive and function properly. A whopping 5o-70% of calories that we consume are used to generate the heat and life energy keep your cells turned on – thats not cleaning the house or shooting a few hoops to stay alive. This is called your Resting, Metabolic Rate, or R.M.R. Another 5-15% of your calorie intake is needed for digestion and elimination. You also need to consider your daily activities and energy expenditure. This is based on several hormonal and environmental factors.
We are all different and interpret different environmental and stressor factors in different ways. When we are eating according to our metabolic type we convert food into energy more efficiently. This means you’ll expend or dissipate more of the energy you take on board, leaving less to store onboard.
When we follow fad diets or eat incorrectly for our metabolic type, our blood sugar is disrupted , energy production is depleted and our cells slow down because your meal is causing stress on the body instead of aiding in smooth operation. There will also be more waste material left behind form eating incorrectly, which is often toxic to the body and usually get stored in fat cells to protect the liver while it catches up.
There are a number of requirements of running your body and keeping it healthy. Be aware that anytime you run your body without adequate nutrient dense food, you drastically increase your chances of slowing your metabolism and becoming fat. Each of us responds to stressors differently. Our calorific and energy expenditure will depend upon relationship challenges, responses to weather changes and many other factors too.
You are when you eat.
Few people understand the link between what they eat and their health. What people think is healthy is probably not. Starting the day off with some sort of grain including toast, bagel, cereal and a coffee, then a sandwich or wrap for lunch is not optimal for the body to function let alone the brain. This will leave your biggest meal of the day to the evening. Eating full breakfast especially rich in protein will give you the energy, efficiency to think, react, make better decisions and move all day.
Really important – if you don’t like the way you look, then you are out of balance and have the opportunity to change it. Eating snacks between meals will constantly reassure your body that energy and nutrition are on board, which often results in elevated metabolism. The body’s metabolism is also elevated by eating, simply because the process of digestion, utilisation and elimination of food is at work for the body.
When you eat regularly and only snack as needed, your metabolic rate will achieve the set point and you will achieve the genetic shape that you want.
The word breakfast means eating after your nightly fast. The highest rates of cortisol are between 6-9am. This means that your metabolism is stimulated and your cells are ready to eat after its nightly fast. For most women who want to elevate their metabolic rate, you should eat a large breakfast composing of as much as 25% of the daily calorie intake. If you’re a carb type on the metabolic typing protocol, a smaller breakfast may be sufficient. Carb type or not, all breakfast should include the macro nutrients – proteins, carbs and fats.
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“Eat, move and be healthy’- Paul Chek