The body needs to burn fat to have energy and prevent weight gain. However, the most common fat-burning activities, like regular exercise and diet, don’t seem enjoyable and appealing to some people. If you’re challenged to follow through on your weight loss efforts, you can always start slowly and make baby steps to gain positive results. Here are some simple changes you can make today to help your body burn fat faster and facilitate weight loss.
“Weight loss can change your whole character. That always amazed me: Shedding pounds does change your personality. It changes your philosophy of life because you recognize that you are capable of using your mind to change your body.” – Jean Nidetch
Here Are 4 Simple Changes That Make Your Body Burn Fat Faster
1. Follow A Time-Restricted Feeding (Trf) Routine
Time-restricted feeding enables you to eat whatever you want, provided you have your meals and snacks between a set number of hours only. This kind of diet follows a similar concept to intermittent fasting, where you eat at certain times of the day and, more importantly, skip the midnight snacks.
So, if you have your breakfast at 7 a.m. and eat your last meal for the day at 5 p.m., you can help your body to burn fat and lose weight faster. A study found in the Journal of Nutritional Science proved that time-restricted feeding actually works to help with weight loss.
For 10 weeks, researchers followed and studied the eating habits of 16 volunteers. The first group ate their breakfast 90 minutes after waking up and had dinners 90 minutes earlier than usual. The second group followed their normal eating hours.
The group that had a shorter window of hours for eating had lost more body fat at the conclusion of the study. Apparently, their eating schedule helped curbed their appetite and discouraged them from snacking after dinner.
However, time-restricted feeding will work best for people with set routines or who do not have demanding work, family, and social obligations. If you have a challenging schedule, your body might not successfully respond to this style of eating.
2. Reduce Sugar And Starch In Your Diet
The human body needs carbohydrates for energy and protection from disease risks. Carbohydrates are one of the most essential macronutrients, along with protein and fat. However, too many carbohydrates in the body, which breaks down into sugar and starch when digested, can lead to weight gain and other problems linked to obesity. So, as per health experts’ advice, you need to burn carbohydrates through physical activities or cut down on your food intake.
A study in the Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism showed how obese women effectively lost weight after cutting some carbs from their diet. They also reduced their appetite without feeling hunger pangs.
Ideally, a person with average weight and height need 225 to 325 grams of carbohydrates every day, as per Mayo Clinic. This should meet the 45 to 65 percent of calories the body needs to maintain optimum health. Anything beyond this amount and you’ll likely get fat, but anything less might also make your body susceptible to health problems.
3. Eat (Rather Than Drink) Fruits To Keep Your Stomach Fuller
Do you love to drink naturally juiced fruits? Proponents of juicing believe that the body absorbs vitamins and nutrients in the liquid form better and faster, yet there are no concrete studies to support these claims.
However, one study published in the journal Appetite proved that eating whole fruits before a meal can make your stomach fuller and more satiated so you wouldn’t have the tendency to overeat. So, the experts recommend that you should try to eat rather than drink fruits.
If you’re not fond of eating whole fruits, however, then juicing could be the next best thing. You can even include juicing vegetables in your daily glass. There are loads of fruit and vegetable juicing recipes online that will appeal to your taste buds. If you don’t like juicing, you can also try blending fruits and vegetables, which retain more fiber and phytonutrients than juicing.
Fruits and vegetables are effective in helping you burn fat because these foods are low in calories but rich in vitamins and minerals.
4. Try Doing Intense One-Minute Workouts
No time for exercise? Experts at McMaster University in Canada learned that you don’t need to spend hours of time working out to lose weight and get fit because doing a minute of intense workout may bring the same benefits as a 45-minute moderate exercise.
In their study, published in the journal PLOS One, the experts followed 27 sedentary men for 12 weeks. They were divided into groups that either did intense training or moderate workouts, while one group did not do any exercises at all. The men that did 20-second sprints every day become more physically fit after the study compared to the men who had 10 to 15 minutes of exercises and warm-ups in their routine three times a week.
The findings pointed out that it’s possible to burn fat faster and benefit from a quick run up and down a flight of stairs during lunch breaks at work. However, intense exercises might not be advisable for those with physical conditions, such as a heart problem. If you plan to do this, get a clearance from a doctor first.
Final Thoughts
Don’t be discouraged if you don’t see immediate results when you start implementing these four simple things. The effects won’t happen overnight but with positive thinking and consistency, you will soon reap the benefits of changing your lifestyle to improve your body’s health and wellness.
