Thank you for all the positive feedback on the first week of the bodyblog. I am enjoying the process far more than I anticipated. It's fun to interact with my pals.
In two messages today, friends mentioned "fixing" their metabolism. Which means their metabolism must be broken. That's too bad, because I think that means they are dead. But I saw them on Facebook later, alive and well. which must mean their metabolism isn't broken! So that's good news. It probably just needs a tune up!
I hear a lot of people talking about "broken", "wrecked", and "destroyed" metabolisms that need to be "fixed", or "repaired." Maybe it is actually the case, but that's pretty gloomy if you ask me.
Hey, I'm no rocket gynecologist or anything. I don't have any data to back it up but that's the nice thing about "Bro-Science", It doesn't require it. Let's just assume that your metabolism isn't broken. It might just be running slow, or inefficient. If exercise and proper nutrition has been neglected, the metabolism might run a little slow. If you have over trained your system without proper nutrition, compromised your lean tissue, or been on a carb deficient diet, your body may be inclined to store more fat.
I think God did a fine job creating these machines that house our spirits. Hope is not lost, we can't wreck them that easily. They are highly adaptable. They miraculously repair themselves when we beat them up. They can also be trained and tuned to be fat burning machines, or fat storing machines.
When I was on the lazy dude's eggnog/fudge diet, my body began storing fat for the long Alaska winter. As quickly as I cut out sugar, grease, and Mt. Dew, and put a couple new habits in place, my body responded and the fat dripped off.
Three simple changes got mine tuned up.
1. Cut out sugar, white bread and anything fried. Eat protein every meal, veggies and slow carbs, (brown rice, oatmeal, whole wheat bread and beans.) I ate roughly the same amount of calories every meal. (400 cals or less for me.) Some women might require only half that. (I know that's not right, because when I speak for women, it's usually wrong. So if a woman will please leave a comment and correct me, that would be awesome! ) I am completely unqualified there. I'm also curious to know more.
2. Eat every 2-3 hours. Keeping carbs lower in the evening.
3. Do something physical 5x/week. Weight training not only shapes the body, but muscle will use up more calories. Do cardio, but don't get crazy with too much. 1/2 hr is good. Get a good sweat and get back to enjoying life.
I noticed a HUGE difference from these three things. My metabolism started to crank. But by far the most important component was the right fuel in the machine.
It might seem crazy to think your body will begin to burn more by eating six meals/day. Train your body to know it will be getting another sip of nourishment soon and it won't need to store.
If you're doing these things, then dig deeper, ask and read, and continue to tweak your training and diet. There are a lot of ways to get there.
Before I published this, I googled "Metabolic Damage" and the first article I found was excellent and loaded with real scientific explanations. It's a great topic, I'm going to continue to research.