Try These Tricks to Burn More Calories

Embarking on a diet and constantly watching what you eat isn’t the only way to reduce the number of calories you burn. Everyday hacks that you can incorporate seamlessly into your day can also help. Here are 7 of the best ways to boost your metabolism and burn more calories in the process.

Drink coffee

It may be something that features throughout your working day anyway but drinking that extra cup of coffee might actually be a good thing when it comes to burning more calories. That’s because coffee increases your resting metabolic rate, which means it increases the number of calories burnt while you rest. An 8-ounce cup of coffee can help you burn an extra 75-100 calories.

Get more sleep

We all know just how important a good night’s sleep is, but its impact on metabolism is huge. Poor, irregular sleep puts your body into a perpetual state of stress, which means hormones like cortisol and epinephrine flood your body. One of the many by-products of this surge of hormones is weight gain and a sluggish metabolism. Not only that but lack of sleep also causes you to make poorer choices come morning, meaning you’re more likely to veer off your healthy eating track and instead crave sugary or fatty foods.

Extend your walk

Sometimes if we put too much pressure on ourselves to achieve a goal, it makes it harder than ever to accomplish it. Instead of forcing yourself to work out more times a week or go at it harder than ever, something simple like just extending your daily walk by a few minutes and increasing your step count can really help. Invest in a pedometer or gently track yourself using your watch and you’ll be pleasantly surprised by how much of a difference it can make. Even aiming to take more steps than you did the previous day is a great place to start.

Take walking calls

Being sedentary at your desk is so easily done but so damaging when it comes to weight gain and metabolism. To break the pattern of all-day sitting, make a plan to take all your calls while walking around, whether that’s outside or just up and down the stairs in your house. If you can’t manage that, try and take regular five-minute breaks every hour.

Switch off and relax

Being perpetually stressed is a sure-fire way to hold on to more weight and, in women in particular, it’s often stored around your abdomen. Try and combat feelings of stress and anxiety by plotting things you enjoy doing in your calendar. Even better if it’s something that involves movement, which will keep your cortisol levels in check long-term and promote the burning of calories.

Add some spice

Spicy food boosts your metabolism by increasing your heart rate and producing heat in the body, which in turn causes you to burn more calories. Add chilli flakes to your soups, sprinkle some spicy seeds over your salad or add unsweetened chilli sauce to your stir fries.

Fidget more

It might have been something you got told off at school for doing, but fidgeting is a great way to surreptitiously burn off some extra calories. Even something as simple as tapping your feet or not sitting still in your chair can work – every little helps, and you could burn up to 350 more calories a day that someone who sits completely still.