How Boost Your Metabolism

Stand up. Now walk. You have just had a positive effect on your metabolism. Standing and walking take more energy than sitting. 

The next question is: how much standing and walking are needed to create change in your metabolism? We’ve written an entire book to answer that question but here are some brief ideas.

Take breaks from sitting

Taking breaks from sitting re-sets the five measures of metabolism of the body improving cholesterol, triglycerides, waistline, blood sugar and blood pressure.

How often? In general those who take the most breaks during the day had better biomarkers for metabolism and a lessened risk for heart disease and diabetes. Even standing up for one minute might help lower the risk for metabolic syndrome notes researcher Dr. Geraldine Healy.

Preferable is taking a break in sitting every 20 minutes of two minutes with movement or walking in place. Not only is metabolism elected but so too are muscles, tendons and joints stretched out of place by sitting too much. 

Fidgeting

It turns out that the positives and negatives of sitting are not as simple as counting time spent doing it. What one does while sitting is important too. Research suggests fidgeting while sitting may be beneficial to metabolism.

According to one study, “Fidgeting is typically defined as involving small movements, especially of the hands and feet, often through nervousness, restlessness, or impatience. … The current results suggest that more complex movements of the hands and feet may be important to measure, in addition to level of physical activity (sitting time).”

Fidgeting expends more calories than sitting still—118 calories an hour versus 80. Calorie consumption is linked to metabolism with more calories indicating more demand on metabolism. Research results showing sitting while reading or using a computer is less impactful on metabolism. It could be the benefit of intellectual stimulation while sitting.

Previous research about fidgeting while sitting showed those who sit motionless consume 80 calories an hour while those who fidget while sitting consume 118

Take steps to be impact metabolism

For every 1,000 steps taken during or 30 minutes of lifestyle activities of daily living (cooking, washing dishes, ironing, and other routine tasks at home or work done while standing or walking), there is a reduced risk for elevated measures of metabolism. 

• Reduces the risk of elevated triglycerides by15%

• Reduces the risk of low HDL (good cholesterol) by 12%

• Reduces the risk of elevated waist circumference (more than 40” for men and 35” for women) by 16%

• Reduces the risk of metabolic syndrome by 13%

(People with metabolic syndrome (abnormal measurements for three of the five metabolic biomarkers) are two to three times as likely to develop cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes; twice as likely to suffer a heart attack or stroke and more than three times as likely to die early from those causes. Those with metabolic risk factors in middle age have poorer cognitive function, suggestive of dementia or Alzheimer’s later in life.)

• No association was found between lifestyle minutes or steps and levels of blood pressure or glucose.

Lessen uninterrupted sitting time especially television watching time
Consider how much time you spend sitting while watching television, talking or texting on the cell phone, playing video games or surfing the Internet. 

One study found that each hour of television viewing increases the risk of metabolic syndrome by: 21% for women and 26% for men.

Another study found that men with more than four hours per day screen time (television, computer, playing video games) outside of work have:

• 94% higher odds (virtually double) of having metabolic syndrome
• 88% higher odds of elevated waist circumference
• 84% higher odds of low high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C)
• 55% higher odds of high blood pressure
• 32% higher odds of elevated glucose

Compared to women who sit less than 1 hour per day watching television and using the computer outside of work, those who sit more than 4 hours per day and do not exercise have a 54% higher odds of metabolic syndrome.

Un-Sit Your Life http://tinyurl.com/un-sit-your-life