I’ve got some pretty cool human facts for you today.

They have to do with your metabolism and I hope at least one of them leaves you feeling empowered!

It’s tempting to think of your metabolism as something you can “turn up” or “turn down” … but the fact is, metabolism is a complicated process that happens in your cells – and the more cells you have, the faster your metabolism.

(Random fact: the average person has 30 trillion cells! That’s a lot of cells … and a lot of metabolism.)

The biggest chunk of your calorie burn (aka your metabolism) happens just to keep you alive – it’s known as your BMR, your basal metabolic rate. BMR can vary a LOT between people. Older we get slower metabolism we get unless we do something about it.

Some things that impact your BMR are things you can’t control – genetics, gender, and more (we’ll get into some of this later).

But there’s actually a lot you CAN do to turn up your metabolism even if you are over 40, and it has to do with your body composition.

I like to think of these ‘metabolic boosters’ like compound interest … it’s not going to make you rich overnight, but over time, it adds up in a big way!

Here it is …

while you’re resting. That’s triple the amount of a pound of fat, which comes in at about 2 calories a day.

So, 10 pounds of fat would burn 20 calories a day, while 10 pounds of muscle would burn 60. Not that impressive.

But over a year, 10 pounds of muscle burns 21,900 calories (a little over 6 pounds), while 10 pounds of fat burns 7,300 calories in a year (around 2 pounds).

That means workouts that build your muscles – whether it’s old-school bodybuilding workouts, or fitness workouts that include weights – have a double-whammy effect!

Not only are you burning calories WHILE you’re doing them, but you get a BONUS burn in the future as you build muscle! Pretty cool, right?

Want to get even MORE tactical?

The American College of Sports Medicine recommends that if you want to build muscle, on top of adding resistance training to your workouts, you should eat 1.2 to 1.7 grams of protein per kg of body weight per day – which equals 0.5 to 0.8 grams per pound of body weight.

If you need help to start building muscles, burn fat and lose weight without going to the public gym and not spending too much money on a gym membership that you never use or big $$$ for a personal trainer, I am inviting you to try my live-streaming fitness classes for women over 40.

You get 7 days free with the access of over 120 hours of classes. Live Streaming fitness classes are delivered fully online in our closed Facebook group. When you join the class, you will be doing what my class is doing in realtime or on replay if you can’t attend in real time. My classes are not staged and have real women who are trying to get fit, lose weight and feel full of energy. If you are interested, you can request to join here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/livefitnessclasses.

Make it a fit day!

Lilia, Nutritionist & Fitness Coach.