Burning calories doesn’t have to bet torturous and hard. You can increase your burning up to 3000 calorie daily without jogging, swimming or aerobic exercise. I’d even say the methods offered here are more effective than these while at the same time more time- consuming.
Walking is great for you and commonly underestimated. Regular walking – one hour at a 5km/60 minutes speed – burns 350 calories – to compare it with one hour of jogging at a 10km/60 minutes run which burns 750 calories (nearly twice the amount). Yet, you can keep walking for hours easily while sustained running at the speed above would be impossible for a new jogger. A brisk half an hour walk daily is really good for you – gentle on the joints, pleasant and rejuvenating. Walking is also easy to implement – simply walk to a shop in a mid-distance to your home, get off from public transport one stop before your work, walk the steps instead of riding the lift etc. – this can burn 500 calories a day and we won’t even feel this.
A relatively obscure but wildly effective activity is burning by small movements. Some people are flabbergasted that they weight gain or loss doesn’t happen according to their expectations. The 300 calories in small activity per day is the key. To compare two polarities – a active, jittery even, person will burn much more (even up to 400 calories) than a complete couch potato. Small movements can easily burn the extra 150 calories.
Wearing moderate to light clothing rather than wrapping up is another secret. Do not wrap up – move around! The body will burn calories to keep you warm. Do not overdo this though, for example in the winter, as the body will start storing fat to ensure your survival. This is more about wearing moderate clothing indoors while sedentary.
Let’s have a look: evening walk – 350 cal. Walking instead of driving: 500 cal. Small activities: 150 cal. Moderate layers of clothing brings us to the total of 1150 calorie burn. We did not even lace our running shoes up! To compare, running a 21 km distance with good results burns about 1600 calories. Surely, such result won’t come straight away – again, by baby steps, introduce the suggested changes and avoid the urge to self- deceive.
High Intensity Interval Training is a good albeit tiring method of exercise. One does low and high intensity exercises one after another, for example walking-running/cycling on a stationary bike. The issue here is the subconscious desire to reduce intensity of the high intensity part of the training. For example – a twenty minute routine of cycling at full speed for 8 seconds and slowly for 12. Another routine consists of 30 seconds of sprinting with 3-4 minutes of rest. Exercise 3-4 times a week and start with the lowest possible intensity – this training is much more effective than than regular jogging or cycling. Main issue here is the high risk of injury and its high level of difficulty.
I am not going to harp on about the each of the “traditional” calorie burning activity – everyone is free to choose what suits him best. Swimming is pleasant as it’s gentle on the joints. Running technique is vital in jogging as landing on the heel is disastrous for the knees and spine; one should land on mid-sole but this requires strong, well-trained calves and Achilles tendons which won’t happen over a month – especially when somebody is overweight. Weight-lifting gym exercises DO NOT burn calories – after an hour-worth of a punishing workout only 350 calories are burnt. Doing YouTube cardio and aerobic exercises will burn much more than toning and sculpting routines like sit-ups of all kinds.
Finally, a trick that has nothing to do with calorie burning but which can ensure vibrant health without any effort. Being sedentary is the worst thing you can do. A sedentary person is endangering their health as much as a smoker. Long-term inactivity contributes to falling levels of fat-burning enzymes. Clogged arteries, lowered immunity, increased risk of cancer, metabolic changes or diabetes ensue. Prevention is super easy – move a little bit, jump or hop for a little while every hour – 2-3 minutes will wake up the metabolism and enzyme secretion mechanisms.