Put More Protein In Your Diet

Muscle it. If you are lifting weights, turn up the heat. If you haven't started then get to know a few dumbbells. It's proven how muscle burns calories all the day long, and weight training can give your metabolism a nice shove.

Switch up your calorie intake. For those of you who are religious about your calories, give it up. Better to eat a low calorie few days followed by higher calorie days. Try to keep them "healthy" calories, but you could go 2,000 for a few days and then drop down to 1,200-1,500. You avoid your body getting into a "comfort zone.

Play around with your daily diet. You may be having bad (allergic) reactions to some foods you're eating. Believe it or not we are all pretty much allergic to wheat on some level. See how you feel by taking out the three largest culprits: wheat, sugar, and dairy. I know, not fun but do you want to make a change?

Put more protein in your diet. Protein makes you feel full, satisfied and helps increase your metabolism. A few studies have shown that people who eat more protein tend to eat less food. It's a lot of work to digest protein so you are making that body work when you eat protein. The work is what jacks up your metabolism.

Look at everything that goes into your mouth. We drink 21 percent of our calories, and we may be consuming a lot of those "hidden culprits." Bread? One of the highest glycemic foods out there. What does that mean? Converts to sugar in the body. For you , calories. Take a look at all the little innocent foods and liquids and make sure you are not getting hammered calorically by them.

Step up the pace. Running? Throw your body a curve ball by doing sprints. You can even do this in the gym on your beloved treadmill or stairmaster. If you are on level 1 go to 3; instead of level 4, hit 6. Throw in some backward sprints on the elliptical. Try two minutes forward with 30 seconds backward sprints. Mix it up.

Look at the entire picture. Examine all areas of your life that influence your health and waist line. Sleep: Are you getting enough? If you don't, you can't recover and that will add to the load put on your hormonal system in your body.

Stress? Number one bad guy. Please do yourself a favor and minimize the stress wherever you can. Take a bubble bath, a long quiet walk, meditate, go to church and say a heart-felt prayer, go blow off some steam with some friends and have a laugh. Whatever is your way to "unload," get rid of that stuff. Even better, when a stressful situation is happening, ask yourself "is it worth it for me to get edgy?"