Today’s health coaching tip comes from Ruth Loregio. This one really resonates with me as I recently fractured my foot as wasn’t able to run for two months! Given that running has been an almost daily activity for me for the last 15 years, it was a really hard experience.

However, some good often comes from bad experiences, and I was forced to try different exercises. I hired a personal trainer and starting strength-training my upper body – which is now a new daily habit which I am really enjoying.

Here’s Ruth’s insight for you:

‘Weight train. Muscle tissue eats up 5x’s as many calories as any other tissue in the body. It’s the first tissue to go in a time of starvation or famine because it is so expensive for the body to continually maintain. If you have more muscle mass on your body (even just a little) you will burn more calories while doing activities such as watching TV.

So don’t stop eating as a weight loss plan and put your body into starvation mode. Because your muscle tissue will be lost first and weight loss will become that much harder when you return to regular eating. So go pump some iron, even a little.’