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Oh Pure, Effortless Calorie Burns…
January is coming to an end. The novelty of your weight loss New Year’s resolution is wearing off. You need some motivation to keep yourself on track. Believe it or not, there are things you are doing every day to burn calories that you probably don’t realize.2/11
Laughing
Aside from just feeling good, laughing has some real health benefits. Laughter causes your heart rate to rise anywhere from 10 to 20 percent. The result is a calorie burn of anywhere from 10-40 calories if you can keep it up for 10 to 15 minutes. (source: Livestrong.com)
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Sleeping
Ah the joy of sleeping! Remember the days when we could lay in bed for hours on end. OK, well snap out of it because now you’re lucky if your kids will let you sleep past 7 a.m.
As if you really needed any motivation to get more sleep, it’s nice to know that your body burns anywhere from 40-100 calories PER HOUR while sleeping. (source: Health Status)4/11
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Shopping
Need some incentive to shop? We didn’t think so, but now you can at least justify it, because 38 minutes of shopping will burn 100 calories. This is old school going to the store shopping, not online shopping. (source: SparkPeople)5/11
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Do Nothing
Your body will burn calories even if you do absolutely nothing. A simple rule of thumb is to take your body weight in pounds and multiply it by 11…that’s how many calories your body will burn per day doing nothing at all. (source: Fitness Blender)6/11
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Breastfeeding
While not exactly considered effortless, we’ll gladly accept the added bonus of weight loss/calorie burning that comes with breastfeeding. On average you can expect to burn anywhere from 300-500 calories per day. (source: Women’s Health Magazine)7/11
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Brushing Your Teeth
The average woman will burn 12.6 calories per day brushing her teeth. That assumes you brush for 2 minutes, twice a day. Want to burn more calories? Brush more often. Fresh breath and extra calories burned! (source: About.com)8/11
Kissing
It’s going to take more than a little peck. A passionate, fully engaged, makeout session type kiss can burn 8-16 calories per smooch. Don’t wait for Valentine’s Day to start burning your kissing calories! (source: CNN)
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Carrying Your Baby
Burn calories and tone your arms at the same time by carrying a small baby. You’ll burn 136 calories in one hour. Who carries a baby for one hour straight? Well, that depends on how loudly it’s crying. But in truth, you can add up your minutes throughout the day and they still count toward that calorie burn. (source: Calorie Lab)10/11
Washing Dishes
This chore is a necessary evil, so you might as well get a bit of a calorie burn out of it. An average woman will burn about 41 calories washing dishes for 30 minutes. (source: Fit Day)
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Showering
An average woman will burn about 75 calories in a 15 minute shower. You’re practically washing the calories away. The odds of a mom getting a 15 minute shower don’t seem very likely, but if you can manage to shower at night this could be a very luxurious and relaxing way to burn calories
