Burn fat in your sleep

By mid-December, most of us are short on time and energy-yet we'd still love to slim down a bit before Santa arrives. Is there a realistic way to make it happen? "Yes!" says 60 Seconds to Slim author Michelle Schoffro Cook, Ph.D., who is sharing holiday-friendly hacks proven to rev metabolism 24/7. "That means burning more fat even as we sleep," she says. Readers who've tested just one or two of her hacks report shedding 1 to 2 pounds a week with no special diet. And Schoffro Cook adds that the strategies tend to soothe inflammation inside our body, which helps release water weight. The bottom line: With minimal effort, we can truly drop a pant size by Christmas Eve!

- ALLISON NEMETZ

Turns out, burning fat while we sleep “is actually a very natural process,” says Schoffro Cook.

Even in slumber, our bodies need lots of fuel for maintenance and repair. When we first doze off, we burn blood sugar; but once it’s gone, we shift into a state called ketosis and are fueled almost entirely by fat. Good news: You don’t have to be on a keto diet for ketosis to happen—though Schoffro Cook does suggest cutting carbs you don’t care about (say, pretzels or candy canes). Because eating fewer carbs will reduce blood-sugar production, allowing you to enter ketosis and start burning fat sooner. And that’s just for starters. Schoffro

Cook adds that you can also experiment with any or all of the following strategies shown to boost resting metabolism. “That means they increase the number of calories your body burns to sustain itself,” she says. So you’ll blast through blood sugar and spend more of the night and early morning hours “burning through your fat stores and dropping extra pounds!”

5 easy ways to supercharge your metabolism as you snooze

1. Sip the best tea

If you’ve ever had tea at a Chinese restaurant, there’s a good chance it was oolong—a brew made from tea leaves that are wilted in the sun to create a rich, mellow flavor halfway between green and black tea. Oolong has a unique blend of compounds that do some pretty slimming things, like helping the body control blood sugar more easily.