It doesn’t sound very pleasant but you may change your mind when you realize that some research shows 10 to 15 minutes of shivering can provide the same fat burning benefits as an hour of moderate exercise.

Your body contains two different types of fat: brown fat and white fat. White fat stores excess calories and makes you appear overweight, but brown fat actually burns calories on your body. You want to have more brown fat and less white fat. Exposure to cold helps increase brown fat.

One of the researchers in this study is endocrinologist Dr Paul Lee from Sydney's Garvan Institute. He has been taking cold showers for six years as part of his study of brown fat.

Being exposed to temperatures cold enough to make you shiver raises the levels of two hormones in your body called FGF21 and irisin. These hormones also increase when we exercise. According to Dr Lee, "In essence, this is a hormone system which allows muscle and fat to communicate and in this process the hormones are capable to convert ordinary fat cells into beneficial brown fat cells".

How much you weigh is determined by way more than just how much you eat and the exercise you do. Hormones have the greatest influence over your body weight, your hunger level and how much satisfaction you derive from a meal. People with insulin resistance usually experience much more hunger and they gain weight even from eating small portions of food. A low carbohydrate diet, fasting and exercise all help to correct the hormones that make a person insulin resistant. The herbal extract berberine gets to the core of insulin resistance. It helps to reduce elevated insulin, blood fats and blood sugar.

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