What's a Basal Metabolism?

Just as an addendum to BrookeM's... drop too far below that, and your body will start doing 3 things

1) Throw the breaks on your metabolism / hoarding every single calorie
2) Resulting in weightgain
3) Start eating itself (resulting in flab initially, then organ damage)

Conversely, increase your calorie load and your exercise/output and your body will up it's metabolic rate.

This is an aspect to dieting / weightloss / eating / exercising that a lot of people don't get.

EX2) Anorexic eating 400 calories a day, and doing strenuous exercise for 6 hours a day can easily be GAINING weight every month

EX2) Athlete eating 12,000 calories a day, and doing strenuous exercise for 6 hours a day can be struggling to keep the weight on because they keep LOSING weight

The real trick is to NOT be in deficit NOR in great excess. Deficit tell your body there's something wrong with the food supply and your body starts hoarding. Great excess and your body starts packing on batteries (fat is 'just' stored energy).

Instead, keep providing your body exactly what it needs (or as close as possible) and it will start doing a few things

1) Increase resting and active metabolism
2) Get 'lazy' with it's energy storage (aka fat)
3) Start resetting baseline 'normal' weight

On the surface... maintain at 1472, decrease & lose, increase and gain... for VERY brief periods of time. The decrease and GAIN, increase and LOSE.

So many many people yo-yo with mini starvations (be decreasing calories or increasing exercise without matching nutritional content), and then splurge, and they yo yo in a gradually increasing line, fighting to stay 'x' weight.

If you're 'fighting' you're doing it wrong. Or you have a medical issue (often hormonal). It's a slower process of upping your metabolism, but it means you don't spend all your life fighting your body, and slipping, and diving back in, and, and, and.

Don't know, but wiki does! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basal_metabolism

so it means to maintain the weight you are at now you need to eat 1472 calories a day. If you eat too much more than that you will start to gain. Eat less than that each day and you will lose weight.

I am a Registered Dietitian (RD). As others mentioned your basal metabolic rate (BMR) approximates your energy (calories/ Kcal) requirements to sustain basic functions; the formula varies with body size and gender. The BMR calculation for obese individuals (which does not include you!) must be modified as adipose (fat) tissue is not as metabolically active as lean body mass; ie "muscle burns more calories than fat" and the BMR can be vastly overestimated. An "activity factor" multiplyier is used to estimate daily caloric requirements: 1.2 for bed bound individuals, 1.3 for sedentary/low physical activity, and 1.5 for healthy, active individuals. An very active althete would have higher factor; caloric needs are also increased for several conditions including wound healing, infections and burns.
Based on your BMR of 1472 your daily caloric need would be of about 1900 kcal/day with minimal physical activity and 2200 kcal/day if moderately active to maintain your current weight. If weight loss is desired, a reasonable caloric "deficit" must occur; either by reduced oral intake or increased physical activity. Ideally, a combination of both is desirable. I don't recommend a daily caloric intake below 1600 calories/day. To lose a one pound, a 3,500 calorie "deficit" is required. If you are moderately active and consume 1800 calories/day ( a "realistic" diet), you should be able to recognize a .5-1 pound weekly weight loss; more if you increase your activity level. It does not appear to me that you are overweight! My intent is that my comments may be helpful to you and others.

Its basically your resting metabolism. This means the amount of calories you need to sustain metabolic activity (heart beat, breathing, cellular activity) if you never get out of bed in the morning. In other words what you body needs to function well if you don't factor in exercise or activity. Its generally the amount of calories you should not drop below when dieting or your body thinks its starving. It is incorrect that eating only your basal metabolism will result in weight maintenance, since we all generally move every day.

Its how many calories you need to survive. This is without activity of any kind. Its how many calories your body burns beating your heart, breathing, etc.