How To Build Muscle: 4 Basic Principles

People in the gym and people I’ve trained come to me with questions about how to get bigger and they have their heads chock full of stuff that’s just misinformation.

When it comes to building muscle, there are many ways to do it right, and many more ways to do it wrong.

I want to give you some basic principles on how to build muscle the right way.

1. Progressive Overload

Your body and your muscles will adapt to whatever situation you put them under over a period of time.

That being said, in order to build muscle properly, you have to continue to overload it. Your muscles will adapt to the stress you put on them by getting stronger and sometimes bigger if you do it right.

Making gains week after week means you must continue to increase the load on your muscles in various ways.

This can be done by decreasing rest between sets, adding more reps, adding more weight, etc.

2. Progressive Variation

This isn’t “muscle confusion”. Your body builds neural pathways to your muscles to do the same motion efficiently. The more you do it, the better you get at it.

That being said, if you continue to do the same exercises week in and week out for the same muscle, you’ll see that your ability to do more weight will increase, but you won’t see growth.

Your body found an efficient way of doing the same motion so it didn’t need to get bigger anymore.

3. Rest

Yes, go to sleep. The mistake I see most people making when building muscle or doing any type of training is Overtraining. When it comes to jumping higher, running faster, or building muscle, less work is better.

You don’t build muscle in the gym. You tear it down there. You build muscle in your sleep and on your days off. While sleeping, your body repairs itself by releasing a lot of hormones it needs to repair muscles.

Building muscle properly requires that you get 8 to 9 hours of sleep each night for proper repair. Give your nervous system, hormonal system, and muscles time to recover.

4. Nutrition

You need the right amount of carbs, proteins, and right kinds of fats.

Your calorie requirements will depend on your weight, level of activity, body fat, and age mainly. So it’ll be about different for everyone.

First, find out the calorie surplus you need to build muscle, then make sure you get that amount each day in the right proportions of foods.

If you get these down and implement them correctly and consistently, you’ll see steady growth.

Learn more about how to build muscle. Stop by Mitch Graves ’s site where you can find out all about muscle building programs and how to completely transform your body.