How to Build Muscles

First, I want to make sure that there is no confusion with the title of the article. When I say "building muscle fast", fast is relative in comparison to the rate at which you will build muscle if the muscle-building factors I am going to discuss are not in place. The fact is building new muscle is NOT a fast process. It takes weeks, months, and years of hard work and dedication, both inside and outside of the weight room. This slow "rate of return" on muscle-building is one of the main reasons people give up on building muscle all together.

When bodybuilders build muscle, their exercise routine and their diet are drastically different then when they are in the phase of losing fat. For several months, they will build muscle by doing split body part routines and lifting heavy weight with low reps.

In fact, if you do this type of workout for 30-60 minutes, you might even lose muscle mass. This happens because long cardio routines do not stimulate your body to build muscle like strength training does. It is primarily aerobic, and aerobic exercise performed in this way can actually cause you to lose muscle mass and decrease your metabolism!

If you want to get into the sport of bodybuilding then I would suggest that you lift weights but if you just want to build muscle and get rid of fat there are other exercises that you can do instead of lifting weights that will actually build muscle without lifting weights.

Not many exercises will build muscle in the upper body like chin ups. Known as the upper body squat, chins stimulate nearly every muscle from the traps down to the abdominals. Any exercise that allows you to move your body through space as opposed to moving a weight or fixed implement around you has a much higher degree of neuromuscular activation, and therefore a much greater potential to elicit gains in size and strength.

A great tip to help you burn fat/build muscle while you work out is to vary the amounts of weight you lift - true, to get truly good gains and build muscle, you need to lift as much as you can without straining yourself, but did you know lightening things up a little, say once a week, will help you burn calories by exercising other areas of the muscle? Lighter weights and lots of reps is a huge calorie burner, and will give you a more sculpted look to the muscle.

To start, it's definitely important to mind what you eat, and when. If you're not taking in the right kind of nutrition at the right times, it won't be able to benefit from workout programs intended to build muscle fast. Some people go on heavy starvation diets; this line of thinking is that if you reduce the overall nutrition, you'll get rid of fat. In reality, this only serves to make your muscles weak, along with your body overall; this approach won't build muscle fast. It's important to cut the junk food and empty calories of course.