How to Gain Muscle

When most people think about the concept of muscle-building, huge bodybuilders and sweaty guys grunting while lifting heavy amounts of weight comes to mind. While this stereotype exists for a reason, there is much more to gaining muscle than simply vanity purposes.

Everyone can benefit enormously from adding lean muscle to their bodies. Men and women, young and old - it does much more than just make us look better on the beach and in the mirror. Muscle helps our bodies work optimally, providing us with functional strength and the ability to perform the activities of daily living with ease. It also helps by significantly lessening our chance of injury and age-related dysfunction.

Muscle is also extremely metabolically active, which means that the more of it we have, the more calories we burn 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Pretty amazing, right? Adding lean muscle to our frames is therefore one of the only true healthy ways to boost our metabolisms.

So how exactly do you go about doing it? Here is the two part process to gaining muscle:

1. Strength Training

   You need to break down muscle tissue through focused strength training that really challenges your muscles.

2. Protein

   Muscle tissue is made up of amino acids which is found in protein. If you want to increase muscle size you need to add more protein into your diet. Anywhere from 1/2 gram per pound of body weight to 1 gram. So if you weigh 150 lbs, you may take in up to 150 grams of protein per day.

Did you find this video helpful? Watch more Fit Tip Thursdays for great tips to help enhance your workouts.