Since the dawn of the Golden Era of bodybuilding, when Arnold and his peers were reigning, developing an aesthetic, muscular physique has been a primary goal for many trainees.

Besides fat loss, muscle gaining becomes one of the relevant goals that people set for the new year, with the idea of realizing their highest physical potential.

And again, that is no wonder because none of us would turn down a perfectly aesthetic, proportional physique with all the tiny details like muscle fibers and separations.

Though all of this sounds tempting, the truth is that just like fat loss, muscle building requires important considerations and a well-thought-out plan of action.

Now let’s have a look at the most important things to factor in.

• Create A Moderate Caloric Surplus

So, you learned that fat loss requires a moderate caloric deficit – That allows you to burn more fat than you store and thus, reduce the overall amount of fat you hold.

Muscle gains, however, are the exact opposite – Building that new, active tissue (muscle mass) would require some extra energy because, well, it’s simple thermodynamics!

If you want to stack more mass (which has its energy content), you have to provide that extra bit of energy.

This, therefore, implies that you should consume slightly more calories than you burn, also known as “eating in a caloric surplus.”

The extra food will provide energy for better performance, recovery, and the growth of your muscles.

Nevertheless, the more isn’t the better here – Just like fat loss requires a moderate deficit, muscle gaining requires a moderate surplus because too much extra energy will lead to excessive fat gain.

• Choose The Right Exercises!

Unlike fat loss, where exercising isn’t mandatory (yes, fat loss can be done with NO exercise whatsoever), muscle gaining is a different story.

In order for your body to build muscle, there needs to be a reason for it to do so, or in other words, a training stimulus.

The main functions of muscle growth are increased strength, explosiveness, and strength endurance.

That is to say that you should do resistance training (RT), with the most effective type of RT being weight training.

The best thing? You DON’T need a complex plan – Just stick to the basics.

The basic, compound strength exercises are – Presses, Squats, Deadlifts & Pulls.

Think:

1. Bench presses under different angles
2. Overhead presses
3. Barbell squats
4. Dumbbell squats
5. Machine squats
6. Barbell/dumbbell deadlifts
7. Pull-ups
8. Pull-downs
9. T-Bar rows
10. Dumbbell rows

All of these exercises, done under the right intensity (challenging weights) will easily create a stimulus for muscle growth.

• Progressive Overload!

Besides picking the right exercises and doing them at the right levels of intensity, you have to make sure that you are increasing the endured load with time.

Progressive overload is a fundamental training principle, which muscle growth depends on.

This principle simply implies creating new and new stimuli for your muscles.

To do so, you can go a couple of routes:

1. Increasing the working weight
2. Increasing the number of repetitions
3. Increasing time under tension (doing movements slower)

• Rest Appropriately!

One of the common misconceptions about muscle gaining is that you have to be restless at the gym – Supersets, giant sets, triple sets, etc.

However, the truth is the exact opposite – Muscle gains are mostly about rest…

Rest times between sets and rest times between workouts.

Think of it this way – Intense activity like weight lifting is strenuous and thus, your performance may decline quickly, set to set.

For instance, if you do a set of bench pressing with 50 kg for ten reps and only rest a minute, odds are you will only get 8-9 reps on the next set, then 7-8 on the 3rd set etc.

However, if you rest 2-3 minutes after the first set, it is much more likely to sustain your performance in the next sets, thus increasing the total amount of weight lifted (3 sets of 30 total reps done over 10 minutes are better than three sets of 20-something reps done over 5 minutes).

Besides that, your rest between workouts is crucial! Aim to rest 48-96 hours before training the same muscle group again, as that will leave enough room for recovery and for your body to prepare to do MORE!