The Best Way to Quickly Build Muscle

The Best Way to Quickly Build Muscle

Aug 24, 2022 mindpump

The Mind Pump philosophy is adding muscle to your body is the best way to improve the quality of your life and age like fine wine. Besides the physical changes, more muscle does wonders for your mental state. Not a person in the world wouldn’t benefit from adding lean muscle mass to their physique.

Instead of bombarding you with 27 ways to build muscle faster and confusing you, follow these four simple guidelines to build muscle fast. Take note, and you’ll be way ahead of the pack.

If you want to build muscle faster, get strong! Getting stronger sounds obvious… but most gym goers completely ignore this advice. To build muscle, you must lift heavy weights using big compound lifts like squats, deadlifts, rows, and presses in the 6-12 rep range. Sometimes lower and sometimes higher, depending on your goals. However, for 99% of people in the general population, performing a 3x per week full body split is the way to go. Focus on compound movements and slowly add weight to the bar. Your goal should be to shoot for personal records in the 6-12 rep range.

Many GYM GOERS make the mistake of “chasing the pump”… performing endless sets and repetitions of biceps curls, lateral raises, and tricep extensions. Not that these exercises are wrong, they certainly have a place. But they are isolation exercises. These exercises don’t require multiple muscle groups to engage, so they give you much less bang for your buck. Doing ONLY isolation exercises for the burn is a surefire way not to build muscle.

Here are two examples of getting stronger in compound lifts to show you what I mean—one for men and one for women. Men, let’s say you start out deadlifting 225 pounds for five reps, and in 2 months, you can pull 225 pounds for ten reps. You will look different and sport a more muscular physique.

Women, let’s use the hip thrust for your example. The hip thrust is a compound movement super effective for building glutes. If you start with 95 pounds for five reps and then in a month you can perform 135 pounds for eight reps, you will have a rounder, firmer backside.

Bottom line: Focus on getting strong in the big lifts mentioned above, and your physique will have more lean muscle. Once you can perform ten reps with a heavy weight, add a little weight to the bar and start again until you can complete that heavier weight for ten reps. Repeat the cycle again and again. Always strive to get stronger!

Don’t train to failure: This one throws a lot of folks off. Mainstream media and Instagram loves to show people pushing themselves through brutal workouts. Once in a blue moon is okay. But simply pushing your body to failure workout after workout, week after week, is a recipe for disaster. You cannot recover from working out like this. You will burn out. And your days in the gym will be over before they even start. Burnout leads me to my next point…

Focus on your recovery: Once you complete a weight lifting session, you must recover to perform in your next session. Weights are taxing on your central nervous system. Because of this, we must learn to recover so we don’t dig ourselves into a hole and risk injury.

Before diving into little things with recovery, you MUST get your sleep dialed in. Not sexy, I know. But if you do nothing else in life but get good sleep, your health will be better than most. If following a strength training program, sleep is even more critical. Make it a habit to get at least 7 hours. 8-9 is even better.

In addition to good sleep, off days from the gym should include a few mobility drills and low-impact movements like walking. Walking is a secret tool for building muscle. Once again, it isn’t sexy, but its overall health benefits are incredible. It’s fantastic for recovery and mental sharpness and burns extra calories without crushing your joints. Aim to get 10-12K steps daily, and you’ll be amazed at what it does for your mind and body, especially during strength training. A 30-minute brisk walk outside first thing in the morning is a secret weapon to a better mood, mental sharpness, and a leaner body.

Eat more protein! It’s the key to building lean muscle and recovering. You’ll hear many people say that you need 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight. That’s great if you can, but it’s hard for most people to get that much protein. Instead, if you can get .75g per pound of body weight, you are doing great. Eating this much protein is more manageable and realistic for someone to stay consistent. For example, a 145-pound woman should attempt to get 109 grams of protein per day. From professional athletes to 45-year-old office workers to your grandma, everybody would benefit from adding more protein to their diet.

So there you have it. Stay consistent with those four guidelines, and your body will have no choice but to build muscle. If you’re not sure where to start we suggest a program like MAPS ANABOLIC that shows you exactly how to do the stuff we talked about above with zero guesswork. Everything is laid out for you to get the ball rolling. Stay consistent, and you’ll be able to build your dream body that feels as good as it looks.