While most people think of building muscle as bodybuilding, if you’re doing it for health you don’t have to end up massive and bulging with muscle. Simple, effective muscle building will leave you looking relatively slight, but with the techniques in this article you’ll still enjoy the health benefits from your hard work.

Focus on working out your largest muscle groups. Concentrating your efforts on large muscle groups such as the back, chest and legs will help you to build muscle faster. Exercises such as squats, pull-ups, bench presses, and dips are ideal for this. These kinds of exercises are generally more intense, and will help boost your protein synthesis.

Before you start trying to build muscle, determine which exercises are most likely to yield the desired results. You should know different exercises allow you to focus on different groups, toning or building. Choose a number of different exercises so you can build all the muscles that you want to build–your leg muscles, arm muscles and chest muscles, for example. Learn techniques for building each group of muscles.

If you have been weight training for a period of time and want to see results a bit more quickly, work on your large groups of muscles, such as those in your legs, back and chest. Some great exercises for those groups are deadlifts, squats, bench presses, dips and military presses.

Refrain from performing both strength training and cardiovascular exercises, if your goal is to build muscle, and not necessarily to improve overall fitness. The reason for this is that these two kinds of exercises cause your body to respond in contradictory ways. Focusing strictly on building muscle will help you to maximize your results.

When building muscle is important, do not forget about carbohydrates. Carbs are essential for keeping you energetic. When you run out of your carbohydrates, your body will burn protein to create the energy it needs. Eat the correct amount of carbohydrates to get your body through its workout.

Use visualization exercises to picture what you need to do to reach your goals. Having vague, undefined goals with no real sense of how to accomplish them is a sure road to failure. Picture yourself sticking to your workout routine and visualize what you will look like in the future. This will keep you motivated.

Use as many repetitions as possible when training. Limit your breaks to less than one minute between each set of fifteen lifts or more. Your muscle will be stimulated by the lactic acids that these repetitions produce. The more times you can complete this process during your workout, the more muscle growth you can expect.

Eat plenty of protein when you are on a muscle-building regimen. Be sure to eat whole proteins with every meal. A good rule to follow is to ingest one gram of protein for each pound of body weight. Good sources of low-fat protein include fish, low-fat milk and lean red meats.

Make use of your own body when you are working out. Bodyweight exercises, which include push-ups, pull-ups, lunges, and dips, can cause you to experience additional muscle and strength gains. Because of this, these types of exercises are a very important component of a solid workout program, and they should be included.

Everyone would like to be healthier and look great, and what you’ve learned here should help you get started towards reaching your goals. You’ll be able to look great, have plenty of self-esteem and reap the health rewards that come along with building your body in a safe and effective way. Enjoy your new life and body!