3 Reasons You’re Still Skinny

When I look around sure I see the fat tubs that we all like to make fun of and that Wal-Mart makes a good portion of its profits off of. But there is something else I see that is just as sickening and that is the pasty wimpy skinny guy. This seems to effect all kinds of males not just the liberal hipster as before. I’ve seen this with blue collar workers, guys who work in offices, and even with guys who go the gym pretty often. It seems when you look around people are operating at one unhealthy extreme or at the other.

There is little balance and overall good health. You have people getting fatter then ever before, others who look like they’d break if they attempted to pick up a paperweight, and then those that look good but turn every gym session into a photo session for instant gram or whatever. Point is you’re hard pressed to find someone with some decent balance both physical and mentally. Here we’re going to talk about the physical part in particular those that are too skinny. So if you’re a shrimp looking to be more of a lion then this article is for you.

Reason #1 – You Don’t Eat Enough

I think most males violate this in that they don’t eat enough and the little they do eat is either rabbit food or processed sugars and carbs. Things that’ll wreck your health and give you some abdominal fat but not things that big muscles are made of. Point is you’re not eating enough and you’re not eating enough of the good stuff. If you’re skinny then you need to throw things like portion size out the damn window. Hell if you work out enough even eating stuff that isn’t so great for you will help.

I remember my football coach making me stuff down peanut butter and jelly sandwiches between classes to put some weight on me. And it worked. You’re not getting enough calories put simply. You can get big if you don’t eat big there is no way around this it just isn’t possible. You have to get enough calories for muscle growth and worrying about what you eat (to an extent) is no way to get the right amount of calories in your diet. Go for nutrient dense foods and make heavy shakes if you have to. That’s what the old timers did and it worked pretty well for them.

Reason #2 – You Don’t Recover Properly

Working out day in and day while certainly has it benefits will be all for nothing if you don’t back that work up with proper recovery. If you bust your ass in the gym and then stay up late and get only a few hours of sleep then you’re body isn’t to going to give you the results that you want. Muscles are built not in the gym and not in the kitchen but rather in the bed during sleep. That is when recovery takes place that is when everything gets put together. Without proper recovery you’re not going to build the body that you want to build.

Recovery has to do with making sure you are getting enough nutrients in from the foods that you consume and that you are getting enough rest so that those nutrients can be put to good use by your body and build the muscle that you want and need. You gotta train big, you gotta eat big, and then you gotta recover big to get big. It’s a three step process. Most get the training part down, few get the eating part down, and even fewer get the sleeping part down. Make sure you are getting enough sleep and not ruining the quality of it with drugs or alcohol.

Reason #3 – You’re Doing The Wrong Workouts

If your workout is named after some broad then guess what? It’s not a workout you’re going to get big on. You can’t train to lose fat (of which you have little) and gain muscle at the same time. Focus on getting big then you can worry about cutting off the excess. Now this doesn’t mean you need to get as big as a balloon before you start trimming down you can be rational about this. Just don’t go for a six pack and big muscles at the same time and expect to get anywhere. Have goals, accomplish those goals, and then move on to the next ones.

You need to be lifting to stimulate growth. So stay away from the high rep circuits and stay away from workouts that consist of many different isolation exercises. Focus on compound lifts for heavy to medium rests. You want to get a good mix of adequate volume as well as heavy weights. A hypertrophy specific protocol made be called for at this time, something like 10 x 10 or you can use a more traditional strength and muscle building workout like Reg Park’s version of the 5 x 5 workout where more and more volume is added.

Summary

Being skinny as a rail is just about as bad as being fat as a cow. Man was not meant to live in either state, that’s for sure. If you’re skinny then you need to make sure that your training, nutrition, and recovery are all in line with what your goals are. No one hundred rep of burpees, no rabbit food, and no partying all night. You have to train using adequate volume and compound movements, eat lots of nutrient dense food, and get lots of quality sleep. Do this consistently enough and you’ll start to pack on the mass.

If you have any questions you would like to see answered in a future post send them to me at charlessledge001 (at) gmail (dot) com. If you found value in this post then I would encourage you to share this site with someone who may need it as well as check out my books here. I appreciate it. You can follow me on Twitter here.

-Charles Sledge

 

Charles Sledge