If you work full time and/or have family obligations, chances are that you do not have the time or energy to gain muscle mass. You may have the muscle mass routines which tell you how to bulk up or how to put on weight, yet they are written by (and probably for) those who can make lifting weights the number one priority in their lives. Many bodybuilders simply eat, work out, sleep, and relax most days; and that does not even take into account all of the supplements they consume!

So how can you bulk up and put on weight if you have work and family commitments?

First, decide on your goals. If you are skinny or frail, then your first goal is to get bigger and stronger. You will do this by lifting weights, eating appropriately, and learning how to recover properly. Working 40 hours a week (or more), commuting, going to family events, and taking care of your family will add roughly 80 hours a week of “stress” which most bodybuilders do not endure.

Second, find out where you are exercising already. Do you walk or bike to work? Do you do several hours of yard work each weekend? Do you shovel your driveway and those of elderly neighbors during the winter? Do you practice sports with your kids? Count up the hours you spend exercising and remember that you are working your muscles during these times.

Third, assuming that you are doing some sort of exercise during the week, realize that for you to bulk up and put on weight that you have to add in the appropriate type and amount of weight training. This means that you must choose muscle mass routines which stimulate growth, yet allow enough time for you to recover and, finally, grow new muscle.

Fourth, you must eat adequately. Assuming that you have your doctor’s permission to bulk up, add healthy foods which are “calorie-dense.” Calorie-dense foods include nuts, seeds, healthy fats like fish oil and olive oil, meat, and other such foods. Of course, drink lots of clean water and stay away from the sweets and candies for a while. Yes, you can bulk up with sweets… but that is not how you want to put on weight!

A good place to start your bulking up nutrition plan is to eat at least 15-16 times your body weight in calories. For example, if you weigh 150 pounds then 15 times your body weight would be 2250 calories. Talk with your doctor about this estimate, and make sure that you make any nutritional adjustments for allergies, diabetes, or any other medical concern.

Once you have everything in place you will want to focus one one thing: consistency. It is easy to get enthusiastic once you know how to bulk up; but after the tenth day your enthusiasm may diminish. Get supportive friends, join online forums, get a coach or personal trainer, or find some other way to keep your motivation high and to keep you on track. Do whatever you can to make these steps into habits.

Finally, have an “exit strategy.” For example, if you are 5′ 6″ and weigh 150 pounds you probably want your realistic muscle goal to be no more than 10% of your current body weight. If you gain too much weight then chances are that it is not muscle. Your metabolism could change dramatically and you may introduce new health concerns. Always consult your doctor about your ultimate goals so that you stay healthy, which should be your number one priority.

Have fun and remember to lift weights intelligently when now that you have learned how to bulk up and put on weight.

Reactive hypoglycemia is also known as postprandial hypoglycemia. It is a medical term that describes episodes of symptomatic hypoglycemia, and it takes 2 to 4 hours to occur after you take high carbohydrate meal or oral glucose load. It believes that it represents the result of excessive insulin release. The carbohydrate meal is behind this phenomenal change. This process, derived from the meal goes through the digestion and glucose disposal. The definitions of Reactive hypoglycemia are controversial. The term, Reactive hypoglycemia meeting the Whipple criteria corresponds to symptoms that can measure low glucose and higher glucose dose and it relieves. Idiopathic postprandial syndrome is similar and not documented for abnormally low glucose levels.

Causes

Fifteen percent people, having had stomach surgery belongs to Alimentary Hypoglycemia, a consequence of dumping syndrome. Hormonal hypoglycemia lacking hormone is hypothyroidism. Helicobacter pylori induces gastritis, and the cause behind is the bacteria that impels reactive hypoglycemia. Late Hypoglycemia relates to occult diabetes that delays release of early insulin from pancreatic B cells. It results in initial exaggeration of hyperglycemia during a glucose tolerance test. Idiopathic Reactive Hypoglycemia is a term that is not existing, as because researchers know the causes of Reactive Hypoglycemia. A hyperglucidic breakfast or ambulatory glucose test is the current standard.

Therefore, hypoglycemia can occur as a side effect of some diabetes medications. It includes insulin or oral diabetes medications. Pills increase insulin production. These can be Chlorpropamide (Diabinese), Glimepiride (Amaryl), Glipizide (Glucotrol, Glucotrol XL), Glyburide (DiaBeta, Glynase, Micronase), Nateglinide (Starlix), Repaglinide (Prandin), Sitagliptin (Januvia), Tolazamide and Tolbutamide. There are certain combination pills cause of Hypoglycemia that include glipizide + metformin (Metaglip), glyburide + metformin (Glucovance), pioglitazone + glimepiride (Duetact), rosiglitazone + glimepiride (Avandaryl), and sitagliptin + metformin (Janumet).

Symptoms

The symptoms vary according to the hydration level and sensitivity to the rate or declining magnitude of blood glucose concentration of the individual. The symptoms of hypoglycemia, induced by food can be coma, heart palpitation or fibrillation, fatigue, dizziness, light-headedness, sweating, headaches, depression, nervousness, irritability, tremors, flushing, craving sweets, increased appetite, rhinitis(runny nose), epileptic-type response to rapidly flashing bright lights, nausea, vomiting, panic attack, and numbness or coldness in the extremities.

Diet of Reactive Hypoglycemia

The sample menu of breakfast can be half cup orange juice, third-fourth cup cornflakes, 1 slice whole wheat toast, 1 tsp margarine, 1 cup of skim milk, and coffee, creamer or sugar as substitute. Launch can be 2 oz lean hamburger, 1 hamburger bun, lettuce or tomato slice, half cup cooked carrot, salad, 1 tbsp Italian dressing, 1 fresh apple, sugar free gelatin, and 1 cup skim milk. The dinner can be 2 oz baked chicken breast, half medium-baked potatoes, half cup green beans, half cup sliced strawberries, 1 roll dinner, 1 tsp margarine, and diet soda. The breakfast snack can be orange 1 med, launch snack includes 1 cup skim milk, 3 Graham crackers and supper snack can be one-third cranberry juice, 1 tbsp peanut butter and 6 saltine crackers.

Background: In the early 70’s Arnold Schwarzenegger burst onto the bodybuilding scene. And he brought the idea of “volume training” into the lime light. After all… if it made a champion out of Arnold, then surely pumping iron for 3 hours a day was the way to go. Right? Right?

Well… maybe not.

While many guys attempted to tackle the Herculean volume training regimen that Arnold developed… it flat out didn’t work for 99.9% of trainers.

The reason? The volume of training that Arnold recommended was far too much for the average joe.

Enter Mike Mentzer.

Mike Mentzer made a name for himself by saying the opposite of what everyone else in bodybuilding was saying.

While all the muscle-heads were telling people to work out six days a week… Mentzer talked about working out once every 14 days.

When the pro’s advised people to hit the muscle from all different angles and perform multiple exercises for each body part, Mentzer said that one exercise per body part was enough.

When most bodybuilders were recommending 15-20 sets per body part, Mentzer recommended just one set per exercise.

The Argument: While most bodybuilders believe that you had to include a variety of exercises and a large volume of sets to adequately work the muscle and activate the growth mechanism, Mentzer differed.

Mentzer reasoned that if you perform one set… and you perform that set until your muscles can move the weight no more… wouldn’t that be enough to activate the growth mechanism?

The Experiment: I was intrigued by Mentzer’s approach and I thought the idea of one-set to failure made sense. So in 1999 I hired Mike Mentzer for a series of phone consultations.

There wasn’t much small talk, but I do remember Mike asking me specifically about a brand new website that had just launched at the time. It seems there method of attracting attention was to go after Mike and try to bash not only his theories but everything else about him as well.

Mike started me out with only two workouts per week. He also told me that the actual amount of protein, carbohydrates and fat I was ingesting per day wasn’t important. He said that a balanced diet was fine and that I should eat frequently but not obsess over the nutritional aspect.

After a month, I had gained weight but my strength increases were moderate at best. Mike reduced my training workout down to one workout every seven days. Ultimately, he took this all way down to once every nine days but I still never gained much strength or made much progress in the gym.

The Result: The result of this training program was a failure. I gained very little strength and my over-all level of conditioning actually worsened from so much in-activity.

The Good: I personally believe that Mike Mentzer advanced the sport of body-building a great deal by questioning whether or not it’s really necessary to do more than one set to failure.

This principle… and the logic behind this principle… still guides much of what I do today in my training programs.

The Bad: Unfortunately, I think Mike’s version of High Intensity Training had some serious flaws.

First and foremost, Mike’s thinking on nutrition was seriously flawed. Without proper protein intake, you simply cannot gain massive amounts of muscle.

Second, Mike only had one solution for every problem. You know the saying, when all you’ve got is a hammer… all the world looks like a nail?

Well, Mike took that to heart. For example, if progress stalled the solution he proposed was always to train less or take more time off.

At times, he took this to extremes. For example, I told him that my calves were one of my biggest weak points and asked him what we could do about that. His solution? Stop training calves all together and see if they would grow from the indirect work of squats and other leg training.

Needless to say… this approach didn’t work. Although many a times I’ve wished my muscles would grow simply by not doing anything… it simply doesn’t happen.

Another flaw of the program is assuming that every person is capable of generating the kind of intensity necessary to trigger muscle growth in just one set.

For example, it’s relatively easy to fry your biceps with one set of bicep curls. But when was the last time you saw someone truly perform one set heavy barbell squats to COMPLETE muscular failure? Or go to complete muscular failure with 1400lbs on the leg press machine? Frankly, it just doesn’t happen because it’s incredibly exhausting both on the body and on the mind.

Overall: If you’ve been volume training for years and feel burned out, you might find Mike Mentzer’s H.I.T to be a nice change of pace. You’ll probably experience some new muscle and strength gains during the first few weeks.

But unless you address the nutritional and intensity flaws of the program, your progress will ultimately stall.

Average White Dude Final Rating For Mike Mentzer’s High Intensity Training: 6/10.

Not the worst training program, but far from effective for most average dudes.

There are some specific diets for acid reflux disease or GERD that can be used for those who have this problem. It’s important that you recognize and reduce your intake of foods that cause acid reflux. Therefore, your GERD diet needs to be extremely simple and shouldn’t have a lot of spices or fats as this can lead to a sluggish digestion. This adds all the more to the trouble. Since acid reflux and diet are related, your diet should follow the following principles:

Fruits, vegetables and drinks that should be avoided

Caffeine and other drinks should be avoided. Soda and aerated drinks should be completely avoided. Also, alcohol should be taken sparingly because it loosens the muscle strength of the LES and makes it sluggish. This can then cause stomach acids to move back into the esophagus from the stomach. Alcohol also increases the amount of stomach acid which is also disadvantageous.

Chocolate and peppermint should also be avoided. These foods can also relax the LES muscle leading to more of a buildup in the esophagus. For example, chocolate contains theobromine which relaxes the lower esophageal sphincter.

Tobacco and citrus fruits should be completely avoided as well when considering acid reflux and diet since they also relax the LES. But fiber rich fruits should be taken such as apples for acid reflux, as it helps in bowel movement and reduces the stress levels. Water should also be taken in plenty. Fatty and oil rich foods like hamburger should also be avoided because they are high in saturated fat which take longer for your body to digest inviting GERD to flare up.

Apples are great but apple cider is not

Apples for acid reflux work great as do bananas. Some fruits like grapes, peaches, raspberries and strawberries can for a part of GERD diet but should be taken in moderation. Apples for acid reflux are fine but apple cider isn’t a great idea.

Remember that vegetable that can cause gas should be avoided at this time, since they add to the problem. Some of the vegetables that shouldn’t form a part of the a GERD diet include cauliflower, cabbage, leeks, sauerkraut, beans and many more. Tomatoes and tomato base sauces should also be completely avoided.

By avoiding foods that cause acid reflux, you stand a far great chance of improving your acid reflux and diet. Interestingly, something as simple as apples for acid reflux can be a great start towards better health not just for GERD but for other ailments as well.

It is no secret that exercise is something that should be a part of everyone’s lifestyle. The reasons or motives to exercise may be different for each person. Some want to lose weight and burn fat. Some want to build muscle. Some want to improve health and performance. But regardless of the reason for exercising, everyone wants the “best” exercise program.

This is where the problems start. What is the “best” workout? And the fact is, there is not one workout program that is right for every person and every goal. So, instead of trying to find the absolute, ultimate best workout… use the workout that is best for you and your goals.

In my opinion, the use of bodyweight calisthenics and dumbbells is the best way to exercise for just about any goal. So, regardless of what workout program you decide is right for you, they should include bodyweight and dumbbell exercises. Here’s why…

Exercise Is About Movement

Unfortunately, when people think about exercise, they think about muscles. “This exercise works this muscle”. This way of thinking originated and was made popular by bodybuilders an is now mainstream. The problem is, the majority of exercisers are not bodybuilders!

The truth is, exercise is about movement. It is about being able to move your body around in an efficient manner. It is also about being able to move around other objects, of a variety of weights. That is why bodyweight calisthenics and dumbbells are great for training the body to move either with or without weighted resistance.

Bodyweight Calisthenics Are Perfect For Training Unweighted Movements

Many people have been trained to think that exercise is weight lifting and cardio. Use weight lifting to improve strength and build muscle. Everything else falls in the vague category of “cardio” and improves heart and lung function. This is the wrong way to think about it.

Just think of all the challenges of work, sport and life that require the ability to move your own body around. The real world is full of challenges that don’t fit into the weight training/cardio format. So, use bodyweight calisthenics to train the body to move the way it was meant to move… without added resistance.

Dumbbells Are Perfect For Training Weighted Movements

The other type of challenges you’ll face in sport, work and life requires the movement of a weighted object. And more often than not, this movement will be done with both limbs in unison, one at a time or in an alternating fashion. So, train yourself for these real world challenges by using dumbbells as your weighted resistance.

The furthest away from real world training you can get is using gym machines. Being strapped into these machines train muscles, not movements and make only small improvements to real world abilities. You do want to perform great outside the gym don’t you?

As you can see, the combination of bodyweight calisthenics and dumbbells is perfect for training the body to move both in weighted and unweighted situations. Not only will this improve performance for real world challenges, but it builds great looking bodies as well. To better prepare you for the challenges of bodyweight and dumbbell workouts, your body will shed that ugly fat, build athletic muscle and improve cardiorespiratory endurance. So, if you’re looking for the “best” workout, look no further than bodyweight calisthenics and dumbbell workouts.

When you have hemorrhoids, you have to pay attention to your diet. Most people suffering from various kinds of health conditions have unhealthy diets and if you’re one of them, you have to act now. Does your hemorrhoid bleed or protrude? Protruding hemorrhoids can be very frustrating but with the natural home remedies, you may be able to heal them completely but with a little help from a doctor. There are foods to avoid with hemorrhoids and you must know them well.

Among these foods are chili peppers, coffee, animal products, red meat, bad fats, and alcohol. It’s best to eat foods containing high fiber like veggies and fruits. Aside from the ones mentioned above, you should also avoid eggs, canned foods, instant foods, too much sugar or sodium, and many others. The doctor can help you in identifying other foods that you shouldn’t eat.

Eating a healthy diet can make natural remedies more effective. For instance, once you decide to use witch hazel to treat the hemorrhoid, you should also take not of these foods to avoid with hemorrhoids. Removal of the hemorrhoid is possible and perhaps the pics of the swollen veins can convince you to act now. Knowing how the hemorrhoids look like will make you more interested in getting rid of this unsightly condition.

Now that you know the foods to avoid with hemorrhoids, you can find relief in a matter of days or weeks. The key is consistency and patience. If you really want to get rid of the hemorrhoid, pick the right food items.

I think it’s great that you finally have a Power Tower or that you’re thinking about getting one. It’s one of the best ways to train at home. But, once you’ve got your tower all set up, it’s time to take a step back and figure out how to best use it.

In this article, I will go over the 4 main Power Tower exercises that you can do and give you some tips on how to do them properly. So, read on to make sure you’re working out in the proper form.

Power Tower Exercise #1 – Back/Biceps/Shoulders – Pull-up/Chin-up

The first exercise you can do with a tower is the pull-up. This exercise mainly targets the upper back muscles but it also works the biceps and shoulders. It is a highly effective bodyweight exercise which can build strength and tone your muscles.

The Pull-up has many variations: overhand grip or underhand or crossed grip, various distances between both hands as they grip, and so on. I recommend alternating between variations to get the most diverse and complete workout you can.

Power Tower Exercise #2 – Abdominals – Knee Raise/Leg Raise

Each tower comes with a knee raise station, equipped with arm and back pads. Knee raises are an excellent way to train and strengthen your abs. You can do this exercise with bent knees or with straight legs. You can also raise your knees in a straight line, or diagonally to train the obliques as well.

Power Tower Exercise #3 – Chest/triceps/shoulders – Push-ups

Each tower comes with low handle bars which you can hold and do push-ups with. These are deep push-ups which are rather intense but as the handle bars are set, you can’t adjust the space between your hands so only regular push-ups can be done with the tower.

Power Tower Exercise #4 – Triceps/Shoulders/Chest – Dips

The dip station allows you to train your triceps mainly but also targets the chest and shoulder muscles. This is a powerful exercise so you shouldn’t feel bad if you find that you can’t do a lot of reps.

General tips

You can make nearly every exercise harder by using ankle weights to add to the resistance. I also recommend using gloves when performing pull-ups to avoid abrasions on your palms.

As you can see, you can get a solid workout with a tower. Make sure to use it often.

It’s almost summer, and we are officially into Pride Season. Along with hotter months comes, for many gay men, the anxiety of are we “beach ready” in terms of our bodies.

Part of this is fun; it’s a good impetus to motivate us to get in better shape, and it can be rewarding to have a sense of “belonging” in the gay male community by having a good physique. It can be a healthy community ideal to see who can have the best, healthy diet and who can exercise in various ways that pay off in a good physique. But there can be many down sides to this, too, which I work on with my clients in-person in my office. This season can provoke feelings of low self-esteem if your body isn’t exactly what you want it to be. The season can put extra pressure on you to be a part of a larger, gay male cultural norm about body image, and we have to meet this with lots of self-empowerment and critical thinking.

Wikipedia has a great description of the Adonis Complex, with the link below. But I believe there is a huge gray area between a healthy community tradition of good diets/fitness and true Body Dysmorphic Disorder, a serious psychological condition. Many gay men fall somewhere in the middle, and most of us need to remind ourselves of some points to help cope with this.

To make the most of the “Season of Shirtless”, I recommend the following coping strategies to my clients:

1. Accept yourself first for who you are: You are NOT your physique. You are a three-dimensional person, with many different traits and aspects that make you wonderful and interesting. How closely you resemble a magazine fitness model has little to do with your success in life or how happy you are; it’s only one element. It does you no good to hate yourself and beat up on yourself for not looking like a magazine cover. Love yourself first, “warts and all”, then go about making any changes you want afterward with confidence and hope, and a sense of joy.

2. Health First: If you have a great physique and you enjoy this, go for it; relax and appreciate it. But if you don’t, you have to be realistic about what it would take to get it. You might not have the genetics, age, time to exercise, or opportunities to get the exact body you want. Focus on overall health by working with a doctor to achieve the best health state you can; don’t focus merely on external appearance.

3. Have a Plan: If you do want to embrace a plan for weight loss or body sculpturing, do so with realistic goals and in coordination with qualified professionals who can help you. These certainly include your doctor, who can discuss realistic and safe weight loss goals. It can include a personal trainer, if you have the time and money to get one, or trusted books/magazines if you need less expensive instruction and guidance. A therapist can help you with the cognitive (thought patterns) and behavioral (realistic actions) plan, self-motivation, and assessing your self-esteem.

4. Strive for balance: If you want a better physique, you have to balance this with the need for a good career, a safe/comfortable home, adequate leisure activities, good relationships, sound finances, and other demands on your resources of time, energy, and money. Make sure your efforts to improve your physique have their proper place and don’t encroach on other, more important areas of your life that need attention.

5. Keep Perspective: Remember that the gay male community is unusually focused (obsessed?) on youth and beauty. We don’t need to abide by this, except to the extent that we want to. Youth is inevitably fleeting; fitness and health should be a lifetime focus. There is a difference. Focus on healthy and happy first, aesthetics second.

6. Keep Priorities: Recently at the beach, I saw an attractive guy with a great physique — smoking! If you work out, eat right, and then undermine yourself with smoking, drinking, or drugging to excess, you will be pretty on the outside but unhealthy on the inside. Not a good combination. Consider the whole package of what makes you feel good, look good, and BE good in terms of your internal health. Engage in any debauchery in relatively small doses of “selective hedonism” and practice Harm Reduction whenever you indulge any vices (email me for more information on the Harm Reduction work I do with my clients).

Summer is supposed to be a time for enjoying what Nature gives us. Live in gratitude that we can enjoy the Sun, water, warmth and camaraderie of being with others. These are enough; “how you look” doing it is just icing on the cake — or rather, peanut butter on the celery. Gotta watch those carbs.

For help with how you feel about yourself, and how to improve it, I’m here for you — either in-person for counseling or by phone or email consultation (outside Southern California).

Wikipedia Link to the Adonis Complex: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adonis_Complex.

Success Story: You Go, Go-Go Boy!

My client, “Nick”, was a very serious Aeronautical Engineering student. Yes, he really was a rocket scientist. But years of school at a chilly New England campus had left him a little overweight and with a very developed mind and not-so-developed body that got through many year of school on venti coffees and whatever snacks he could find. His career was going great, and he was in a good relationship, in a comfortable home. But he wanted just one more thing: a little brawn to go with the brains. His goal was to dance on a box in a club, like his buddy Charlie, who “ruled” as a local go-go boy. In therapy, I helped Nick identify some realistic short-term goals, referred him to a gay-savvy physician who could advise on the physical goals, and helped Nick stay motivated and focused on what he was trying to achieve. Nick made a plan, and most mornings before his work at an aerospace firm, Nick some kind of exercise: weights, Pilates, cardio, swimming. He enjoyed each one and the varied routine never got stale. Over time, the work paid off. Nervous and apprehensive, he auditioned to be a go-go boy at a new club (there’s always a new club, right?) and to his astonishment, got the job. Work and his relationship prevented him taking too many hours working at the club, but the chance to finally live his dream of dancing on a box after first becoming a rocket scientist made Nick feel like a very well-balanced guy, which made him delighted and proud.

He learned that with help from others, personally and professionally, when he put his mind to something for short- and long-term goals, great things could be achieved.

For Nick, balancing the brains with some brawn made him feel self-empowered in all aspects of his life. And learning the skills of self-empowerment can help you to…Have The Life You Want!

(All depictions in success stories are altered to protect client confidentiality, and include an amalgam of different cases seen in actual clinical practice.)

Watch for my new book, “Self-Empowerment: Have the Life You Want!”, coming SOON

You may not know this but emotional overeating is the reason that 95% of diets fail. You might already know you’re an emotional eater. Or you might not be sure and you may need a little bit more information to decide. The first step is to find out if you are emotionally hungry. Below are the twelve types of emotional hunger that trigger Emotional Eating. As you read through the list, ask yourself how many of these apply to you and your life. If you use food in any of the ways listed below, you’ll know that Emotional Eating is the real reason you struggle with your weight.

Type 1. Food: My Adult Pacifier

If you get really hungry when you feel angry, depressed, anxious, bored, or lonely, you use food to dull the pain that these emotions cause.

Type 2. I Stick Up For Myself by Stuffing Myself Up

If you react by getting hungry when others talk down to you, take advantage of you, belittle you, or take you for granted, you eat to avoid confrontation.

Type 3. Food: My One Faithful Friend

If you crave food when you have tension in your close relationships, you eat to avoid feeling the pain of rejection or anger.

Type 4. When I’m Chewing I Can’t Hear My Inner Critic

If you tend to become hypercritical of yourself, if you label yourself “stupid,” “lazy,” or “a loser,” you eat to stuff down self-hatred.

Type 5. I Don’t Have Love but I Have Food

If your hunger gets activated because your intimate relationships don’t satisfy some basic need like trust or security, you use food to try to fill the gap.

Type 6. Food Can’t Fill Up the Missing Parts in My Past

If you eat to make up for the deprivation you experienced as a child, you eat to forget the past.

Type 7. Don’t Tell Me What to Eat

If you eat to assert your independence because you don’t want anyone telling you what to do, you eat to rebel.

Type 8. I’m Too Busy Eating to Take a Risk

If your appetite kicks in when you’re faced with new challenges – if you use food to avoid rising to the test, you eat to protect yourself from the fear of failure.

Type 9. Fall in Love? I’d Rather Fall in Chocolate.

If you stuff your face in order to avoid your sexuality – either to stay overweight so that nobody desires you or to hide from intimate encounters – you eat to protect yourself from getting too close.

Type 10. I Use My Body as a Battleground

Emotional eaters often eat to pay back those who have hurt them, often in the distant past. They use their bodies as battlegrounds for working out old resentments. If you do this, you eat to get revenge or control anger.

Type 11. I Won’t Grow Up

If you eat to make yourself feel carefree, like a child, you eat to keep yourself from facing the challenges of growing up.

Type 12. I’m Secretly Afraid of Being Thin

If you overeat because you fear getting thin, either consciously or unconsciously, you eat to avoid the fear of change.

Emotional hunger is real. It’s part of life for everyone. If you address the things that make you emotionally hungry, you’ll have a chance of having real satisfaction in your life. But if you eat each time you’re emotionally hungry, you’ll miss the opportunity of satisfaction, and your emotional hunger will continue to grow along with your waistline.

1. USE MULTIPLE SHOULDER ANGLES IN YOUR BICEPS TRAINING

The angle of your arm positioning in the shoulder joint, as well as the rotation of the wrist, are crucial for setting stimuli on the various muscles of the arms.

In order to place as much stimuli on your biceps to make them grow as fast as possible, you need to implement an exercise that will put a stretch on your biceps by positioning the elbow behind the center of your body. Inclined seated dumbell curls are one of the best exercises to cover this requirement. The upper body is laid backwards by the inclined position of the bench. The angle here can be chosen to be up to 45 degrees at most. Because of the lessened strength potential of the biceps in this position and the slow, controlled matter of performing the exercise, this one should be performed with relatively light weight.

The integration of an elbow positioning in front of the body, or even the head, is equally important. Take the concentration curl as an example. By bringing the elbows forward, the concentration will be focuses more on the short head. Exercises like these should be also performed slow and controlled, squeezing the biceps very hard at the top for the best results.

2. WATCH YOUR WRIST ROTATION AND HAND PLACEMENT

The wrist can also have an impact on the stimulus of your arms. Especially when it comes to the biceps, different wrist rotations need to be included into the workout. Besides the bending of the arm, the biceps is also responsible for rotating your wrist. This is especially noticeable when you hold your forearm in a 90 degree angle in front of your body, twisting the wrist.

You will notice a movement in your biceps without flexing it. To include this knowledge into your workout, one should therefore alway include exercises such as hammer curls or reverse curls. Another possibility is a rotation of the wrist while performing dumbell curls. Twist the weight inwards when curling up, back on the way down.

3. INTEGRATE DIFFERENT SHOULDER JOINT ANGLES IN YOUR TRICEPS TRAINING

When working the triceps, the short and the lateral head will most likely be stressed more than the long head, because of the positioning of the elbow in front of, aside from, or behind the body. This is the reason for the utterly necessary of overhead triceps movements. The long head is the biggest part of the triceps and needs to be addressed accordingly. There is a lot of variety for doing overhead triceps work and will, correctly done, ensure a good muscle soreness and triceps growth.

Overhead triceps pressing is not only done with a barbell or a dumbell, in a seated, standing, or lying position. You can also do an overhead extension movement on a low bar, TRX bands or gymnastic rings, using your bodyweight. There are endless possibilities to keep your long triceps head challenged as your body advances and you will be able to handle more volume and muscle stimuli.

4. HOW TO CUT OUT WRIST INVOLVEMENT

In order to make your curls are as effective as possible and achieve the best results, good curling form is crucial. I’m pretty sure that I don’t have to tell you how to do a bicep curl. However, there are some common mistakes people do in their biceps training.

You might have experienced soreness in your forearms or wrist pain when curling at some point. This is mostly an issue of not keeping the wrist in a neutral position. If you happen to experience wrist pain when curling, what you’re most likely doing is slightly curling up your wrist as you curl up with your biceps. This will put a lot of pressure on your wrists and should definitely be avoided to stay injury free. To get rid of bad curling form, which is essential for biceps development, I always recommend to lower the weight and focus on perfect form.

The second issue occurs when people are trying to twist their wrist when doing barbell curls without noticing it. This one is a little tricky, so here’s what you need to do to spot this. Grab a long stick, find the mid of it and grab it there, then close your eyes and curl it with just ONE hand. What your partner might find is that you’re twisting the stick as you curl up. So without noticing it, your wrists are trying to twist into one direction when you do barbell curls. Actively focus on this when you do barbell curls to not put your wrists under such pressure.

5. THE BEST-FITTING TRAINING VOLUME

How often shall I train my arms? How much exercises and sets should I do? There is no “perfect” frequency that anyone can follow and get huge arms guaranteed. But I can tell you one thing from personal experience: most people tend to train their biceps too often.

The basic idea of muscle growth is the destruction of the muscle through overexertion. Training your arms often without muscular soreness at all, you basically just let your arms do what they are capable of, without forcing them to grow.

Because of their size, it’s indeed true that your arms are not as resilient to higher frequency of training and will take time to recover. This is especially true for the biceps, being a small muscle. Stressing the triceps more often than the biceps is acceptable, for it is a larger muscle and has the be integrated into your chest workout at some point. Better than stacking up the frequency of your workouts because of lacking progress, is increasing the variety and the intensity of your workouts.

I can tell you I’ve experienced serious bicep growth when I was hitting them less often. On the other hand I seemed to be stuck in my bicep growth when I was way too pathetic about arm growth. So just relax a little and may lessen the frequency of your overall bicep work. It is more important to shock your arms. When you hit them – hit them hard.

You can also shock them through a frequency overload. You can do this by working out your biceps 2 days in row, one time with big weights, using lighter weigh on the second day. Another option is to hit your biceps with huge amounts of volume and low rest intervals. Make sure you get a good amount of rest days afterwards.