If you are skinny and find it difficult to pack on muscle then you are going to definitely want to watch this video. Here I am going to break down how to eat to build muscle and give you strategies on the best ways to approach your meal plans to give you the best chance of success. Too often, the overly simplified advice of “eat big and get big” is not enough. Here we are going to see why this can lead to an abundance of low quality gains (i.e. fat) instead of defined muscle.
If you have been lifting for any length of time you have likely heard how important your nutrition is to the way your body looks. Pack a bunch of low quality foods into your diet and even though you may pack on some mass through training, it is going to look bloated and non-aesthetic when it is composed of mostly increases in body fat. This is not the look you should be going for especially if you are going to need to perform at a high level as well.
Instead, the goal should be to build lean muscle without unnecessary or excess body fat. In order to achieve this you must first realize that simply eating more food indiscriminately is not the way to go. You would be better off learning how to make smarter food selections and opting for high quality nutrient dense foods.
There is a problem with this approach however, and it can be a big one if you don’t manage it properly. That is, often times the nutrient dense foods are not calorically dense. Meaning, the healthier the food option becomes the fewer calories it has. When you attempt to simply cram more food into each meal to compensate for the sparser calories you often find that you get too full too quickly and cannot sustain it.
This is where the approach to eating more frequently throughout the day comes in helpful. Now there is nothing magical about eating 6 times per day rather than 3. However, when it comes to hardgainers, it is especially helpful and a much more successful approach to eating since meal frequency is always an easier ask than increased meal volume when the stomach is used to eating a certain amount per sitting.
Next, it is important that you chronicle your meals for about 2 to 3 days. This forces you to assess how much you are truly eating in a day. Often times, this is eye opening to those that actually take the time to do it. It becomes abundantly clear that they are not eating enough food to amount to any kind of muscle protein synthesis. Higher protein intake can help to lower the demand for calorie excess however in both instances, your body still needs enough high quality food to help you to build muscle.
It is here that liquid calories and making the more calorie dense foods like avocados, natural peanut butter and nuts your staple foods, becomes most helpful. Adding a few protein shakes or smoothies in to your existing meals and not forgetting to opt for these more calorie compacted food options for snacks is a great way to quickly increase the intake throughout the day.
A sample day of eating is included in this video towards the end to give you an idea of how you would want to structure your meal plan if you were looking to put on more size and were struggling with being too skinny at the moment.
Oh hey, best advice I've seen on this subject.
I’m 8’7” and 14 ounces with a 47 gram bench. Any tips for adding muscle weight
YES !!! Jesse is the "every man." It reeeeeally helps us trust the system and trust what Jeff says, when we get to see it actually working for someone who started out as a "beginner" like most of us are, and to see the transformation. I hope and pray that Jesse keeps the momentum going and stays focused, because whether he realizes it or not, he is now the role model that so many people are looking up to. He's the guy that's giving us the confidence that :Yes, this WILL work for us, because it worked/is working for him." We are ALL anxiously waiting to see further and continued improvement in Jesse, to keep our belief system in place! We NEED to constantly see him bigger/stronger/more muscular than he was last time. Yes, the changes become much slower the longer you do it, but as long as we still see progress, it will keep us going ! …… no pressure or anything Jesse lmao THANK YOU for being the "test subject." This is what alllll of us excuse-makers have been dying to see, to build back our confidence and motivation and to KNOW FOR CERTAIN FINALLY that the system works.
Jeff you get likes before I watch….. cause you da main mane!
I'm 6'1 and was 145 at the start of my junior year and I just hit 170 and it's not even the end of third quarter yet
JEFF I NEED HELP… I was doing 5k calories a day and went from 163 lbs to 182 lbs in 1.5 months. The problem occurred when I didn't shit for 2 days after shitting 3-5 times a day my whole life. I took some stool softeners and had a nice crap, got it out and list a pound or two of that weight but its all good. Kept chugging then friday I got food poisoning from some milk that everyone at my school had and I was shitting myself from 9 pm until 3 in the morning that day and now I can't even eat food and I want to die.
I used to eat 2 eggs and bread every morning. Sometimes also tomatoes. Everytime I ate it I felt nauseous and so full…
Now I eat 5-6 eggs. Usually with some bacon. No bread. I am ready to do whatever, right after I finish eating. I can literally sprint and not feel nauseous. Turned out, it was all caused by the flour.
It was a bread from a small local bakery by the way. No mass produced crap. Some would even call it healthy. Not me! 😀
Easy gainer meal plan?
3 weeks ago I started working out and eating right, also quit smoking as well, started 6'4 170lb and 3 weeks I have had 3 cigarettes in total rather than a pack a day and I've lost 5 pounds but I'm eating 3500 calories and getting good carbs and protein, I may have lost weight but I can feel muscle and I can arm wrestle and beat people who last month I couldn't beat
Following your channel for quite some time, and working out for a year now. I can see some gains. I'm want to know if u could give some advice or tips for a Type1 Diabetes Hardgainer? I have diabetes my whole life also 28 years. I see some improvement already, but if possible some tips would be a great help. 😁