Frustrated about lack of progress in exercise

What is your goal? To become stronger? More endurance? To improve body composition? To increase muscle mass?

Depending on your goal
- you might not be training the right way (types of exercise, frequency, rest...)
- and/or your food intake may not be appropriate (number of calories, protein,...)

It would help to specify what you actually want to accomplish.

Many, many people have gotten frustrated trying to achieve the elusive "toning" through exercise.

In reality, there is no such thing as "toning," is doesn't exist. You can build muscle strength, endurance, and bulk. That's it.

It's very possible that you have hit the limit of how much bulk you can add with your current exercise routine. You can keep at it and build more strength and endurance and never gain any more muscle mass, that's very possible.

It doesn't mean the exercise isn't working or that you aren't improving, it just means that if your goal is to build more muscle mass, what you are doing might not be the best approach.

The other side of the "toning" coin is losing enough body fat for your muscle bulk to be visible and not hidden.

People always assume I'm very athletic, which is hilarious because I'm disabled and can barely walk. However, I look super "toned" because I maintain decent muscle mass through PT, and I keep my body fat low enough for that muscle bulk to show through.

However, I've been a heavy gym goer in the past, but I had more fat on me and NO ONE assumed I was particularly fit because I didn't look "toned." My muscles were much bigger, I was insanely strong, and ridiculously fit, but it was camouflaged under fat and I just looked bigger, not buffer.

This is why body builders have to go through such intense cutting phases to show off their muscles.

So if you are expecting the same old routine to substantially alter the appearance of your muscles under your fat, then yeah, you're probably just going to get frustrated.

If you just want to be active and exercise for your overall health, then keep doing what you're doing, it sounds like you're taking great care of your body.

But if you want your muscles to be more visible and achieve that "toned" look, you either need to lose some fat cover to let your muscle mass show more, or you need to focus on substantial muscle bulking, which is far more challenging and may or may not be worth it.

Point being: be clear in what your body composition goals are and what it takes to achieve them, and then decide from there what efforts are worth doing.

But whatever you do, don't give up exercising just because it won't magically, unrealistically alter your body composition, even if you stay looking exactly the same, regular exercise is incredibly important.

If you "give up" I guarantee you won't get to keep what you've already worked so hard for and a future version of yourself will look back at you now and say "man, I wish I had kept up that exercise, I was so much stronger and healthier back then, plus look how great my body looked!"

girish_ph wrote: »

My friend told me that I need 90 to 100 gms of protein daily. I was way below that. Two days ago, I changed my diet and am taking in a large amount of protein . I hope it helps.

Guys, please tell me -

i) If I increase protein intake, how long for the effect to show up in muscles/strength?
ii) I am about 10 kgs (22 lb) overweight - mainly on my belly. Wiull taking protein reduce that?

Thanks for your support

Fat gain/loss = result of calorie intake, not protein intake
muscle/strength gain: depends on exercise program/rest, sufficient protein AND calorie level

So no, just increasing protein doesn't guarantee that you will lose fat and gain muscle/strength: your exercise also needs to be sufficiently stimulating as well as incorporating sufficient rest (your muscle grow during rest, so for example it's best to not train the same muscle every day) and your calorie intake needs to be appropriate (building muscle in a calorie deficit is harder than in a calorie surplus).

FYI: under ideal circumstances, you can possibly gain 1 or 2 lbs of muscle per month.

Without knowing more about your actual routine and your goals it's hard to be specific but if you're doing reasonably intense workouts 5 or 6 days a week part of your problem may also be lack of recovery time.

It sounds counterintuitive but your muscles need time between hard workouts, that's why you'll see people doing push/pull/legs kinds of splits.