One of the most important things you can do in your attempts to build muscle is to have patience. Most people I talk to in the gym, especially beginners, want to gain muscle overnight.

But the truth is, building muscle only comes from persistent, hard training. There are no shortcuts and it isn't easy. But if you stay the course and have patience, you're bound to continue doing what you need to do in order to gain muscle.

Besides, building muscle is a never-ending process. The most popular bodybuilders spend years of consistent, dedicated training before they even consider competing.

The way to make consistent gains is to strive to get better each workout. Try to get one more rep than you were able to get last workout.

Or try to add 2.5 pound plates to each side each week. If you do this, the amount of weight you lift after a few months will be much more than if you didn't use small, incremental gains.

And the amount of muscle mass that comes with these small increases will be staggering.

Now, for you to build muscle, you have to follow the essential principle of progressive overload. Progressive overload means that you consistently increase the amount of weight you use in an exercise.

And this takes time. It can't be done overnight, it takes years. That's why patience is so important when trying to build muscle. Without it, you're going to give up way too soon.

Muscle gains always follow significant improvements in strength. So the key to quality muscle mass is to focus on becoming stronger, particularly in lifts like the bench press, squat and deadlift.

Young or old, the only way to make big improvements to your physique is to focus on becoming stronger in these key lifts. When a bodybuilder makes steady gains in strength the muscle mass is sure to follow.

Truly impressive strength doesn't happen by accident. Most of us have to work at it if the goal is a noticable strength increase.

Many people use the same amount of weight in an exercise for weeks, months or even years. And they soon realize that after a certain length of time, the muscle and strength gains just don't happen.

To keep the gains coming, you have to use progressive overload. Big gains are made with small steps. You need to keep making improvements in strength, in very small increments.

Most gyms have one-pound or 2.5 pound weights. These are the tools of progressive overload and the true secret to massive strength and muscle mass.

Just imagine, if you manage to add a one-pound weight to each end of the barbell, every week. After one year of training you'll be benching 104 more pounds than you were at the beginning of the year!

And the muscle mass gains that come with this strength increase will be amazing. And it all happened from a one-pound increase, performed consistently!

Small persistent gains are the foundation of progressive overload and the foundation of building muscle.

So have patience when it comes to building muscle and take small, persistence steps to reach your goals. I can guarantee, the longer you stick with your training, the more muscular and stronger you'll be.