Most women don't really want to learn how to build muscle, as they are more interested in losing fat, particularly around the stomach.
This, however, is precisely why it is necessary to learn how to build muscle because it is the best way to get rid of the fat.
The more muscle that you have, the more calories you will burn throughout the day and the less fat you will end up with.
If you want to get a nice lean stomach you need to make sure that you add strength training to your routine.
Building muscle for women is really no different than it is for men; it is mainly about lifting heavy weights.
Of course the term heavy is relative - if you have never done any strength training before you will need to start off with fairly light weights.
The big thing is to make sure that you are doing the correct kinds of exercises to build muscle.
If you want to build muscle you need to be doing compound exercises.
These are exercises that involve several different muscle groups all at the same time.
This is things like dead lifts, squats and bench presses.
Unfortunately these are also the exercises that most people avoid doing, mainly because they require a lot of hard work.
The reason that the compound exercises are so effective is that they involve several different muscle groups at the same time which ensures that your whole body gets trained.
These types of exercises also allow you to handle more weight which will help to increase the amount of muscle that you develop.
One key that you have to keep in mind if you are trying to build muscle is that you need to constantly be increasing the workload that you do.
If you keep doing the same workout with the same weights over and over again your muscles will have no reason to get stronger and they will not grow.
It should be your goal to add either more weight or more reps at every workout.
There will be times when you won't be able to do it but it should be your goal.
One other key when you are trying to build muscle is to make sure that you rest.
Strength training is not something that you do every day; the muscle actually grows while you are resting between workouts.
Three to four times a week is probably the ideal number of strength workouts but you may benefit from fewer.
There are some women who get best results from just one workout a week.
Everybody recovers at different rates after a workout so you need to see how your body responds so that you can determine what kind of schedule gives you best results.
One last thing about building muscle for women is that you have to make sure that you are eating enough.
It takes food for muscle to grow, in particular protein.
In fact you may find that you have to increase the amount that you eat to add muscle and burn fat.
Keeping in mind of course the foods that you eat do need to be healthy.