Picking specific goals increases your chances of success. Setting a bodybuilding
goal is like choosing a destination when taking a road trip. Going on a road trip
without a destination will likely result in a lot of driving in circles, getting lost or
wasting a lot of time and money with nothing to show. The same goes for
bodybuilding. Without determining what your specific goal is you too will likely
just waste a lot of time, resources and energy.

Set your goals realistically relative to what your current body weight and body fat
percentage is. Determine what your current lean body mass is. For example, if
you weigh 198 pounds and your body fat percentage is 19.8 then you would
weigh 159 pounds at 0% body fat. So if your goal is to have a 5% body fat then
you would figure out your goal weight at five percent body fat.

Current weight / (1- percentage)

Using the example above:

159/ (1- 0.05)
159/ (.95)
=167 pounds

So according to the above example, gaining no more muscle achieving five
percent body fat would net our example at a weight of 167 pounds.
Depending on your body fat, you can figure out realistic goals according to the
following time lines:

Calculate fat loss at 1- 2 pounds per week.
Calculate muscle gain at 3 pounds per month.

So using our champion above, losing 31 pounds of fat should take about 15
weeks of consistent smart dieting. More than three pounds of muscular weight
will likely be gained in your first month from proper carbohydrate loading and
water retention. However, three pounds per month is a realistic long-term goal.

Look 16 weeks into the future and see what your achievements could be. Write
them down somewhere that you can see it frequently like the back of your
bathroom door or on your forehead (joking).

Proceed to Step 3 ahead.

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