back to the point
If you do some weight training, and add a few pounds of muscle to your body, you will, 24 hours / day, burn more calories / hour than you did without adding those pounds of muscle. That's a really good thing! It means that you don't have to go on a diet to lose weight! But there's a catch - of course
It's not that easy to add even a few pounds of new muscle to your body. Having lifted weights off and on for more years than I care to mention, I've found the fastest way to gain muscle mass is to "train heavy". Here's how it works:
Step 1: You have to get your muscles, and tendons, and ligaments prepared to "train heavy". This part of the process usually takes 4 to 8 weeks depending on how strong you are, and on how consistent you are. The basic idea is that you want to start doing some easy and then medium difficulty weight training using those muscles that you want get bigger. For most people (men and women), growing the following muscles usually gives you the most "bang for the buck". In other words some muscles grow faster, and make you look better than others. I would recommend that you focus on your quadriceps ("quads" - front of your legs above the knees), your leg biceps ("hams" - back of your legs behind your knees), your "glutes" (butt muscles), your pectorals ("pecs" - chest muscles), your triceps (back of your arms above the elbow), your biceps (front of your arms above the elbow), your deltoids ("delts" - top or your shoulders), your latissimus ("lats" - on the upper back, outside), your lower back, and your abdominals ("abs"). Of these, the leg muscles, lats, and triceps will grow bigger fastest - adding the most muscle mass, but you don't want to neglect the other muscles I mentioned because you want to keep opposing muscles balanced. For instance, your quads and hams oppose each other, and your legs will be the strongest and healthiest if those two muscle groups are both strong. If your quads are strong and your hams aren't, you can have all sorts of problems.
Okay, with those muscles in mind, the idea is to do maybe three "sets" of 10 or so repetitions for each muscle group. For instance, if you're working on your biceps, you might do 10 bicep curls, rest for a minute, do 10 more, rest for a minute and do 10 more. Start with a weight that doesn't hurt when you do your 3 sets. In these beginning stages you can probably work on each muscle group every 2nd or 3rd day. If you want to work out every day, just do some of your muscles on one day and other muscles on the next day - that way each muscle is being worked with the best frequency. After a week or so you'll probably be able to start using more weight for each of your muscles. It's a good idea to keep a record, for each muscle group, of how much weight you're lifting.
The idea for this first 4 to 8 week period is to establish a basic level of muscle tone, and to get your tendons and ligaments strengthened.
Step 2: The "train heavy" phase. As a disclaimer, I need to say that "train heavy" is potentially dangerous
Really!
I think that it's the fastest way to get strong and grow muscle mass, but it puts a real strain on your bones, your tendons, your ligaments, and your muscles! I would recommend that you work with a trainer who really knows what he/she is doing. Your trainer might not use the phrase "train heavy". but if you explain what you're doing, they should be familiar with this idea. To do "train heavy" safely you have to prepare correctly, learn really good lifting style, and pay attention to what your body is telling you.
With all THAT said, here's the basic idea of "train heavy"...
For each muscle group, (other than abs and lower back - don't do "train heavy" on your abs or lower back!), you will do ONE SET! and ONE SET ONLY - once every FIVE DAYS! But this one set will be a monster! You want to use so much weight that you can't possibly, if your life depended on it, do more than 12 reps. Also, you need to find the correct amount of weight so that you can do at least 6 reps. It might take a few sessions to find the correct weights for each muscle. Once you've calibrated weights for each of your muscles,
you should find that after 2 or 3 sessions you can do 12 reps. When that happens you need to add more weight until you can't possibly do 12 reps.
Once you're into the flow of this, maybe 6 to 8 weeks from when you started, you'll find that you can do all the muscles I listed above in less than an hour, and you'll need to lift only once every five days.
The theory behind this approach is that if you do a really heavy set, "to failure" (i.e. you can't possibly lift that weight again), your muscle will need 5 days to repair and grow.
A lot of people will tell you that you need to do 3 sets and probably that you need to hit each muscle more often than once every 5 days. I can tell you that in my experience, a REALLY FRICKIN' HARD set, every five days, builds muscle the fastest.
Remember - get those tendons and ligaments ready!
Also, longer term, your muscles will get stronger much faster than your tendons and ligaments will. So long term. once you're up and running, you have to do your train heavy schedule on about 8 to 10 week cycles. Let me give you an example... Let's say that when you started, you could do 40 lb. curls. Let's say that after 8 weeks of train heavy you can now do 55 lb. curls. At this point you should probably take off a couple of weeks ( or do really light weights). When you return, don't start at 55 lbs. Drop back to maybe 50 lbs. and grow from there. This approach gives your tendons and ligaments time to "catch up" to your muscles.
I've skipped over a lot of details, and I'd strongly recommend that you work with a good trainer - but this stuff REALLY works!
Next of course, you should also be doing aerobic exercises to help your heart and lungs, speaking of which, I gotta go buy some new running shoes
hth,
Bert
p.s. For both men and women, you don't have to worry about busting out of your clothes and "bulking up" too fast
Adding muscle mass and size is a slow process, and as Kathy says, you always have a "body back" guarantee - if you don't like your new muscles, just stop training and you'll get your old body back
. I plan to work on exercise so I wanted to know how much time you spend on exercise. Initially.. I plan to start with dumbbells... I am actually planning to reduce weight and build muscles 
