How exactly does one STRENGTH train?

I'm at a loss!

I want to built more muscle mass and I don't know how to go about it!
Please, everyone. Help me out! I have no idea where to start!

That's a very lost post. PM me for specifics but basically you want to work your major muscle groups so you're doing a full body work out three days a week

Hi Emily, where you start depends a lot on what you are starting with.  Are you currently doing any kind of exercise?  Any cardio, flexibility training?  Do you have access to gym equipment or are you doing this from home? 

Also, every individual is different and no one single exercise program is perfect for everyone.  The most important thing is to find something that works for you, your skill level, your body type, and that you enjoy enough that you can stick with it.  That being said, do you know how much time you have to devote a week to exercise?  What are your favorite things to do?

:)  A bit more info and I'm sure we'll all be able to come up with quite a few suggestions!

sweetjaneee, since your profile shows a history of ED, do work through the potential issues with a doctor first:  you can't gain muscle without eating a calorie surplus, and that means gaining weight, and that also means gaining some fat too.  The fat's not permanent, it can be lost later while retaining the new muscle, but it's something you need to know in advance is very likely to happen.

If you're cool with that, do take spirochete up on her offer -- she knows a lot about this.

I have paid personal trainers to help me with this so let me tell you what they told me for $60 a half hour!!

Start by doing a cardion warm up...  8 to 15 minutes of running or eliptical or whatever.

Now pick a muscle group....  legs, back and bicepts, chest and tricepts.  Stomach you can do everyday.
You work ONE of the muscle groups a day for about half an hour.  then you can do your stomache for 10 minutes. 

Then you hit the cardio.  don't do more than an hour.  Always mix up the exercises that you do (including cardio) because your body remembers and if you do the same thing over and over your body gets used to it.  If you mix it up you keep it guessing. 

I like to run one day and do the elipitical the next maybe the stair climber the day after that and so on...  you see what I mean..

I hope this helped!  Like I said I got this from people I paid to help me so here is hoping that they were right!

dove2424, I don't know what you told those trainers your goals were, but the program you describe is most appropriate for an experienced lifter trying to lose fat, or an experienced lifter trying to maintain muscle but improve aerobic fitness.

So much cardio work would make it very hard for anyone to gain significant new muscle mass.

An intermediate-to-advanced lifter may need that much volume and isolation per muscle group to make progress, but beginners are better served by whole-body routines sticking to big-muscle, multi-muscle lifts (like squats, deadlift, bench press, standing press, chinups/pullups, bent rows).  Much faster progress at the start that way, and builds the proper foundation to support productive high-volume isolation work later.

Sometimes the only advantage to paying for advice is just that bleeding cash motivates you to do something ;-)

Hey guys,

pandajenn19; This would all be happening at the gym I attend, yes. I do cardio/abs 5-6 days per week. (kickboxing, running, gym machines, etc)

I'd also like somthing to burn some more fat as well as train my muscles.

As a trainer, I can tell you that  the explanation dove2424 gave was pretty spot on.  If you are having problems getting started, get with a trainer so you can be taught the proper way to do these exercises.  I literally have 20 exercises I can teach for each muscle group but you also need to understand how to challenge yourself in a way to get something from your strength training.  I see a lot of women get little to no results because they don't challenge themselves enough when it comes to the weights.  Get a trainer, have him show you what to do.  We may be expensive, but it is knowledge you'll always be able to use and pass on.  Just make sure the trainer has a reputation for being good before you shell out any money. 

Just make sure the trainer has a reputation for being good before you shell out any money.

I wanted to stress that. Sadly there are a lot more bad trainers than good ones, that's pretty common knowledge among people who spend a lot of time in the gym. One guy was trying to get me to use the Smith machine (ew) when I have a workout built around things that are not the Smith machine, and another lovely lady trainer didn't know what a squat rack is. I mean come on.

Spirochete, what do you have against the Smith?  Do you find something inherently wrong with it or does it just not fit in with your routine?

I don't like it at all because it really limits your range of motion. Our bodies don't move straight up and down like that, plus it takes away the ability for our bodies to work those stablizer muscles. I understand if someone is doing a very heavy bench press or something without a spotter, but really that's about it. Just one gal's opinion!