how heavy??

i have been going up on my free weights every 2 1/2 weeks and i am at 8 right now. the thing is, should i go higher than 12 lbs? or will i probably cause an injury since theres no machine spotting me and im a small person. and is 12 heavy enough to actually keep building muscle after the 2 1/2 weeks of using 12 lbs are over?

Well no one can really answer that for you. It's definitely a good question, no one wants to get hurt or waste their time either!

What are you doing with 8lbs? I don't have a spotter, either but I'm also not a small person. 12lbs would be way too light for me, but for others it's pretty heavy. Only you can answer that for yourself

i do about 20 minutes of static lifting exercises and 20 minutes of weights with movement of the rest of my body. im not worried about getting hurt with 12 for the static but for the dynamic things i dont want to accidently swing the weights and pull something or for something bad to happen. i dont want to bulk up either. i just want to keep toned arms and for my body to keep being challenged, not get stuck on a plateau by staying at the same amount of lifting weight

You CAN NOT bulk up. You can't if you tried. Even if you tried really really hard.  Don't worry about that!

You didn't specifically say, but it sounds like you're doing a lot of isolation work. If you want nice arms do more compound movements: rows, military and chest presses, lat pull downs.

Also don't forget your lower half. Squats use almost 50% of your muscles!

Read Stumptuous. It's a great resource for female lifters. It dispels myths (like bulking up), has lots of routines and helps you if you don't know what some of those exercises are that I mentioned. My new favorite book is "The New Rules of Lifting for Women"

well thats a relief!!! i was really scared of bulking up!

yes i do a lot of isolation work. are compound movement where you use opposing muscles??

and yes i already do squats and lunges. they are definitly a good workout!

thanks for the link, i will definitly look into that. and thanks for all of your help:)

Compound movements are using lots of muscle groups at once, not just biceps or triceps. They are better because you're working those smaller muscles at the same time you're working other, bigger muscle groups. Unless you're competing in a body building thingy or something, don't worry about doing those smaller movements.

Squats and lunges rule. I can squat a lot but I recently found out lunges are kicking my butt when I changed up my work out :(

Original Post by smartjock256:

"a body building thingy"?

haha, I just thought that was funny...maybe that's a sign I should go to bed...

Sorry about my use of technical terms!

Perhaps this will help?

http://exercise.about.com/od/exerciseworkouts /a/liftingheavy_2.htm

it's good to put different weights to use. For instance I can't handle much weight when my arms are out away from my body, I can do a larger weight on shoulder presses than on bicep curls. For Lats or lunges I can do a much larger weight. large weight for chest presses too.

Listen to your body and you can usually tell where to increase and where to continue.

thanks so much thats great advice!!!