Does BodyBuilding not create muscle imbalances?

[hughesa1]

My perfectionism has never allowed me to get anywhere in the years I have tried building my body but one thing that has always played on my mind is the subject of muscle imbalances. Basically, no matter what your workout there is no way you can work every muscle of the entire body in equal proportion. That is impossible. Some muscles maybe worked more than others, others (really tiny ones) may not even be worked at all.

Some people even continue to work on other muscles when they have injured certain muscles. Some people even leave certain body parts out completely. Does all this not create muscle imbalances? Is this not a serious problem? I have read that muscle imbalances can cause pain, poor posture, etc. Just the thought of my muscles not being in direct proportion to one another makes my stomach churn. Is this just the perfectionism and not really relevant at all?

I think the main reason I though of this recently is that when I started training properly recently, I started on light weights and worked my way up to the heavy weights, making small increments each week. It took like 8 weeks to do my first set to failure. This was on the chest/shoulders/triceps day. I was going to failure on these for like 5 weeks, yet I still weren't going to failure on the other muscle days because I weren't up to the heavy weights yet. I started thinking that these to-failure muscles would be growing and the other muscles would be left behind, maybe creating imbalances. It caused quite a bit of stress.

[j.daddy]

It sounds like you are really overthinking everything. Still, the point of bodybuilding is to keep everything in perfect perportion.

[Wildtim]

OP.

You are an idiot. Your failure and stress comes from the fact that you are trying to do exerything all at once exactly correctly. Ain't gonna happen, not in bodybuilding, not in life.

If this stuff is causing your stomach to churn and you to experience stress I suggest you give it up, lock yourself in a room and never come out again.

[thedogdidit]

My perfectionism has never allowed me to get anywhere in the years I have tried building my body but one thing that has always played on my mind is the subject of muscle imbalances. Basically, no matter what your workout there is no way you can work every muscle of the entire body in equal proportion. That is impossible. Some muscles maybe worked more than others, others (really tiny ones) may not even be worked at all.

Some people even continue to work on other muscles when they have injured certain muscles. Some people even leave certain body parts out completely. Does all this not create muscle imbalances? Is this not a serious problem? I have read that muscle imbalances can cause pain, poor posture, etc. Just the thought of my muscles not being in direct proportion to one another makes my stomach churn. Is this just the perfectionism and not really relevant at all?

I think the main reason I though of this recently is that when I started training properly recently, I started on light weights and worked my way up to the heavy weights, making small increments each week. It took like 8 weeks to do my first set to failure. This was on the chest/shoulders/triceps day. I was going to failure on these for like 5 weeks, yet I still weren't going to failure on the other muscle days because I weren't up to the heavy weights yet. I started thinking that these to-failure muscles would be growing and the other muscles would be left behind, maybe creating imbalances. It caused quite a bit of stress.

Stick to full body workouts. Functional. Problem solved.

[Verbalcody]

sounds like your 'perfectionism' is pretty retardedistic

[poloralphloren]

I think this is a realistic concern -- indeed we see many heavy lifters out there with very poor posture, and injuries do happen quite often as a result of muscular imbalances.

But if you train properly this shouldn't be a problem. I think the key is to establish a base of strength using compound exercises. Let's take the squat as an example -- you could try to duplicate the effects of the squat by exercising your glutes, quads, hamstrings, calves, etc. in some perfect ratio such that your legs and core are prepared to keep you aligned correctly with respect to gravity. Or you could just do squats. By the nature of the exercise, all muscles are worked in exactly the right proportion to move your body upwards against gravity.

This is a big reason why Starting Strength is a great program, in my opinion. But any program that focuses exclusively (or nearly so) on compound exercises, with both pushes and pulls, upper and lower body, etc. should establish a base that will keep you strong in a functional, balanced way.