When you see someone pushing forward towards their goals, you are probably wondering how long it will take you to get to where you want to be. Of course, there is no single rule that applies to everyone, so if you want to know the answer to this question, you?ll have to dig deeper and explore a multitude of factors.

First of all, you need to know what your goals are. If you want to lose weight, pack on lean muscle mass or completely change your body is a key determinant in how you want to go about fulfilling your plan. If you already know, the quest becomes easier and you can actually calculate how much time you?ll need to get to your goals. Let?s break these possible goals down and see the results.

1. Building Muscle Mass

You can put on a couple of pounds of muscle mass monthly, but if it?s your first time trying to pack on the beef, you might grow a bit more. Be aware of the fact that some of this will be body fat instead of lean muscle, which means you will need to do a cutting phase after a good bulk. If you get heavier really quickly, you might be putting on a lot of body fat, and you want to try to avoid this by burning more calories, working out longer or eating fewer calories. If your bodyweight stagnates, eat 300 extra calories per day. If that doesn?t work too, add on the calories until you can grow two pounds per month.

2. Losing Weight

More often than not, losing weight is a lengthier task than putting on lean muscle. This is because you can only drop one or two pounds of body fat weekly, so it needs a bit less time when compared to the time it takes to grow muscle. But when you want to lose weight, you might find it difficult to keep track of, simply because you can only drop about two pounds a week healthily ? if you want to lose more weight, you can have issues with gallstones, your liver or loose, flabby skin. To lose weight easier, several things are key ? getting enough sleep, eating healthy and drinking water. You want to eat lean meat, some nuts and green veggies if you want to cut properly. Also, you will minimize the amount of muscle mass lost when cutting, and you?ll be able to keep yourself healthy while losing weight.

3. Completely Transform Your Body

If you want to put on, say, 40 pounds of lean muscle, the calculations become a bit easier, meaning if you can grow 2 pounds per month, it would take you 20 months to get it done. If you find yourself stagnating, know that sometimes your body may refuse to grow more than two pounds per month. Also, remember that you will also be growing some body fat which you will need to cut later to appear more muscular.