How music affects your gains

There are many different kinds of music, musical taste varies from person to person. While we are not the same, we have one thing in common: we all have at least one favorite genre of music.

Why is this important to note? Because music can give us power. It is more than capable of making us calmer, or, on the contrary: cheer us up. Rarely, but sometimes what we listen to depends on the situation we're in. For example, it doesn't matter how much you love hardstyle music (which is usually around 140 to 150 beats per minute) you shouldn't listen to this type of music while you're laying on your bed and trying to sleep at night. In this case, you should stick to more relaxing tunes, or to complete silence (which is probably the best for you t night).

However, there are certain periods in our everyday life when we should strongly consider listening to our favorite songs. For example our workouts.

Prior to (and more importantly, during) your workouts – counted to the pre-sleep period we mentioned earlier – you should be full of energy, both mentally and physically. In other words, all you should think about is attacking the weights. There are certain products on the market that put you into the right state of mind, but you can do this even more naturally – yes, with the help of your favorite music.

Studies have shown that music can increase your strength by up to 15 percent. This is a very strong and very real, scientifically proven placebo effect. If you already trained to your favorite music yet, then you know it's true. What? You haven't? Then please read further.

Why is it so important to listen to your own music?

So we now know that music can have a great impact on you and your performance, but only if you like what you're listening to. The problem is, each gym plays different kinds of music – so when you arrive to the gym without your headphones in your pocket, you let the gym decide what music you'll hear while you're lifting weights. And what happens when you continuously hear music you don't like?

Since you are forced to listen to what you dislike, you could easily lose concentration. Why? Because all you can think of is how that music sucks.

While the right choice of music can increase your performance and therefore your muscle gains, music you don't like can either hurt your gains or do nothing at all, so you won't get the benefits of the power of the music. Those who think it doesn't matter what can be heard in the gym should re-think their opinion. The best thing is that enjoying the benefits of listening to your own selection of music is completely free – you just need your smartphone and your headphones.

What is the right kind of music for YOUR workouts?

Never let anyone tell you what you should listen to while working out. Probably most people think Eye Of The Tiger is the best workout song of all time, but if you haven't seen Rocky, or you think it's outdated, you don't have to agree with them. Find a song/music genre that motivates you, whether if it's rock, hip-hop, electronic music, or just a track from your favorite movie.

Working out to silence is way better than working out to bad music. There is nothing wrong with training in silence, you can achieve great results like that, but – like I said – most of the time it's not up to you what you listen to in the gym. And doesn't matter how hard the gym tries, it is impossible to play music that everybody loves to work out to.

You have a weapon against disappointing music though. If you train seriously, and you concentrate hard enough on the exercise, you may be able to exclude the outer world – partly. Unfortunately, this is very difficult to do when you have a bad day, and this technique (which should be automatic) will not work between rest periods, and you might start to think about music instead of training.

Be careful!

Sometimes music hypes you up too much, and this can very easily lead to overtraining. You need to chill a bit from time to time, it does more harm if you try cheer yourself up with music for 60 minutes than good. , so make sure to include songs with slower tempo in your playlist. If you never tried to listen to your own selection, it will be a new sensation for you, and you will train much harder than before. Remember: less is sometimes more.

Oh yeah, and just because the music is fast and strong, you should always pay attention to the negatives of the exercises, because it's even more important than the positive phase of the movement when you want to increase your muscle mass.

Lastly, but not least, try using earphones instead of headphones. The cord could get in your way, and believe me, if your earphones fall out in the middle of a hard exercise, it will ruin your whole set. So make sure the cord is in between your skin and your t-shirt.

Also, choose the right shorts, because if your pocket is too tiny, your phone can easily fall out between reps, and again, it will ruin everything.