Muscle gain is not an entertainment or leisure volition. If are you are in this game for the sole purpose of developing an impressive muscle mass, then the best advice one can ever give you is to get ready for a real undertaking. An undertaking in which hard work will be the norm and maximal efforts a must. In this game nothing less of ultimate dedication and patience is demanded, for the work will be tough and the gains slow.
That is the truth and anything else you read or hear is as a consequence of individuals whose talent is oversimplification and underestimation. The human body naturally responds slowly to the combination of exercises in resistance training, proper dieting and adequate rest. It is a process of growth after all and growth has no magic formula. The shortcuts being preached today from every pulpit are as big lies as a lie can be. Eat the right diet, train with optimal intensity and then rest. That is the way, the only way to activate hypertrophy.
It is easy to victimize yourself for not doing enough to amplify muscle gains if you have been in the gym for a while. But the fact is, it is not your fault but that of your body. Not wanting to do more than is comfortable is very natural. Not wanting to go far than the body can manage at the present is as natural as eating is. Naturally, your body is lazy and reluctant to do more than it is comfortable at doing. The only way you can prompt it out of this natural laziness, what you have not yet done if you are not on a path of optimal growth yet, is to force it to adapt to greater workload than it is comfortable with. To develop more muscle the body must be given a reason, and a good one at that.
This easily achieved by training with an overload whereby the body gives al it has and is challenged to go further than it is ready to. Consequently, when forced to deal with such an overload, an overload that is persistently placed on the muscles, it has to initiate new growth. This process of prompting the body out of the comfort zone is what resistance training is all about. You have to strive for greater work loads perpetually, such that every time the body grows into the previously challenging intensity and starts getting comfortable with it, you shift to a higher intensity and the growth continues.
All along the diet must feature the increased demand in training such that the curbs and fats provided can adequately fuel the workout and the proteins ingested throughout the day can facilitate the growth of new muscles as stimulated during training workouts. Over and above this, the workouts must be juxtaposed in between adequate rest sessions so that the muscles recover from the intense workouts. Recovery only occurs during moments of rest, when new muscle tissues are made, the existing ones are rejuvenated and the injured ones repaired of replaced.