will lifting weights make me bulky?

idk if its any use cuz im female so our bodies are diff but i lift 10/12kg and im not bulky at all. my shoulders are more.... idk what the word is but you can see i have stronger shoulders maybe? idk. but im not bulky at all.

using 2kg will tone your arms nicely after a while cuz its not an overnight thing but it wont make you bulky. youll probably need to eat a lot more protein and lift 20-30kg like bench pressing (i think thats what its called ahha) to see proper bulky muscles, even then that takes a long time but i could be wrong.

what your doing will tone you it wont make you bulky

 

It takes years of specific training and eating a specialized high-calorie / low-fat diet (and/or abusing steroids) to get really bulky, as body-builders do.

If you want to show more upper-body muscle, that is technically adding bulk, just not a large amount of it.

You should lift heavy enough weights that sets of 6-12 reps are challenging toward the end. The amount to lift varies from exercise to exercise. 10kg is a decent amount for a biceps curl, but next to nothing for a chest press.

The coach / trainer you're working with can provide more detailed advice and customize the workout for your body. That said, regular weight training will not make most people bulky, unless they are following a specific "bulking" program.

 

I was (and still am) a pretty skinny/ lean person. My job now is a lot more physical and I have had about this same amount of exercise for a bit and besides simply being stronger (running longer/faster, carrying more) I've barely noticed any change except I lost two inches off my waist and my thighs are more toned. I don't think it will make you "bulky" in it's own right.

 

Haha, I wish I had a dollar for every time I heard this question. ;-)

You won't get "bulky" unless you work your ass off to do so. Trust me, if it were that easy a lot more people would do it. It takes years of specific training and dieting to get a physique like a bodybuilder.

I'm a huge advocate for strength training and strongly suggest you get on a program. There are basically six exercises you should do for strength training. You can do other exercises too, but these should be the base of your workout: squats, deadlifts, bench press, overhead press, pulldowns, and rows.

Personally, if you're looking to gain strength but not get bulky, I'd start out with a 5x5 program with the above exercises. That means that you would lift three days a week, say Monday, Wednesday, Friday. You have a day of rest in between each workout, and two days of rest at the end of each week. Allowing rest days is important so you don't burn yourself out. You would split the exercises up into Two workouts, A and B, and do 5 sets of 5 reps with each of the exercises with a 2-3 minute rest between sets. In workout A for example, you do squats, bench press, and pulldowns. Then your next workout day you do workout B, which would be deadlifts, overhead press, and rows. All of the exercises should be performed with a barbell, with the obvious exception of pulldowns. (You could also do seated cable rows instead of barbell rows though.)

Now, especially during the first year or so, you WILL gain some muscle. It won't be a lot, because it's not a hypertrophy program (more on that in a moment), but it's your body's adaptation to the imposed demand of lifting. You will NEVER look like a bodybuilder from doing this program though.

I should also add that while muscular strength and size are correlated, it's not in the way most people think...this is going to get a little scientific but hopefully you'll get the gist of it.

An increase in strength is associated with an increase in myofribular hypertrophy, which increases muscle size to a smaller extent than sarcoplasmic hypertrophy (which results from hypertrophy training). However, the correlation exists due to the fact that an increase in myofibular hypertrophy increases the potential for sarcoplasmic hypertrophy. This basically means that the stronger you are, the more POTENTIAL you have for hypertrophic muscle growth, but if you just do strength training, you won't gain nearly as much muscle as you would doing a bodybuilding program.

To further simplify things, a 1-5 rep range is considered best for gaining strength, while 8 or more reps is considered better for muscle growth.

Make sense?

Hope that helps! Feel free to ask questions.