With the routines proposed here, drastic changes to your lifestyle are recommended as opposed to subtle ones. Why? Because your body is good at adjusting to and reverting back from moderate changes. You may actually get nothing out of subtlety. Of course this is all dependent on age and health concerns, even though most (but not all) ectomorphs are young and in decent shape. So drastic could be dangerous for some.
With any drastic change comes a challenge, and with any challenge comes success or failure. Success will happen if you truly want it, conform to it and say to yourself, "my lifestyle and habits are the reason my body is like this, and it's time for a much needed, warm welcomed change." Again, you have to really want this! Of course, failure will happen if you expect to succeed overnight; this is going to take some time. The required changes will be joining a gym, using supplements and doubling your daily calories.
To stress any kind of mentality or way of living that might help you with growth, relaxation is the most important. You need to settle down; you need to start being lazy and using as little energy as possible. Ectomorphs usually possess this hyperactive, nervous energy that keeps them in a state of motion, if not exercise, throughout the entire day. This could be considered a cardiovascular workout in itself that's keeping your body mass very lean. Therefore, if you want to gain fat or muscle, you need stop subconsciously burning it so much. This means eating a lot and stopping the jittery behavior. This also means doing the right exercises as opposed to the wrong, which will be covered later. Your entire life has been a workout of cutting (losing weight), now it's time to bulk-up (gain).
No matter how skinny or weak you feel, you should pride yourself though: People with other body types, even naturally muscular types, usually have to interchange bulking to gain muscle and fat and cutting to lose most of the fat and some of the muscle. They have to go back and forth, while their weight goes up and down, whereas with you, the only way is up. (Face it, cutting for us is only having a can of soda all day. Our super metabolism knows no fear and cannot be reasoned with. It could digest a small, Indonesian family.)
Moving on from your strengths, your biggest weaknesses are envy, despair and discouragement. Envy is when you constantly compare your body to other men's bodies at the gym and fall short. Doing this too much will lead to the despair and frustration of wanting but not being able to have what they have, then to the discouragement and laziness of not wanting to work out and eat right because you question the point of it all. Even though your goal is to match or better the strength and size of your body over other men's, don't preoccupy yourself with these thoughts and motives because they will weigh you down. Speaking of weight, don't step on the scale everyday; give yourself a few days to a week and try to do it during the same time of day to ensure that the amount of food and water in your body is consistent everytime.
The following is a good example of how your weight will go up and down over a period of weeks or months. It's a back and forth journey, but don't let it discourage you. Also, avoid digital scales because they are inaccurate.
(Girls tell me I have cute feet.)
"My arms and legs are too skinny."
"I'm embarassed that I can't lift very much weight."
"I hate the way I look in the mirror, and there are mirrors everywhere!"
"I'm so broke."
"I might hurt myself."
"Oh my god, naked old dudes! Ewww..."
Some of these negative thoughts and more may have crossed your mind when considering a gym membership. You may already have one but never go. There is so much importance to using a gym though. Think about: If you struggle to gain fat, think of how much you'll struggle to gain muscle if you're not working it out right. For you, the right way to work out muscle is to use weight resistance (lift heavy bars) and the wrong way is to do cardio (jogging, swimming, rollerblading, etc), and really, if you're new to bodybuilding, the gym is the only place that can provide this. Knuckle pushups and legups on the bedroom floor will not help you build muscle (trust me, I know this from experience); it will just keep the muscle you already have strong.
Some people might think that working out increases stress, but it actually helps relieve it. There's this incredibly euphoric feeling after a workout due to the body releasing endorphins (tranquilizers). It's one incentive to walking into the gym and feeling the burn.
Please don't take the gym "environment" too seriously. Although you may spend upwards of several hours a week there, do not consider it a major place for socializing. Go to there to do what you need to do and leave. Don't consider gyms to be a competitive environment or a good place to meet the opposite sex. (I still like to take a walk around the treadmills and look though... yum.) This mentality relieves you of the apprehension and intimidation involved in getting through the door. Remember, some people were born with beauty while others had to work hard for it, and most, if not all, of the people at the gym are in the hardworking class. If they were naturals, they wouldn't need to be there!
In the end, if and when this works for you, there's something very redeeming about not being able to fit into your favorite dress pants anymore or trying to take off a fitted dress shirt without unbuttoning it and getting stuck in it once you reach your upper body ("Somebody help!").
Now let's pump some iron...
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