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Aesthetic Appeal

Sculpting a body for aesthetic appeal is all about perfect proportion and symmetry. With a strategic approach to training the body as a whole and a focused effort on the details, one can have a physique which is balanced and proportionate giving an appearance of an ideal look. This works for both men and women.

In fact what we consider as a good body actually implies a body with ideal proportion and symmetry. Not only a balanced body works better but also looks aesthetically pleasing – even if you aren’t quite conscious of it, you are attracted to that body structure.

The Major Muscle Groups:
  • Upper Body — The major muscle groups in the upper body are the deltoid muscles in the shoulders, the biceps and triceps in the arms, the pectoral muscles in the chest, and the back muscles.
  • Lower Body — The lower body is primarily made up of the quadriceps and hamstrings in the thighs, the gastrocnemius and smaller soleus muscles in the calves, as well as the gluteus muscles in the hips and buttocks.
  • Abs — The abdomen is made up of four major muscle groups: rectus abdominis, internal and external obliques, and the transverse abdominis.

To develop your body as a whole, with optimal symmetry and proportion, you must train all muscle groups in order to maintain balanced muscles, better body symmetry and better posture.  Most people ignore the training of muscles they can’t see such as back, hamstrings, calves and triceps and focus on the muscles they admire in the mirror such as chest, biceps, shoulders and abs. This causes an unbalanced looking physique, poor posture and also disregarding a muscle group overtime potentially leads to injury.

Opposing Muscles

If you're training one of the muscles you must also train its antagonistic partner (like biceps and triceps, quadriceps and hamstrings, chest and back). All major muscle groups work in pairs and need to be balanced in terms of strength and flexibility. This creates balance and prevents injury. For example, when you bend your elbow by using the biceps muscle, it's pair the tricep muscle must be willing to stretch for the bicep muscle to contract and bend the elbow fully.

Muscle Imbalance

When one muscle is stronger than the opposing muscle, you have an imbalance. Below are few examples.

  • If you strengthen the abdominals, and forget to do the same for the opposing lower back muscles, your can have a back pain because the abdomen supports the back.
  • If you work your chest muscles and neglect the upper back muscles (trapezius), you will have a forward stoop to your shoulder which can cause upper back pain. Also people who do push-ups and bench presses for chest workout but never do rows or pull-ups for back workout, their chest gets far stronger than the back and they have a strength imbalance.
  • If you work hard to strengthen the front of your leg, the quadriceps but often skip exercising the hamstring then a muscle imbalance in this area of the leg can result in a ‘popping’ sound in the knee.

 

The bottom line: 

Be your own judge for your body and find your weak points and aim to develop ideal symmetry and proportion. For your body to look its best both proportion and symmetry need to exist. A proportional body has everything in harmony, the balance, the strength, the flexibility, the ideal look, the aesthetic appeal, the efficiency in everyday activities and a better athletic performance.

It is vital that all fitness enthusiasts appreciate that fitness is not all about training the obvious larger muscles they see in the mirror but effective training is about balancing your body with a variety of exercises and movements that focus equal attention to the smaller stability muscles also.