Upper body workouts for men. As motivation.

[Monster2]

I started working out my upper body this month, and I forgot how much I love my muscles. It's good to be a man and feel STRONG and POWERFUL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I look in the mirror now, and say. You know I'm really starting to look good, and if I lose more weight I'll look even better. It's been a long time since I enjoyed looking in the mirror and maybe this is what I need. Maybe it's the male equivalent of a woman putting on makeup. (um... maybe not)
I'm not talking about power lifting or anything. Just working the upper body with a few sets of curls, push ups, dips, takes 10 minutes or less, every other day. (for me)
I guess what I am saying... (I know... I wasn't exactly sure where I was going... LOL)
Is that being able to work out and really see a difference in my upper body is really helping. I would walk a lot, but as a guy you don't really notice too much of a difference physically when your lower body gets in shape, especially if you're fat. Whereas you can notice a huge difference, visually, by working out your arms and chest and quickly too. This was especially true in my case, I've always been naturally muscular, but I have let things go a bit.
ALSO>..... Do you really want to lose weight and look flabby and ... (gasp) have man boobs? Gotta say I don't. I have seen a few pictures of guys that have lost a lot of weight and have NOT done any upper body and it really shows. I was starting to wonder what was the point of losing weight if you're going to look flabby and old manish when you're done. (I'm turning 41 this year, so it's a big, SCARY concern)
So.... your thoughts, guys? gals?
.............
I also wanted to add that if you want to look better, esp the man boobs, make sure you work your WHOLE upper body, muscle mass on your shoulders back and arms will help pull loose skin.

 

[Monster2]

Okay. sometimes I have no idea how to say what I'm going to say, but I'm great at analogies. Here's the best I could come up with:
If you're a sculptor isn't it better to start working with a nice looking piece of rock than an ugly one?

 

[AthalaRanger]

I was under the impression (i read it somewhere) that if you are fat and work your chest area, it will make it look even bigger?

I'm sorry if I'm being ignorant here.

 

[Monster2]

I guess it's a matter of how you feel about how you look. I don't really believe that's the case, especially if you're working on tone and not size. Right now, I'm just trying to firm and NOT lose size in my upper body. I've always had a good amount of natural muscle mass, but it's gone soft, and made my muscles look like fat. But it isn't fat! I think that right now, since I've only been doing this a few weeks now, I need to focus on power and not tone, which is okay, because I'm so out of shape that anything I do will firm me up! Once I start feeling like my upper body is less like pudding, and more like rubber, then I'll start reevaluating what I need to do.
SO>>>>>> to answer your question, I guess it really all depends on how you view yourself. I've found a way to quickly feel better about I feel about myself, and it's MOTIVATING ME! If I can pass that on, great!