Hormonal harmony.The main hormones to consider when attempting to maximize your anabolic drive are listed below. Note that Thyroid can be both anabolic and catabolic; at normal levels, it can lend to anabolism, but high levels are catabolic. Maintaining the right balance between each group of hormones increases muscle mass over time.
The 5 laws of anabolism
Enough science; you can wake-up now. Changing certain training variables such as exercise duration, intensity, and the type of exercise can affect levels of the vrious anabolic and catabolic hormones. Lifestyle, attitude, a good diet, and supplementation also play significant roles in developing the anabolic environment. At the heart of all this talk are the five laws of anabolism -the fundamentals and tools pro's use to ratchet-up muscles of steel. Here's what you can do today to activate your anabolic reactor.


The anabolic attidtude
If you think you can, you will; it's all in the state of mind. Every great bodybuilder's routine begins with the right attitude. In other words, the next Mr. Olympia will not be the self-defeating type. According to the latest research, staying positive will help you to support the anabolic environment. Findings show that your overall mood can influence levels of anabolic and catabolic hormones at the same time. A positive attitude can increase levels of
Growth Hormone (GH) and decrease levels of cortisol, while a negative attitude can lead to a reverse in those effects. Success comes in "cans," not "can'ts," right? Stay positive and you'll stay anabolic.
Lifestyle
An anabolic lifestyle is one of consistent and healthy habits. Needless to say, recreational drugs and alcohol are not part of the anabolic environment. If you want to fully realize your anabolic potential, you're going to have to say goodbye to your cigarettes, beer, and any other decidedly catabolic habit. This isn't rocket science. If you're ready and willing to make a commitment to an anabolic lifestyle, you must adopt good habits; eat right, train right, and live right.
Training and Recovery
Manipulating factors such as duration, intensity, and the type of exercise performed can make you an anabolic freak - in a shredded, muscles-of-steel kind of way. Anabolism, remember, is about strength, not endurance. Limiting the number of exercises performed during each workout will maximize muscle response and encourage growth. As long as you're stimulating the muscle and not overworking it, this limitation is effective in promoting muscle mass. At the same time, lifting more weight over fewer sets maximizes muscle stimulation, stresses muscle more efficiently, and allows for improved growth. Be careful - too many sets can cause an overload of catabolic hormones. Focusing on functional strength or compound exercises, such as bench presses, squats, military presses, and dead lifts works numerous muscles and put the body through heavier, multiple-joint movements. In contrast, isolation exercises, such as concentration curls, lateral raises, and tricep push-downs work only a few muscles and joints at a time. Thus, an ideal program might incorporate two exercises over eight sets for smaller muscle groups, and three exercises over twelve sets for larger muscle groups.
The important thing to remember is that overtraining can be extremely catabolic because overworked muscles break down faster than they can be rebuilt. Balance   is  again crucial to bringing about anabolic results. Too much work increases catabolic hormone production, while too little work wastes extra anabolic hormones. Bodybuilders must be wary of their peak anabolic state - the point at which catabolism increases beyond anabolism. You might see a need to increase the intensity and frequency of your workout upon reaching this plateau. Unfortunately, this does more harm than good; overtraining, besides increasing catabolic hormone production, leads to impaired performance, lethargy, and negative changes in behavior and mood.
Just as clocks need rewinding, muscles need rebuilding. And, as any seasoned gym veteran will tell you, muscles aren't built in the gym. Sleep offers the perfect opportunity to build lean muscle mass without lifting a single barbell. When you sleep, your body recovers and releases growth hormones. Cutting sleep short disturbs the physiological and anabolic mechanisms that rebuild muscle. While it's hard to determine exactly how much you need, bodybuilders should try to get at least eight hours of ZZZs to allow for maximum recovery .
For you early-risers out there, science has found a few benefits to early-morning exercise.
Morning workouts metabolize more fat than workouts at any other time of the day. This may or may not be affected by another interesting finding - exposure to bright light in the A.M. may boost testosterone levels throughout the day. Early-morning light has been found to raise levels of a particular hormone (luteinizing hormone, or LH, for the curious) that in turn boosts testosterone. Here's a tip: for an even greater LH boost, try adding some tribulus to your supplement routine; a few hundred milligrams (625 mg or so, standardized for furastanol saponins) ought to do the trick.
Diet & Nutrition
Every bodybuilder should use diet to satisfy the needs of energy, water, protein, essential fatty acids (EFAs), and most, if not all of the vitamins and essential minerals out there. Creating the anabolic diet, however, is not always an easy endeavor, as this involves figuring out how much of what to eat, and when. Thankfully, some general rules still apply - for example, getting six or more meals  per day, with a few in the form of meal replacements allows most everyone to increase the absorption of nutrients that feed the anabolic environment. Following these guidelines will satisfy your dietary needs and boost your anabolic drive.
Recent studies, for instance, demonstrate that the anabolic effects of intense training are improved by a diet high in
protein. After you've maxed-out in the gym and stimulated your muscles to the point that they must adapt, your need for protein increases in order to increase muscle mass. Studies have also provided evidence that insulin and growth hormone levels surge when protein is taken after training.
But how much protein should I take? How many carbs? As a general  rule, three grams of carbohydrates per pound of bodyweight daily will provide your body with plenty of energy, ensuring that your protein-derived calories will be left to support muscle growth and repair. Fast-digesting carbs, or simple sugars, can also promote the release of insulin and suppress cortisol levels when taken post-workout. Ingesting between 40 and 60 g of these along with 25-40 g of protein in the meal following your workout serve you well. Complement those carbs with a healthy dose of protein - one gram of protein per pound of body weight should suffice, but depending on your personal goals, you may wish to bump that up a bit more.
In case you're limiting your carb intake, you may be interested to know that recent research backs replacing simple carbohydrates with monounsaturated fats, as this can increase anabolic hormonal production and aid in recovery. Moreover, dietary fats, especially the omega fatty acids, are vital to immune system functions, hormone synthesis, prevent muscle inflammation, improve glycogen formation and, as an added benefit, can provide a sense of well-being.