To BUILD MUSCLE you have to take in more calories than your body needs to maintain your current weight and include this with a weightlifting program. If you are natural lifter you won't be able to add a noticeable amount of muscle to your frame unless you're taking enough calories and nutrients to support muscle growth. If this is not followed you may even lose muscle despite your hours of lifting weights at the gym. So with that said, if you are not taking in enough nutrients your muscle growth will be hampered, but this does not mean that the more you eat the more muscle you will build. I to have made this error 3-4 years earlier on in my quest to build muscle and its one of the biggest mistakes a natural lifter can make when training to build an eye catching muscular physique.
Natural lifters have a limited ability to build muscle. The amount of muscle you can build depends on your body's ability to create new muscle tissue from the protein eaten. Your body's ability to recover from your weightlifting sessions and build muscle are chiefly dependent on your natural Testosterone levels, your Testosterone/cortisol ratio.
You can eat as much food as you want; but you must understand as a natural lifter you simply can't change your protein synthesis limit naturally. Eating more food than your body can use to build muscle will with out a doubt lead to more body fat being stored.
So, you can't force your body into building muscle by over eating. Adding nutrients and calories will have a positive effect on muscle growth until you reach a certain point specific to your body. After that, any additional calories will be stored as body fat. So understand this, the more you eat the bigger you will get but this additional weight will be mostly attributed to fat gain NOT MUSCLE GAIN.
Another thing natural lifters should be aware of is that once your body creates a fat cell it cannot be removed. The more fat cells you have, the easier it is for your body to store fat. When overeating for a period of time, your body in turn will increase the total number of fat cells. This is huge because the more fat cells you have, the easier it is for your body to store fat as well as making it more difficult to lose it!
When following an over eating bulking approach to building muscle it will make it harder to lose fat and easier to gain it over time. Of course thru diet and exercise you can deplete these fat cells of its stored energy but you cant actually remove a fat cell from the body!!!
I'm all for taking in extra calories to feed muscle growth to build muscle you must take in more calories than you burn each day. But once you meet your specific daily calorie requirements to feed muscle growth any additional calories will only make you fatter so you should not overeat trying to force your body to build muscle.
It is my personal opinion your calorie intake should allow you to gain on average 1 to 2 pounds monthly. If you are not gaining that amount of weight per month increase your daily calorie intake by 300 calories. If you are gaining more than 2 pounds per month, more than likely you adding a lot of unneeded body fat. You should reduce your calories by 300 until you reach the 1-2 pound range per month. Once you start to attain that 1-2 pounds of weight gain per month then you have found the amount of calories specific to your body which is half the battle. Also you should keep a close watch on yourself in the mirror it never lies!!!
So in closing in your quest to build a muscular physique don't become a fat slob. No one should be above 12% body fat; I have been guilty of this myself. You can't force your body into adding more muscle by overeating.
You will hurt your muscle gains if your not taking in enough calories and nutrient dense foods. So adding good food will help you gain muscle faster, but once you meet your specific daily calorie requirements any additional calories will only make you fatter . As far as the best macro ratios there is a lot of conflicting information out there probably because we are all different. Typically I keep my sources of daily calories (macros) around 50% carbs 30% proteins and 20% fats. But as I previously mentioned we are all different just like you have to figure out your specific daily calorie requirements to feed muscle growth you also have to figure out the best sources of your calories for optimum muscle growth specifically for you. (For example im currently seeking a certification in Sports Nutrition it was mentioned in one of the textbooks the typical bodybuilder should keep their calories from fat sources to 10% which for me would be on the low end)
Natural lifters must also understand that gaining 1 to 2 pounds of muscle per month in the first year is the most you can expect. And for most, gaining more than 5 pounds of solid muscle per year once your are no longer a beginner is not common. But if you gain 5 pounds over several years means huge noticeable muscle gains!!! One final thing muscle gains should never be a justification for eating junk foods. So understand a calorie is not a calorie when it comes to building muscle!! This is all advice DO WHATEVER THE F@CK YOU WANNA DO!!
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