There's a popular misconception in the world of fitness saying that weightlifting is for men, but any woman who lifts will tell you that this idea is a complete joke. Many people believe that weight lifting will make women bulky, while that's not the case. Women don't have the levels of testosterone necessary to bulk up like a man would. Give me a reason why women shouldn't lift and I'll give you 5 reasons why they should.

1. You'll burn more fat.

While everyone knows that cardio burns fat, they don't realize that cardio also burns muscle while, according to a study published in Obesity, strength training almost exclusively burns fat.

2. You'll burn more calories.

Your muscle mass largely determines your resting metabolic rate and the more muscle you have, the more energy your body expends. While reading this article, you're burning calories, but if you had been lifting weights and building muscle mass, you'd be burning more calories. Everything you do, from brushing your teeth to watching TV, would be burning more calories due to a higher metabolic rate.

3. You'll feel empowered.

Ignore the people who haven't read this article depicting the benefits of strength training for women, and notice how good you feel after lifting weights. It's a kind of mental uplift after a strength training workout, whereas most people just feel tired or "happy to be done" after cardio.

4. You'll drop a dress size.

Since fat weighs less than muscle, many people lifting weights notice an increase in their overall weight, but a decrease in waist size. This false notion that strength training makes people "bulk up" is completely false. With nearly 5-10% of the testosterone that men have, women actually have a very hard time bulking up.

5. You'll burn more calories during Cardio.

Since strength training actually increases the number and size of calorie-torching muscle fibers in your body, you could actually end up burning more calories during your cardio workouts!