Walk very far distances. Before cars, a lot of people walked between towns. It was completely normal and safe if you know what you're doing. I have friends who sometimes walk up to twenty miles to the neighboring towns because they swore off vehicles, and they show up and people are flabbergasted like they're thinking "holy crap it's a miracle you must be gods" as if the friends didn't just have to use two feet for two hours to get there. But that's what a human is supposed to do, biologically that is. And you don't even have to run, in fact it's better for your body and mind to walk than run.

Also, sleep well and stay hydrated. Sleep controls metabolism. Metabolism controls fitness. Bad sleep equals bad metabolism. Same goes for hydration. Drink a pint of water every time you piss. That's probably why there are drinking fountains next to bathrooms. All this advice has worked for me too.

It's important to note that fitness is not really a project with a beginning and an end - it's a journey that you will be on for as long as you live, basically. As such, you ideally want to find things that:

• Can sustainably fit into your life
• You truly find joy in doing

For example, I used to think that the only viable form of cardio was running, and that I needed to be running for the sake of my health. The problem is that I fucking hate running, I consider it to be boring as shit. Hence it was always an uphill battle to run for me.

In its place, I've found cycling to be an endless source of fun - I don't really have to try hard to go cycling, because I yearn to do it as much as I can reasonably fit in.

So I recommend that you try different things until you find something that you really enjoy.

Other than cycling, I really like strength exercise. I used to have easy access to a gym earlier in my life, which is unfortunately not true where I live today, so to get strength work done, I do a routine of body weight exercises. This is by no means the perfect way to become stronger, but you really shouldn't let perfect be the enemy of good. The best fitness activities are the ones that you can consistently do indefinitely.

Finally, two things that caused problems for me at the start of my fitness journey:

Having neglected strength work for all my life gave me some muscle imbalances that didn't correct themselves by just doing regular workouts, I had to consult with a physical therapist to learn how to counteract these years of inactivity. The same may or may not be true for you.

Being overweight posed a big challenge at the start of my fitness journey - higher-intensity exercises can really hurt when your organs are a bit cramped by fat. After a huge struggle with dropping my weight, I noticed that a lot of exercises that previously hurt a lot no longer do. This may or may not be applicable for you either.

I used to be a gym rat and have won a few bench press contests in my day. The trick is to make it an enjoyable routine. You don’t have to kill yourself, but you do need to push yourself a bit. Do a few body parts a day and maybe two exercises per part. I did chest and shoulders one day, back and triceps the next, then legs and biceps. Lift slow and use weights you can control. No jerking or bouncing. If you hate doing something, don’t do it. Find something else that works.

Number 1 rule is consistency. Whatever workout routine and schedule you adopt, you must stick with it. No don't skip it because you were tired. No don't skip because you were hung-over, no dont' skip because it's a nice day, or a rainy day. Do it consistently, and commit for months.

Diet is really important. Eat light breakfast such as museli, oats etc, lean meat, egg for lunch and dinner. And A little exercise is all you need.

I second the recommendations here about finding an activity that you like. For me it was rec sports. Gets me out of the house a few days a week, and for me it was an activity to help me stay active but also a reason TO get fit. I wanted to feel less beat up after playing, so I started working out and stretching regularly.

I also had trouble with getting to the gym, and had trouble with focus and picking workouts, so I had success with P90x. It's all workouts you can do at home with some adjustable dumbbells. I think I got a deal on the streaming subscription to Beachbody for 100$ for the year. Then I just followed the program and the workout calendar. They have a number of different programs on there, if you want to get ripped I recommend P90x, if you just want to do some sort of workout for 30 minutes a day I'd recommend p90x3 because it's easier to stick to.

That was a good start for me, but I ultimately settled on just picking my favorite moves from the program and I switch between upper and lower body workouts every day because I found I was consistently skipping certain days of the programs.

You lose weight when your caloric intake is less than your energy expended.

Which sounds shitty and dismissive but it's real: You either have to increase expenditure or reduce intake.

Good luck, I hope you reach your goals!

Fitness can be a lot of things. Health can be a lot of things. It just really depends on what your goals and needs are.

If there are heart problems rampant in your family tree, you might want to consider strengthening your cardiovascular system through things like running or biking. Give C25K a shot and see how you feel. Maybe do some Maffetone style training after that just to learn to deal with running slowly and consistently.

If you're worried about brittle bones, arthritis and muscle issues when you age, try some resistance training. Your local gym will definitely have beginner courses available that show you all of the machines in a basic training circuit. Then you just play around with weight amounts and set ranges depending on more granular goals.

If your goal is just aesthetic (also completely valid), it's probably a diet thing or a combination of cardio/strength training that will get you there.

Generally, I'd say just pick a thing that you reasonably like (don't expect to love it right away, don't drop it when you hate it atm) and stick with it until you've convinced yourself that you're a "fitness person". Just that self perception will be an absolute game changer!

For me personally, just that change in self perception has brought me from "ugh it's sunday I need to go on a run because my training program wants me to go on a run on sunday" to "oh it's sunday, time to go on my run cause that is what I do". No need for convincing, no need for motivation, no need to tax my brains' go/no go mechanisms.

The first question you should ask yourself is what you want to achieve, beyond just saying "to be fit", and be honest with yourself. Do you want to be stronger, bigger, more flexible, better endurance, etc...?

If your main goal is to just stay overall fit and flexible as you age, yoga is a great inexpensive option that you can do at home without fear of other people judging you (if you got social anxiety). Get a yoga mat and try out a yoga session, you might get pleasantly surprised. Down Dog is a great app that generates sessions for you based on your time, experience level, etc...

By the sound of it though, you are currently looking at training in a gym doing weightlifting, since you're mentioning stance and bracing. In that case the best advice would be to stay the hell away from fitness influencers while you're getting accustomed to the gym.

The industry is rife with grifters that are making a living criticising all sort of things and telling you to DO THIS THING IF YOU FEEL THIS TOTALLY NORMAL THING DURING YOUR SET (looking at you Squat University) because they know many people who go to the gym are insecure since it's a completely new environment and prefer to be told what to do.

Simple fact is that there is no one size fits all. People are built different which means your friend with a short torso and and long legs will need a different stance than your friend a long torso and short legs, etc... Unless you got a competent PT to help you, you'll need to find out yourself what works for you.

Find a beginner program that fits your goals and schedule and stick to it, and don't worry too much about doing the movement perfect. It's takes time for your nervous system to get used to a new movement. Don't expect your deadlifts and squats to move perfectly, it takes time and repetition. Experiment with stance width, grip width, etc... to find out what works best for your body.

And remember that your body is more resilient than you might believe. Don't worry too much about your aches and pain, being sore is normal and not harmful, often your brain will play tricks with you and makes it worse the more you worry. Barbel medicine (which is run by actual medical doctors) is a good source if you got fitness influencer induced exercise anxiety.

Good luck on your journey and remember, the most difficult mile is the one from your house to the gym :)

Edit: some links to help with the technique/bracing confusion you got.

A level headed video talking about lifting technique.

How to brace, explained by the current world's strongest man (bad/clickbaity title unfortunately)

Do you have a doctor? They could give you personal and accurate advice on what would help you, specifically.

If you have a gym membership, do stronglifts 5x5 to start. It's a scheduled workout plan with basic compound exercises, meaning, they don't focus a single muscle, but a movement instead. Ease into it, all of them need a degree of technique so you don't injure yourself in the process. 3 days a week to start is good, don't push yourself this early on. Your body needs to be made aware that working out is something that will happen constantly, and that takes time. It will suck at first, everything will hurt, even muscles you didn't even know were there. You will also be more hungry. Eventually, DOMS (muscle pain after working out) will become tamer, only then should you think about increasing your workout sessions.

If health is your primary motivating factor, be mindful of what you eat and how much you sleep. We need every kind of nutrient, but if at the end of the day you have a calorie excess, and you're not working out like a madman, you will gain weight. Mind you, most of the calories we burn aren't burnt on a treadmill, we just burn calories by being alive. So, better to have a healthy diet with some cheat days, than stress about what to eat and what not to eat.

C25k. Simpleses.

What's your goal? Weight loss? Build muscle? Have more stamina?

For weight loss, I would start with diet. I lost 60 pounds in four and a half months just calorie counting with no exercise - but it's really hard to out-exercise a bad diet. Losing that weight made it easier for me to start exercising. I do a combination of hiking and running to try to keep things interesting. A "couch to 5k" type program is working well for me.

For me, the big thing was to deliberately eat regular meals and cut back on beer. I am already pretty active with the things I like to do and how me and my friends like to roughhouse a lot. With good inputs, I've gotten a lot stronger just living the life I want to live and have been even more empowered to be silly and active because my strength and endurance have improved. Virtuous cycle. Also, I finally got a work computer and can walk to work because I don't need to carry it back and forth.

I have a lot of Himbo tendencies so take with a grain of salt!

I do something I enjoy 4 days a week, Brazilian Jiujitsu. I augment it with something I don't - strength training once a week for half an hour. One warm up set of 12 reps and one working set of 5-8 reps to complete failure. I use machines to avoid injury from failure. 5 exercises- leg press, chest press, row, lat pulldown and overhead press. It's a pretty intense workout. My goal is to keep the muscle I have and prevent injury in jiujitsu. I feel like I get like 40% of the weight training benefit for like 20% of the work that I've put in before with barbell training (strong lifts, 5/3/1, madcow, etc).