What physical activity do you currently do?

What sports or physical activities have you enjoyed doing in the past, including childhood?

Do you usually cook for yourself or do you eat out?

My general prescription: eat out at most once per week. Cook more or less healthy stuff for yourself the rest of the time (really don’t need to try too hard here, you aren’t trying to become a fitness influencer or whatever). Find a physical activity that you enjoy and look forward to, then do it every second day. Common “fun” physical activities for adults include vinyasa yoga, rock climbing, martial arts (BJJ, Muay Thai, boxing, kickboxing), or some kind of group general fitness class. Finally, if you have a sedentary job, on the days when you aren’t doing your physical activity try to go for a walk around the neighborhood of at least 1 hour duration. This will make you more physically fit than probably 90% of the population.

Regarding a lot of the other advice here: this is a bit of a hot take but going to the gym then putting in earbuds and lifting weights alone while staring at the wall is sad, boring, and lonely. I’ve lived that life and it fucking sucks. Mattress on floor vibes. Physical activity is an excellent way to connect with others, so choose forms of working out that do that.

Hello comrade, I’d be happy to help as someone who has been working out for the past couple months and is finally closing in on benching 225.

Before I begin any diatribe, I’m going to link a couple stickies and resources that might help you out better than I can:

- Mao Tse-Tung’s essay on the importance of physical exercise - This is Rohit Nair’s program picker if you’re having a hard time deciding on an exercise routine - Liam Rosen is the 4chan /fit/ board’s sticky - The Reddit fitness wiki - This is my favorite blog as a beginner, and this is a link to an article that I think will help a lot with the dad bod.

Now, I will try to explain some things to the best of my ability. For your exercise routine, just pick one that works for you. I would personally start with a 3-day routine or anything that any of my sources suggest. You’re just beginning to get yourself into the gym so start off with something manageable. Personally, I do the PHUL workout routine and only then that’s after taking the time to get used to going to the gym. Exercise is simple but it is not easy.

As for your diet, what do you normally eat? There’s a few ‘no duh’ things like making sure to limit fast food and soda. Especially the latter because even if you treat soda like a dessert in drink form, it’s just not that good. I would focus primarily on traditionally cooked food. Generally if it is made by hand or naturally occuring, it’s good. If not, then no. Usually I make sure that 80% of the time I’m eating this good stuff and the other 20% is ‘do what you will’ wiggle room. You’re going to hear the term ‘macros’ or ‘macronutrients’: those are the things that make up calories. Fats, carbs, and protein. Other than limiting saturated fat and sugar, or ideally eliminating trans fat entirely, there are no “evil” macronutrients. Protein is the one most hyped up, but if it’s possible 1 gram for 1 lb of bodyweight is touted but I find myself growing just fine at eating whatever my weight is times .8 in grams.

Next time you get a chance to go grocery shopping and plan meals, look at some recipes you might want to try. Even for some of the 20% foods, how can you make them better? Cooking more if you have the time is also just better for your wallet. If you’re interested in some staples, beans and rice are my go-to. It’s a shame that a lot of healthier foods are much more expensive as the stereotype goes. Probably in no small part because the bourgeoisie want us unhealthy and dependent on their garbage while healthy eating is barred as a luxury. A healthy lifestyle is a great way to go against the whims of the rich.

Thats under 90 kg. I’m also 6’1 and thats a decent weight, could lose a few if you want, not necessary.

If you’re starting weightlifting, which is almost certainly the right decision, what you need is like 90 grams (as many grams as your bodyweight in kg) of protein a day while keeping the same caloric input. So increase caloric input through protein and decrease carbs/fat.

Protein powder is a very convenient way of doing this. Its a lotta protein for the minimum calories.

For anyone who says you must bulk then cut, ignore em. Body recomposition is real. If you bulk first theres a good chance its counterproductive.

Good luck.

So for as basic as it gets, buy a cheap food scale and start counting calories. This is important whether you want to lose or gain weight. I recommend the app cronometer but there’s tons of different ones.

Weight lifting is great and all and the programs recommended in this thread are perfect for a beginner but for general fitness I recommend to start running. Couch to 5k and then bridge to 10k are both excellent beginner programs and there’s many free apps for tracking them. Weight lifting makes you look good but cardio makes you feel good!

Good luck on your fitness journey!

If you have no prior experience in weightlifting, starting a beginner program like Stronglifts 5x5 is a good way to gain muscle quickly. Weightlifting technique is important to prevent injury, so watch some youtube videos on the basic lifts (squat, bench press, deadlift, military press, and Pendlay row) so you can keep your vertebrae in place.

In terms of food, start weighing what you eat and try to track your carbs and fat. To gain muscle you’ll want to get at least 120 g protein a day and to avoid gaining too much weight you want to keep protein as a fairly high proportion of calories, 25% at minimum and ideally around 30. Carbs should be 40-50% with the remainder as fat - carbs will be what enable you to recover quickly after your lifts. You may need to increase calories - 120 g protein @ 4 kcal/g @ 25% of your diet is 1920/day, while you might want upwards of 2500 (150 g protein) on your lift days and 2000 on your off days. If you enjoy it, throw in some light to moderate cardio in your off days and then wait for the gains to roll in.

The hardest part of building lean muscle is making sure you’re getting protein from comparatively low calorie sources, otherwise you go over your calorie requirements and start adding fat as well.

All pretty good advice here! Just wanted to add that slow and steady unironically wins the race with this stuff. Radical changes are less likely to stick compared to slow, incremental change.

I started with Stronglifts 5x5 myself as well and it’s a very uncomplicated program. I now do Push Pull Legs focusing on hypertrophy but what I’ve learned is that a program that you can stick to is the best one. It’s easy to get lost in the sauce regarding optimising programs when really, going as much as you can and listening to your body will deliver changes.

One last thing - the lifting is important but sleep and nutrition is as well. The gym triggers responses in the body to build muscle and a lot of the actual physiological activity for muscle growth occurs while you sleep.

Good luck and good on you for wanting to get into it! You got this