Gyms are where we go to feel better about ourselves, get healthy and toned, and make us less ashamed when masturbating in front of the mirror. But if you're a noob, or someone who purely does it to stay in shape, some might accuse you of wasting your time. There are rules to follow, after all. Rules set by bigger men. And scary women.
Discipline
The premise of weight lifting is to take it slow, build up weight every week, and hopefully develop into a bigger, healthier person able to kick the shit out of smaller, more domesticated people. At least, I hope your goal isn't merely to reach the "commando" stage of wellbeing where you can lovingly lift your daughter onto your shoulder one-handed, the sun reflecting off your pearly whites and fawns looking at you affectionately on their gaily skips to local streams.
I was once like the meatheads until I realized I didn't have the genetics and didn't want to lose my penis by taking it several steps further. Unfortunately, few are able to train within their own standards. Instead, they attempt to reach the goals of people who have been training for years, so even if they don't get bigger, they can at least over-train and have long stretches of skin where their nipples used to be. You see, the amount of information on bodybuilding and weightlifting is astronomical, yet the adherence to the one simple rule "listen to what your body is telling you" is thrown out the window as soon as we see the results of Men's Health models (who I've noticed are doing less and less as the years go by to reach such goals… which would imply that such magazines simply regurgitate the same garbage but tweak it to the realization of just how ineffective the misinformation they churn out month after month is to absolutely EVERYBODY).
Size
In my 12+ years of working out, I've never grown beyond an average/slim build because my genes will never cut it. I go to a place where they have men the size of mountains, though, so I'm hoping in 60-70 years, bam, evolution will take its course. Naturally, who knows what size I'll be at that stage, but I'll finally have muscles… something that detracts from the breast-like curves of my chest, puffy teats, and so much hair to disguise the fact I can only lift a small child if I'm using both hands and lying on my back.
All these dinosaur-fuckers hate the little guy. One of them keeps shouting "gay" at me, probably because I'm performing dumbbell squats with ladies' weights. I can only assume that years of steroid abuse have melted his mind to the point that he simply loudly proclaims what he sees. Or he wants to fuck a woman who thinks I'm the man he'll never be, and that's quite the blow to the self-esteem he's been injecting into his cranium for so many years.
Bananas. Weights. MILKSHAKES! Muscles-zzzzzzzzz.
The thing is, the heavies don't believe the smaller folk are entitled to use the equipment, despite having paid for exactly the same membership. It's a meat-headed way of thinking, but if you're generally not stacked, then get used to dancing around a shit-ton of half-wits who think they can plough around a place with little thought as to who they're stepping on.
Diet
I was once like the meatheads in the sense of what I wanted to achieve until I realized I didn't have the genetics and didn't want to lose my penis by taking it several steps further. But I've tried all kinds of natural supplements and diets, weight-gaining shakes and 3000-calorie-a-day intakes, all to little avail. I've also tried Creatine, which gave me stretch marks from lifting more weight than my body could healthily adjust to, and acid shits.
Come on, muscle definition!
The gym I go to has pictures of competition winners lining the walls, all tanned to resemble bronze statuettes of the Ancient Greek athletes they purportedly live up to (here's a hint, I don't think they used steroids, but at least their cocks were still tiny). In all seriousness, it's both fucking depressing and impressive the lengths and the results, but who are they truly doing it for? Will this society ever remark upon them any other way than how freakishly big they are and how ridiculous the effort put into it? And then, when age comes calling, that's when the true sadness of such tales will kick in.
Women
Women in the gym are the strangest thing. Because there are pretty much nothing but men working out around them, there's a clash of feminism and sexiness, where they dress in tight spandex and won't stop bending over, yet look at you like you're pig-headed if you check out the beef curtains seeping out the sides of their thongs.
The etiquette towards women who work out in the same space as you is a bizarre one. Seeing as there are mirrors everywhere, it's time to use them, use the peripherals to just before the moment your cock starts jutting out of your shorts. Please refrain from cumming in your pants because lower testosterone levels lead to lesser gains.
They want the attention because they're enswirled within torrents of angry/rapey pheromones, but at the same time it's like "Pffft, I'm here working out, hello! Leave me alone you perv, can't you tell I'm working out??" Even the ugly ones will have you wanting to test the dexterity of the bicycle seats with your nose.
Testosterone
People who lift weights make noise. They want to be noticed for their dominance. Men scream at themselves in the mirror, generally acting like loud, boisterous, obsessive and freakish animals. Their gains speak for themselves. But they're battling their inner insecurities by building a hardened, ballooned exterior unable to operate simple machinery or process emotions beyond, "Uuugh. AAAARGH. Ugh ugh. Me. Dick. You. Pussy? Wanna? BOYFRIEND?!!!? BLAAAARGH!!!!!!!"
Uuuuuuaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrgh!!!
Ultimately, it seems that our culture isn't so much teaching us to work out for our health, but to get bigger than the other guy so we can aggressively vent all the frustrations we were once too emotionally weak to deal with. Quite the detrimental cause, if I must say, when our body naturally makes us feel better the minute we finish the last set. If lifting weights is making you an angrier person because you feel like stomping over everything in your way, something tells me you're doing it wrong.
Spotting
When spotting someone who is lifting more than their body will allow, you are only allowed to support using extended index fingers; using any more will reveal just how much of an impetus on the lifting exercise you're having, meaning roughly 30-40%. Use words like, "Go on. All you. All you. It's all you. Yes. One more. Come on! One more. Yes. It's all you" to the set's completion, then laugh and say something like, "I only helped you a little bit on the last rep." Then congratulate them, but reservedly and briefly, and go on to do your own exercise. To do anymore would suggest you might be friendly, and you have more important things to do.
In incredibly homophobic gymnasiums, it is acceptable that on the bench press, you squat over the lifter to the point where your testicles nearly brush the bridge of their nose, implying that you are helping them more than a "man" in their circumstances should be comfortable with, and that maybe they should change out of their sweatpants and into a leotard.
Illustrated here using a bag of marbles.
This will fuel a combative response in the recipient, allowing the set's completion again with "only a little bit of help." Given such circumstances, though, it is acceptable that you lift the bar using a closed grip, for to use extended index fingers is to suggest you are otherwise trying to get your balls sucked on.
Talking
You must at all times talk with a loud roar, as if you are having an argument with the person to whom you are talking, although you may diffuse the atmosphere by laughing and insulting other men who are not in the room so that any potential competition is immediately offset. It's not that you mean to be such a man all of the time, you simply are.
When others are shouting back at you, make sure to have a bottle in hand so that you may quench your thirst while simultaneously flexing your biceps. Performing on-the-spot squats at the same time will boost your rep points on the floor as well. Think of it like ballet… but with dick. Enforce your heterosexuality by performing pirouettes while insisting it's to build flexibility, stamina, and endurance, all the while talking about the men you could kick the shit out of using your moves.
Bitches be creamin'!
Showering
You can talk about a man's figure, obviously. You are all hard trainers who treat weightlifting as you do life: as a discipline, hardcore. You can talk about how big his neck is. How muscled his arms, shoulders, and lats. You may compliment how the water glistens off his ass. These are all completely natural observations to make. You are a bodybuilder, not a homo.
What you are not allowed to do, though, is exit the shower, and while drying, have the two of you naked at the same time. Practice an alternating turns system of removing and reapplying the towel. If one of you is baring his testicles as he dries his legs, the other must be applying roll-on deodorant or something with the towel wrapped about his waist.
Better yet, just have your pants on already and leave the fucking building—and take your leave swiftly, with no room for interpretation.
Feedback
You can help anyone in the gym on form, technique etc, but it is advisable to simply keep a distance and point and mock. After all, you had to learn the hard way, why shouldn't others?
Wiping Down
Don't do it. Don't come with a towel. Real men allow their scent to permeate through any leather so as to ward off potential threats.
Farting
Buddy, you're filled with enough hot air as it is, now you're going to add protein shakes to the mix? What choice do you have other than to let rip in a humid room?! You are, after all, 220 pounds of lean muscle. Who's going to correct you, the management? Pffft.
Pffft.