How long before I actually get better?

Sooner than you think for the small stuff. Longer than you want for the rest.

Inside the first hour you will move better than you did walking in. A stance instead of standing flat. A punch that comes off the ground instead of out of the shoulder. Getting up off the floor without turning your back. Those are switches, not skills, and they flip fast.

The first few weeks are where the quiet change happens. You stop gassing out in thirty seconds. You stop tensing everything at once. You remember what you did last time without being told.

Around two to three months of steady work, most people notice the real thing: it stops being something you think about and becomes something you do. A grip break works because your body did it, not because you recalled step two.

Frequency decides the timeline, not talent. Once a week beats once a month by a lot more than four times, because you waste less of each hour remembering. See how often to train.

So does the ten minutes in between, which is where people cheat themselves. Shadow boxing in the kitchen. Hip escapes on the carpet. One grip break on a door frame while the coffee goes. That is where the extra reps come from when you only train once a week.

I turned pro at 42, so nobody here is telling you that you started too late.

If you are still deciding what to work on at all, start with not knowing what you want to train. Then book one session and find out rather than reading another page about it.