I like piercings, Im a fan of body-mods.
I have a ton of tattoos and some scarification, and Ive had 4 piercings in the past. My body will not accept metal of any kind, and never has been able to. Even as a kid with pierced ears I constantly had problems even with gold, silver, stainless surgical steel, etc.
I grew up and got a bunch more piercings which never healed and were only the cause of much distress in the long run- but luckily I dont scar easily.
My advise- get an ear or nipple or something done first to see how your flesh heals. Its no fun to have visible scars where once you had 13guage rings. yknow?
Be sure you find a REPUTABLE PIERCING PLACE this is absolutely hands down the most friggen important thing about your piercing "journey". Go to a few parlours, look for their health code certificates (depending on country), speak with the piercers who would potentially be doing your work. BE SAFE, there is no such thing as "too careful" when it comes to wounding your body for artistic purposes- and there are far too many skeezy parlours who dont properly cleanse their equipment or train their staff.
Dont look for the cheapest place.
Never get pierced with a plastic piercing gun. its scientifically impossible to 100% cleanse porous plastics and its not worth risking. Though many people have not had problems with such- its again not worth being the statistic opposite. Yknow?
How into pain are you? Can you tolerate it? Some parlours offer something called EMLA which is a topical numbing cream you can buy at drug stores for around $50 (i think) and will make the process muuuch easier.
AFTER CARE. Seriously, you want it to heal properly and look great? Then friggen CARE FOR IT. Your piercer will recommend a great balm or cream for it, some places even make their own (the place where my tats were done makes organic aromatherapy balms for tattoo healing- smells SO GOOD). Polysporin works for piercings, when you see swelling or any infection you can use epsom salts and warm water to create a soak for it (might be hard with a lip heh) which worked for me in a pinch.
follow any directions given by your piercer to the letter, if they want you to apply healing balm for 2 weeks and avoid kissing and such DO IT. Theyre not giving you those rules for kicks- be smart.
If you really want lots of great advise on piercings/mods check out bmezine.com they have TONS of info on every kind of mod/alteration you can possibly imagine. I love that site.
Also keep in mind there isnt anything wrong with "play" piercings. Little magnetic or clip on jewelry that absolutely looks 100% like the real thing and wont infect/scar/disease you. I wore a faux nose ring for a year basically, took it out for showers etc, people had NO idea it was fake LOL.
Piercings arent right for everyone, best you have ALL THE INFO before you go to some parlour and have needles jammed into your skin in ignorance.