Moving towards the body of a guitar is moving UP the neck; moving towards the head is moving DOWN the neck.

As for the starting point, pick any fret that feels comfortable. There are no rules, and if you look around the internet and books you can find lots of variations instead of working fingers 1 to 4 (such as 1,4,2,4,3,4 on each string to build pinky finger strength - try this starting on the 12th fret and work along every string from 6 to 1, then work down the neck one fret at a time until you either: a) get pain, in which case stop immediately; or b) run out of frets. If you reach the 1st fret, you probably have nothing to gain from this exercise unless you want to increase the speed of doing it).

Exercises like this can be good but getting a riff or lick locked in gives far more satisfaction, especially if the technique is good