Clone the repo in any location and inside the root of the dotfiles folder run:
stow --target ~/ .
note: Make sure you dont have the same file structure as the dotfiles folder, if you do, backup everything.
Remember, never delete something unless you're 100% sure you'll never need it again.
Stow will create a symlink for each folder and file in your $HOME.
Set the global Git configuration to use your template file.
git config --global commit.template ~/.git_commit_template.txt