Most of us want to be better than we were yesterday. The drive to be better is intrinsic human behaviour. This is where investing in yourself comes into the picture. Investing in yourself is the process where you are applying resources to improve your personal and professional skills. To do these things you will need to give time, energy and of course, money.
However, money isn’t the key factor when it comes to investing in yourself. The main factors are dedication, discipline and patience. However, you have to realise that investing in yourself increases the likelihood of a higher income but it is not 100% certain. In this case, putting in a lot of money or landing up in debt may not a healthy approach to take.
Hence, here we are going to list down ways through which you invest in yourself without shelling out a lot of money:
Learning is a life-long approach. To make sure that the learning process journey never ends, it is important to create a timetable or a dedicated self-learning mechanism. The best part is that you don’t have to spend too much money on it.
Is there are a new skill that is required at your workplace? Or do you want to switch to you a different job profile? Or you want to learn something just for fun?
Online courses are a good way and inexpensive way to upskill yourself. There are hundreds of courses on tutorial sites. There are many online sites like Udemy, Skillshare that allows you to learn at your schedule and pace.
You can also use a public library. There are many public libraries where you could borrow books and read. By paying a nominal membership fee, you can get access to countless books. Moreover, there are bookstalls, from where you can borrow second-hand books. You may need to pay the price which is later given back to you once you return it.
Youtube is also an inexpensive way to learn new things. There are many educational and informational sites that you can access without any fees. All you need to do is search for the topics that you want to learn. For example, if you want to know how to get smart with money, you can look at youtube channels like the Financial Diet, the Dave Ramsay show or follow personalities like Ramit Sethi. Various fund houses also have their videos on Youtube to help make investors the right investment choice.
Reading blogs can also help you to increase your knowledge of any particular field. It is a free resource and you can copy-paste the important lines to your Evernote to refer back to it later. E.g., if you want to learn about digital marketing, you can read about the basics of digital marketing through Neil Patel’s blog.
Tip: Our brain is not expert in remembering all the things that we learn. Hence, it is essential to note the important and key takeaway points. If you are learning two or three skills simultaneously, you can keep multiple journals on different topics.
Being physical and mentally fit is a major part of today’s world. With the mushrooming of gyms and fitness centres at every other street, it is easy to just walk in a gym to take care of your body. But it may not be economically sustainable for many. Also, there is a high probability that you may quit it halfway or it may not work for you. Before undertaking any program, you need to understand what you will comfortable with. Plus, you need to be consistent.
There are hundreds of fitness channels on Youtube. Whether you want to do Zumba, learn a new dance form, increase your strength or do yoga, you will find a couple of youtube videos that you can practice with. Ask a fitness freak friend for channel recommendations.
Having someone you will be answerable helps a lot in staying on track. There will be days that you may not want to get up from the bed to go for a walk, in these situations, your buddy will make sure that you get off that bed and start walking.
Mental health is as important as physical health. Meditation is a great way to relieve stress, overcome anxiety and clear your mind. There are a few meditation apps that help you to meditate as well as keep track of your practices. Insight Timer is one such free meditation app. It has 12,000 free titles that you can listen to any time. If you are beginner, you can select the beginner option on the app. It has guided meditation and you can meditate with the timer as well. It also helps you to be disciplined as it tracks your mediation daily. You can set mediation reminder notifications as well.
Investing in yourself does not have an expensive process. We can find free and less expensive substitutes as well. The main factor that plays a role in this process is being disciplined.
Now that you have saved money, you use the money to open an RD or FD of your choice and earn higher interest rates.
