5 Reasons Why You Should Invest in Your Education

Hint: it might help you succeed

I’ve never had a lot of money.

I got $120 every month when I went to school, but once I dropped out, I had no source of income for a year. I saved the last of it and started searching for a way to make money online, instead.

In those months where I bought nothing at all, it made me rethink my choices when it came to spending my money.

The thing is that just about everyone who doesn’t have a lot of money spends a lot of time thinking about it because they have to. Money is an essential part of life.

But even if we don’t have heaps of money, we have no problem spending it on inessential items. After all, we can get virtually anything by the click of a button — so that hasn’t made the minimalist lifestyle any easier.

With that being said, from someone who used to spend all my money on clothes, makeup, and fun gadgets, here is what I have learned about buying responsibly.

“Many folks think they aren’t good at earning money, when what they don’t know is how to use it.” — Frank A. Clark

The discomfort of discussing money

It’s common knowledge that money is required to live a comfortable life. More money means luxury, which means less stress and more relaxation.

But it’s an uncomfortable topic. A study shows that 44% of Americans view money and personal finances as the most challenging topic to discuss with other people.

Besides that, 40% of couples don’t speak about how they will manage their money before getting married. This goes to show how challenging and stressful it is to speak about money for many people.

But that’s not the only reason we feel stressed about money. According to another study, people who make a connection between time and money experience high levels of stress in their work environment.

A group of people were told to calculate their hourly pay, while another group wasn’t. Turns out, that the group who knew what their time was worth experienced higher levels of stress. Their cortisol levels were 25% higher than the people who didn’t know their hourly pay.

We’re taught that time is money, therefore we do our job as quickly as possible. But the truth is that value is money. When we rush to get things done, we’re not focusing on the most important part, which is delivering great work.

#1 Over-delivering is the key

We all know that money can’t buy happiness, but how we spend our money can help us create happiness in the long term.

If we want to become successful, we have to over-deliver in value and make people think that we’re giving them more than they asked for. That is one of the key elements to success because it’s what makes people want to come back for more.

That is, if the amount of time spent on one project is reasonable for what we make from it.

But it’s easy to provide more value when we know a lot about a subject. This is why we should focus on learning as much as we can so that we can grow the value of our work.

The problem is that once we have money, we often spend it on things that make us feel good — for a limited amount of time. We give in to our desires and buy into the latest trends.

It will temporarily satisfy our shopping cravings, but it won’t give us long-term fulfillment or help us succeed. This simple reason is why we should focus on spending our money on our education more than the latest fashion trends.

#2 It’s better to want than to owe

It’s important to remember that it’s better to want than to owe when we’re thinking about buying something. Especially if it’s an impulsive purchase.

If we can’t afford it or desperately need it, we shouldn’t buy it, no matter how badly we want it.

Think about it this way. If you would buy that one thing that you really, really want, how would you feel after you looked in your bank account?

If that feeling is dread? Then we shouldn’t buy it. We should ask ourselves if it’s worth it before buying anything that we don’t think we can afford.

And if we can’t afford it, we can choose to save up for it or we can buy something less expensive that will be more beneficial to us in the long run — like a book.

We all have areas of our lives that we want to improve, and there are a lot of experts in all fields who have written books to help us do just that.

#3 Figuring out your goals

Take a moment to think about your situation. Are you happy with your finances, family, relationships, health, body, and lifestyle? If not, try to imagine what your ideal situation would look like.

When we focus on the part of our lives that we aren’t satisfied with, it becomes easier to work on them.

Of course, if we’re unhappy with the way we look, our appearance won’t change if we pick up a book. But we can learn how to be kinder to ourselves and accept ourselves for who we are.

We must remember that whenever we react negatively towards anything, we can’t blame the situation for how we’re feeling. If we hate the way we look, it’s our attitude and mindset that needs to change, not our appearance.

By pinpointing what we dislike, we can work to improve it. The problem is that we often think “it’s too late” or “I can’t do that”, which is only an excuse. Everyone starts somewhere, and if we begin our road towards improvement now, then there is no limit to what we can achieve.

There are millions of problems that can be solved by simply reading a book. If we don’t like reading, we can pick up an audiobook. There is no excuse for choosing not to improve our mindset and health.

We just have to prioritize what we spend our money on. Instead of buying something we think will make us happy, we should invest in our health that we know will make us happier.

#4 Expand your knowledge

There is no limit to the amount of knowledge one can collect in a lifetime. It all comes down to our commitment and desire for learning.

The greatest thing about collecting knowledge is that we can then use the information we learn to become a healthier, happier version of ourselves.

We should create a habit of purchasing things that will make us smarter. The more we know, the more we can provide, and the more money we earn. So instead of buying objects that will give us a higher societal ranking, we should spend it on learning new information, in ways such as:

Taking an online course
Buying a book
Hiring a coach
Going to an informative talk

These are all things that will make us smarter and help us learn new things that will, in turn, provide more value to both our work and life.

#5 Become the person you aspire to be

There will always be someone who has walked the same road as us, and written about what they learned. We should listen to the people who know what we’re feeling and has the results that we want as well as the solution to get there.

We should spend more money on learning new things so that we can become the person we aspire to be and the person we’re proud to tell others about.

After all, knowledge is power, and we don’t have to worry about it going out of style in a couple of years like the latest piece of technology. Here is how we can optimize our success:

Always over-deliver in value.
Do everything you can to invest in your knowledge.
Don’t buy anything you can’t afford.
Find areas of your life you want to improve.
Imagine your ideal situation.
Listen to the people who have the answers you’re looking for.

When we learn new things, we also become better at what we do. No one wants to pay for work that is rushed and doesn’t provide value.

If we work to over-deliver and constantly expand our knowledge, it becomes a lot simpler to reach our goals. We will also feel better when we focus more on the value of our work rather than how much time we should spend on it.

Everyone values quality. If we can provide that, people will admire our work and keep coming back for more. That is the key to success.

Knowledge is power. Information is liberating. Education is the premise of progress, in every society, in every family. — Kofi Annan