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Comment by groaner | Hacker News Reader

OK... so as one of those people with a fair amount of spare cash lying around and no debt, I still can't quite grok this "invest in yourself" idea. Clearly I'm not about to start swallowing Ben Franklins.

I'm just a jaded programmer who is frankly terrified of the brutal startup culture, with no intention of being a founder (can't handle the high pressure and emotional roller coasters) or employee (not a fan of grueling schedules for minuscule hope of a payout). I'm also a couple of years out of grad school and have no interest in going further down that rabbit hole, so don't try selling "education" as an investment vehicle to me either.

The only area where I have a good idea of how to invest in myself is to improve my physical fitness. Still, that's mostly an investment of time and effort, not money.

What am I to do? Maybe it's time I just check out of the working world and wander for a while.

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Physical fitness is a great way to invest in yourself. Either you spend the money (which it doesn't really take that much of really) to stay healthy now, or you spend it down the road getting tubes stuck in you in at a hospital.

That said, there aren't any side-projects, interests, hobbies that you'd be interested in trying out on the side and seeing if you can turn into small businesses. Surely, there has to be something.

One thing you can do is take your money out of the stock market and keep it somewhere safe.

This is investing in yourself in that your financial success is tied much more to yourself than on things you don't control. It has practical value should you find yourself in a situation where you need to rely on that money, it won't have disappeared due to external risk.

Cuban's points were a bit all over the place, but if we're talking about wealth creation of the F you money type, taking some personal/career risk often is required. Whether that's being a startup founder, being a hedge fund trader, or the best investment banker in the world, etc.

So if you don't want to start your own thing or work at one or work hard or generally take any risk, the wealth thing is probably going to prove elusive.

Of course, if you want to retire with a couple of million dollars, a nice corporate job and frugal lifestyle is prob all you need.

You could try a side project ala "Start Small, Stay Small", with the 'stay small' being a great way to keep it from being too stressful.

You could try to replace your income with small business ventures and certainly having some cash will help. This business makes it seem like the only way to do well is to hunt down VCs and convince them you are the next prodigy. There are other paths - they just aren't going to be written about on Techcrunch.

What's your passion? Do that.

Ha! If only it were that easy. I've spent most of my life being a goody two shoes, only doing what other people told me to do and never really exercising any individual free will. Passion? What passion?

I'm aware of the irony of reading what more people, this time strangers on the internet, are telling me to do. I doubt I'll see the answer in a web browser.

For the time being I'm simply trying to do something I've never done before every week. It doesn't have to be drastic, maybe something like trying out a new recipe or taking a photo of a different neighborhood or going for a moonlight run at 3am. Sort of a "throw lots of things at the wall and see what sticks" approach.

i took a look at your past comments. i'm getting a little personal but i hope you don't mind. you have the financial resources and seem like a mature person, you should move out.

think of it like an investment in learning the skills to be fully independent. it'll also build self confidence and trust in your faculties.

separating yourself from the social conditioning of your parents will give you the breathing room to develop your own intrinsic goals and interests.

This is probably the best advice in the whole thread. Nothing could be a better investment in yourself then living on your own. I for one didn't realize how much parents take care of for you. Once I moved out on my own I really got a sink or swim feeling, and that was the jolt I needed.

Move out, or better, move abroad. There are a ton of fun places out there to see, live, make friends. The time away from your scene will probably help you reassess what you care about.

Heh, I don't mind. Anything I say on the internet can and will be used against me.

I appreciate your advice and it's definitely something I plan to follow.

Maybe this will answer your question:

http://www.quora.com/Day-Trading/Where-can-I-learn-about-spe...

Seems that you just want return without the excruciating work of a startup. And that's cool.

So you want to invest in good companies and not trade more than twice a year.

People who say stay out of the stock market don't understand what it's for - liquidity not return.

If you want return, you have to buy cheap and sell high companies with high margins, low debt, great management and awesome economics.

It's relatively easy once you've chosen your awesome companies, and valued them using common valuation models.

Spend a few years at a 9-5 corporate giant, let us know what happens.

> the brutal startup culture

doesn't have to be brutal. that's a dial we can turn

> or employee (not a fan of grueling schedules for minuscule hope of a payout).

again, doesn't have to be

> so don't try selling "education" as an investment vehicle to me either.

education can be had for free. lots of ways to gain education for free and/or cheap, relatively fast and flexibly. but you can't restrict yourself to the traditional K-12-college pipeline, those are very costly and rigid in terms of time and money.

> Still, that's mostly an investment of time and effort, not money.

arguably money is fungible with time and energy. somewhat. you can trade and convert between them. if you have tons of money and little free time, that tells you what currency to spend (spend money); if you have little money, but some time/energy, spend time/energy on self-investment instead.

The best thing you can buy for yourself is time. Undoubtedly our most precious resource. The base ingredient for any pursuit.

agreed because everyone has a hard upper limit on how much time they'll get to spend. a limit called death.

(in the default case, assuming no early death, ceteris paribus, etc.)

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