Summary:
When’s the last time you deliberately set out on a strategy to brush up on a skill or subject area? Or for that matter, the last time you decided to educate yourself comprehensively about an entirely new subject?
It might sound like a luxury to focus on self-education, something you left behind in your student days. But the truth is that a commitment to ongoing learning will lead to far greater earning in the long run, just one of the many benefits you will reap from greater confidence and knowledge.
We are luckily living in a golden era of self-education, in which access to a wide variety of information has been democratized. You don’t need to return to a campus to set about mastering new subjects – all you need is the commitment to make it a priority on your schedule.
Read on to learn more on how you can get started on your own self-directed business curriculum.
Transcript
What are you going to learn today? What did you learn yesterday?
If that sounds like a preposterous question – “I’m far too busy to be studying!” – then you need to reassess how you’re going to reach your long-term plans. Too many of us regard our self-education as something to be completed during our years of formal schooling, but there is much to be learned during every phase of life. Especially with the rapid pace of change in the economy and virtually every industry, you need to make a concerted effort to keep up with new developments in your field and ensure your own ongoing relevance.
The difference with learning as an adult is that you get to decide the curriculum. A lot of us checked out as students when we found our coursework not having any relevance for what we wanted to do with our lives. But there is a whole world to get up to date on – investments, real estate, online marketing. Adopting a positive mindset in which you see new fields as fun challenges, not something to fear, can help you to continually add new spheres of expertise and layers of possibility to your business.
The Wisdom Advantage
Don’t think of your age as an impediment to learning new things. It’s true that our brains are much more like sponges when we are younger, making it easier for children to learn certain subjects, especially languages and mathematics that are built upon memorization of objective rules and norms. But the older of us have our own advantages thanks to our experience. We can see patterns and trends in ways that younger colleagues can’t. And we often have developed a sense of calm about new challenges or being seen as unsuccessful. This can free us up to become bolder in our thinking as well.
After all, history is littered with stories of late bloomers who educated themselves and mastered new crafts later in life. I think of the famed chef Julia Child, who didn’t open her own cooking school until her 40s; President Ronald Reagan, who didn’t enter politics until his 50s and assumed the presidency at the age of 69; and entrepreneur Ray Kroc, who didn’t launch McDonald’s into a nationwide franchise until his 50s. I am especially moved by the example of Michael Jordan – probably the greatest basketball player of all time, who nonetheless took the gamble of risking public humiliation at the peak of his career by venturing onto the baseball field in pursuit of his childhood dream.
In all of these cases, well-established professionals took the time to invest in their own self-education and head down a new path. Even if we ourselves are left with more yesterdays than tomorrows, there is time to learn more and try new endeavors.
New Modes of Learning
Obviously you don’t need to return to a formal schooling program necessarily – most of us will seek ways to educate ourselves while maintaining our employment or business endeavors. Luckily there has never been a more opportune time to seek out knowledge online. There is an emerging trend of more courses and educational programs coming online in which you can learn about your field of interest at your own pace.
Read More!
With all of the online tools at your disposal, don’t lose sight of the enormous value of the old-fashioned printed word. Just as you might make it a priority to exercise for an hour a day, you should set aside a regular block of time each day for learning and enrichment activities. These might include subscribing to a magazine or periodical focused on your industry or you might even be able to commit to reading more widely outside of your immediate sphere of knowledge. The benefits of pledging yourself to ongoing self-education will manifest themselves throughout your life. You will find yourself to be a more worldly and interesting person in general, which will pay dividends in any situation you are in – a networking event, a professional conference, or a first date.
I’ve learned to not bother discussing the latest happenings on the hottest television shows with very successful people, because they very likely will have little indication of what is new (unless these are show business moguls, of course). High achievers spend far more of their time on reading, learning, and personal enrichment activities. They recognize the high value of every hour of their time and generally can’t stomach the thought of frittering away such a precious resource on entertainment that doesn’t produce large returns for them in terms of insight or knowledge. This is why when I do watch entertainment, it is either purely entertainment, or I like something that has some sort of cultural value.
Value Without Measure
Learning more is the sort of nebulous goal that is important, but hard to quantify. Unlike earning a certain amount of revenue or contacting a set number of clients, it is much less tangible when you want to assess how much you’ve learned. I try to compensate for this through the simple routine of asking myself each evening, what did I learn today? I even write it out in my journal, a topic for another day. This helps hold me accountable and reminds myself of how much progress I have made, even if I can’t visibly see it. It also helps improve my recall by pushing me to reflect back on what I have read each day.
Another simply way that I’ve been able to measure this aspiration of learning more is by making a commitment to learn one new word each day. It sounds basic, but it is a powerful tool to expand your vocabulary and improve the clarity of your writing, which still remains one of the most essential skills in getting ahead in business.
Learning Opportunities Are All Around You
I also try to adopt a general mentality of seeking education to my daily life. Once you get into the habit of seeing experiences as learning opportunities, you will have a lot more patience and curiosity to try new things. A new product or side venture that goes south won’t be a failure, it will be a course in how to not use affiliate marketing. A meandering coffee meeting with a young person seeking career advice won’t be an unfocused waste of time, but an opportunity to hone your mentoring skills and teach others about how to productively focus meetings. As long as you can come away from your day with a sense that you have expanded your knowledge and skills, you will begin to see more and more of your days as wins.
How will you begin your own self-education? What steps will you take first? I would advise to write out a list of your strengths and weaknesses, but thinking of your weaknesses less as liabilities and more as learning opportunities. Perhaps you identify that you lack much knowledge in how to give an effective presentation or attract more advertising revenue online. You have now thrown down the gauntlet for what your first self-education track will be. Pledge yourself to spending a chunk of each day over the next month deliberately building up your knowledge in this area, using the tools I’ve discussed. Make learning something every day a fun and prosperous pursuit.
You can also learn more by visiting my website: tonyneumeyer.com and registering to receive free trainings articles and more. Also subscribe to my YouTube channel and follow me on Facebook. You can get your copy of The 7 Minute Millionaire and check out my other books at https://tonyneumeyer.com/books/.
