15 Ways To Invest In Yourself

• An investment in yourself pays the best dividends.
• There are clear ways to invest in yourself to change your life for the better.
• Learning to read for growth is essential.
• Surrounding yourself with mentors and building a network will aid in your growth.
• Traveling expands your understanding and makes you richer in experience.
• Take courses to build new skills and optimize your personal and professional environment.

Investing in yourself pays the best dividends, but how many people really understand how to do that? Well, that's exactly why we made this video—to help you out. This is our own list of clear ways to invest in yourself if you want to really change your life for the better. Welcome to Alux, the place where future billionaires come to get inspired.

All right, starting off at number one: read for growth. Honestly, the most accessible thing to do for long-term growth and investment in yourself is to learn how to read for growth.

People often don't read books these days because their teachers force them to read boring books, and they got graded on them. There's now an association between reading and homework, and truth be told, we all dreaded having to do the homework, right? Schools actually made you hate the most valuable self-investment tool out there. So, the best strategy to pick up a reading habit is to read what you love until you love to read. Reading is and always will be a superior form of personal growth. You can watch a thousand TikToks about a topic, and it'll never come close to reading a good book.

Number two: talk to people, find a mentor. Talk to people, okay? A lot of people from different backgrounds and ideologies. The more you expose yourself to different types of thinking, the more you get to understand the world around you. More often than not, people live in what we call ideological bubbles.

You go out with people who are very similar to you. They live near you, they consume the same content as you do, they think the same way you do, they vote the same way you do—basically creating an echo chamber where your ideas get redirected right back at you. The problem is that growth happens only when you expose yourself to new concepts. Growth happens when you either assimilate newfound knowledge or the old knowledge gets replaced by better stuff.

Never be arrogant enough to think you know everything, okay? In your quest to talk to interesting people, some will become guiding lights for your future. Pick one of them to become your mentor. If you're looking to invest in yourself, finding a mentor that's open to guiding you through life is one of the best investments you could ever make.

Number three: make friends. Your friends and network are your own personal and professional safety net. Your net worth is directly correlated to your network. The higher the quality of your connections, the wealthier you are in life.

Outside of professional and financial reasons to network, what kind of life is it where you get to go through all of it without sharing it with the people you care about? Other people's happiness becomes your happiness, and the person who doesn't have friends lacks a big piece of the puzzle that we call life.

Invest in quality friendships; sometimes this will mean time, others it will mean investing money or even resources. Keeping those friendships alive requires work. If your friendships faded away, it's because neither of you made it a priority to invest in that friendship, and you know what? Both parties are worse off because of it.

Number four: travel far. This point expands on the previous two ones. In our experience, the farther you go, the more your understanding of the world changes—in the best possible way.

A ten-hour flight away, and the entire way people look at life changes. Karma comes into play, or maybe a different type of education—customs and traditions. The further you travel, the less self-centered you become. You realize there's an entire world out there that's been going on forever without knowing or caring about your existence, and that moment of realization is quite a big milestone in one's journey.

Travel is one of those very few things that when you spend money on it, it makes you richer. So, embrace travel! Make it a priority to see hard-to-reach places. Don't be a tourist; be a traveler. You'll never learn about the country you visit in a Starbucks or a McDonald's. Embrace the culture and allow it to shape your identity, and you will be richer because of it.

Number five: take courses to build skills. The best investment that someone could make in themselves is to acquire new skills in their life. Skills are like upgrades to the quality of the potential outcomes you can achieve.

They're like valuable tools that you can put to work. The best thing about learning new skills is that nobody can take them away from you. Once you learn how to do them, they're with you forever. Some skills you acquire naturally as you grow through life in various forms. You might have the skill to effectively communicate with people, which gives you a huge leverage into expanding your network, but you might lack other skills like how to make clear and practical objectives for yourself.

Your life is cheap because you think investing in yourself is expensive. If you think spending $15 on a book or $250 on a course is too much money, you're not there yet in your journey to understand the ROI of you. A single idea from a course or a book can make you tens, hundreds, or thousands of dollars. It can give you a new perspective and shift your entire attitude.

Because of this, we're offering you one hell of a Black Friday deal this year. If you go to alux.com/blackfriday, you'll get access to all six of our premium e-learning courses at alux.org, plus a lifetime membership to the Alux app. A lifetime for an investment of $9.99! You'll receive life-changing courses on mastering your goals, learning how to learn, getting the ins and outs of meditation, and you can even get started with Bitcoin and understanding how crypto works.

And as for the Alux app? I mean, there's nothing else like it! We designed it specifically for high achievers, top-level managers, and entrepreneurs to develop their skills, improve their relationships, and just be happier, more well-rounded individuals overall—not to mention crushing their financial goals. The daily coaching sessions and curated lesson packs from industry experts just can't be beat. If you're serious about making 2025 a year of transformation, go to alux.com/blackfriday and use the promo code BF4.

Number six: understand how to and actually build health in your life. You know, people neglect health when they're young because they don't understand that health neglect is an invoice coming your way in the future.

Most people take away from the future and use that health in the present. The more you develop, the more you understand the ROI of good health and good sleep—the difference between running at 95% brain capacity versus running on the fumes that the Red Bull gave you at 3:00 a.m. Invest time and money into learning about nutrition and the body, and then invest effort and money into making sure you're reaping all of the benefits of that knowledge.

Number seven: sell something. Now, this is a piece on the most valuable ways to invest in yourself, right? But hands down, one of the best ways to grow is by trying to sell something.

So many skills have to come together in this type of exercise that your growth accelerates because of it. As with everything, the more you do it, the better you become at it. When you set your goal to sell something, you have to figure out what to sell, who to sell it to, how to communicate with that potential buyer, and figure out how to deliver and close that deal. All of these steps can be translated to other parts of your life, which is why practicing selling is one of the best investments you could ever make in yourself.

Number eight: optimize your environment. Now, this has two clear benefits.

First of all, time management—you're no longer wasting time figuring out where all of your stuff is or what you're supposed to do next. Second is increasing efficiency. Well-organized spaces allow you to get more done quickly. Even if you don't follow a minimalist approach to life, the idea of having things organized is something most youths are struggling with. The bad thing is some people never shake off their entire lives, living in a constant environment dominated by chaos.

Happiness, success, and the feeling of calm come as a result of you putting order into the chaos of the world. So, begin by optimizing your immediate environment and expand outwards.

Number nine: teach something. If you want to master something, teach it to others because teaching is an incredible tool. It forces you to rationalize things in a way that is easy to comprehend and follow.

It's one of the things we hated most in school. Learning stops the moment you begin to memorize stuff instead of learning. Learning should be about understanding. When you're teaching someone anything, it coerces you to make sure that you have a good enough handle on this topic at hand so that you can pass on that knowledge efficiently. In the process, you're getting a lot of value for yourself too because the information you're teaching gets cemented into that wisdom palace called your brain.

Number ten: build a separate income stream that's not dependent on you. Now, this is the only purely financial point on this list.

You're here because you want to know how to invest in yourself, right? Well, invest your money so you don't have to work for money. The oldest advice in the book: let your money work for you. You will never be rich as long as you're trading time for money. The moment you're able to generate a second income stream that's independent of you, your life changes.

It might not be a lot, but if you do it right, it's there to stay. The most important thing is that it's not dependent on you bringing in more income; otherwise, you just got yourself another job. So, here are three books that we strongly recommend on this topic.

First of all, The 4-Hour Work Week, second, The $100 Startup, and third, The Parable of the Pipeline. Read all three of these books and figure out how to build for yourself.

Number eleven: clean up your image. Investing in yourself means giving you access to the highest number of opportunities.

To get there, you need to sacrifice those headstand keg chugs that you and the boys did last summer that are all over the Internet. We all judge people by their appearances, and your social media profiles are the new Emperor's clothes. You're probably lying to yourself if you think it doesn't affect you. Clean up your LinkedIn, do some press, and opportunities will start coming your way.

Now you can start taking better care of yourself. Learn about fitness and grooming, about personal hygiene, and the snowball will keep rolling down that hill in your favor.

Number twelve: expose yourself to art and creative ideas regularly. Most people don't see just how valuable art is. They think that paintings are overpriced, and who has the time to look at statues, buildings, or print anyway?

We've got a TV celebrity to bash on Twitter instead. But creativity breeds value, and the only way to be creative is to exercise your creative muscles. Think of it like light in a room; the more you expose yourself to others, the brighter yours shines. You connect dots differently, you learn about different approaches. Outside of family, art and beauty is probably our favorite thing to be surrounded by.

Art should inspire you; it should make you think, it should make you question things, it'll tell you more about yourself. That's why you should make a habit out of coming face-to-face with creativity in any opportunity you have now. There are two great shows on Netflix which you should definitely watch if this sparked some interest in you. First, Abstract: The Art of Design, a phenomenal show that spoke to our creative side, and second, Chef's Table. We're big foodies over here, but their take on creativity and storytelling through food is really what got us.

Number thirteen: learn a new language. Learning a new language has immediate marketplace value; it'll get you better jobs or better deals because of it. But that's not all; when you're learning a new language, your brain is expanding.

You're learning culture, you're learning new structures, which all have recurring results over time. It doesn't hurt that your inner circle increases in value because of your newfound passion. Going to a restaurant in Italy and ordering in Italian makes all of our Italian friends throw their hands up and cheer! It gives you the feeling of being embraced by a culture, and there's so much value in learning that you can do something just like this.

Number fourteen: better equipment and tools. Out of everything on this list, this is the most straightforward one: buy better tools that allow you to either increase the quality of your work or do your work faster.

Early on in your journey, at least 70% of your residual income should be reinvested in equipment that is directly correlated to bringing in more money. Why? Because these are things you need to buy once, and then you're good to go! At one point, you'll have everything you need, and these tools will pay for themselves in the short to medium term. Don't be afraid to spend more on things that make you money. Not only are they a deductible expense, but you can't afford to be wasting time fixing issues that could be solved by simply throwing money at them.

And lastly, number fifteen: practice introspection and stop saying yes to things you don't want to do. Now, this one's about investing time into yourself.

Here's why introspection is one of the most valuable skills that we've developed over the years. It ties in with meditation, but not only that. We're all carrying a bunch of baggage with us, right? Whether you see it or not, the goal of introspection is for you to solve the issues of the past one by one until one day all you have to carry or stress about are issues at hand right now in the present. This is a fundamental step toward happiness!

Not having to worry about the anchors of the past is illuminating and freeing. Can you imagine getting to a point in your life where all your worries boil down to simple and trivial things? You should!

The additional step to this is by not bringing in new issues. Now, some of you, and we're willing to call you out on this, say yes to things that you know you don't want to do, and people take advantage of that—leading you to a more miserable life than you deserve. So stop doing this! Stop living for other people, and start thinking about what you want out of life.

Investing in yourself means taking all of these things that we've mentioned seriously and pursuing them because you understand and can see that they have a direct beneficial impact on your existence.

This makes us wonder: How many of these 15 do you actively pursue? Let us know in the comments.

As a thank you for those of you watching this video until the very end, you’re being rewarded with a bonus Golden Nugget: invest time before you invest money. Until you have enough money to invest to buy time, this is one of those concepts that have governed our lives for the better half of our professional life.

Growing up poor, we didn't have very much to invest, but we were all given the same amount of time, so we put as much time into it as possible into things that had the potential of getting us to the point where we could buy time with the money that we've made.

And here's a deep point that we want to get across to you, the true aluxers who watch these videos until the very end: If you have to choose between investing money and investing time, always invest the money.

You'll probably run out of time before you can run out of money, and we know this might sound difficult to grasp at first, especially if you're early in your journey. But keep this golden nugget in mind, and one day it'll hit you right, and things will click for you.

You'll find yourself overpaying in the eyes of others, but they don't even know that you're actually buying time here. Everything we've mentioned in this video is meant to help you become more than you already are.

Everyone loves to talk about the return on investment or even the return on time, but we want to raise the following question: What’s the return on yourself? The ROI, because nobody can make you rich, nobody can make you fit, nobody can make you smart. It's not them; it's you!

It's the passion, the hunger, the desire that you're channeling for change. You are the one generating a positive return on your life. Never forget that.