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If you're on your own, you must know a level of self-repair and maintenance. Especially if you somehow become a home-owner, you're going to need to know some things or you're going to be spending an lot on specialists who could overcharge you.
You have to have some passions, everyone does. If you know what they are and wish to excel or make careers out of them, then go try college to do so.
If you can get the training I knew someone who was a massage therapist and what got me is its the one skill where you don't really need anything to ply the trade. Like a massage table and oils or whatnot are pretty much expected but again not strictly needed. Also you can take one phlubotomy class at a community college or such and be assured to get work that is over minimum wage. Granted you got to be able to handle the work. I can't stand blood myself.
If you want useful, cooking. You'll learn a lot and you'll use it all the time.
It'll impress the ladies/gentleman/etc... Especially if you can do it "clean" - like if you leave the kitchen a mess, it's not nearly as hot.
"Clean as you go" gang rise up
Saves a shitload of money too. Groceries are ~4x less expensive than restaurants.
Protip: You can freeze meats, cheese, and bread. You don't need to go to the grocery store constantly, you can buy more over fewer trips.
You're actually supposed to freeze all bread anyway (and immediately toast it from frozen whenever you want to use it): https://www.newsweek.com/doctor-shares-why-you-should-freeze-bread-before-consumption-1938412
One of the best side effects of having gone vegan is that the cost of food has gone through the floor. Plant-based staples are dirt cheap and extremely shelf-stable, and because most times it's easier and more interesting to cook for myself, I learned a lot of insanely cheap, yummy, and healthy foods to cook. I just bought 8 lb of Desi chickpeas and 20 lbs of basmati rice β enough to feed the fucking Artesh for a year β for about $30 (and I wasn't trying to penny-pinch). The spices, herbs, sauces, oil, nuts, etc. that go into making that, meanwhile, barely even factor in cost-wise.
Even with a non-plant-based diet, you'll find cooking staples like chicken at home saves you a fuckload of money.
Yeah, if you are a routine meat eater, it's not unreasonable for meat to make up over 50% of your grocery bill, especially if it's beef.
Even if you don't want to be vegetarian or vegan, using meat as a condiment (e.g., pepperoni pizza) instead of a staple really saves money.
Beef has gotten truly insane where I live. I've completely stopped buying it.
Same, swapped to pork and chicken-based meals. Ground beef is still cheap enough though.
Here here, I've eaten better after going veg than ever before, and I was a damn good cook as carnivore. I can still pull off some of the best braised short rib or 24 hour smoked brisket, but my veg ramen is so much better and I feel better after eating it.
How to do home maintenance, drywall, basic plumbing, electrical, and basic carpentry.
Brakes, learn how to do the brakes on a car, bonus you learn to change a tire
These things will save you a bunch of money and you will feel less helpless when stuff goes wrong.
Learn skills to survive without electricity or internet. Gardening, navigating, hunting, cooking, etc.
Learn to fix both a car and a house as much was possible.
Become a DIYer
In that order. The goal is to become completely self sufficient.
Learn a trade of some sort. Mechanic, HVAC, electrical, plumbing are all skills you will use your whole life. Working on your own home/vehicle can be very rewarding in itself not to mention money saved by turning your own wrenches. It's also a decent way to make a living while you figure out what your really passionate about.
Try learning a musical instrument. Hit a pawn shop and get a cheap guitar or whatever your interested in and learn how to play. It's a great creative outlet, and can lead you to some music you normally wouldn't listen to.
Read a book. Any book. Seriously reading is great for your brain.
Learn a language. Duolinguo kinda sucks but it's free and it gets your brain working.
Being able to look at a problem with my house and just knowing what I am looking at is such piece of mind. Someone at my workβs husband just moved an electrical plug in their basement and ziptied the case to a shelf.
Reading is underrated. Definitely read a book often, front to back. I only made it through two books this year after over 10 years without, and... it was definitely harder than I remembered ;^.^
Paradox Hotel by Rob Hart was a fun sci fi ish romp :u
You won't believe how exasperated I am evry fucking day working for a boss with shit for brains reading comprehension - but I digress
If you enjoy scifi Project Hail Mary was a fun page turner. I couldn't put it down
1: Put a set amount of your paycheck by percentage into a savings account before you ever see it.
Aim for at least 10%, but if that's too much because our economy is fucked, do 1% of your take home pay. You make $500 a month, you put $5 a fucking month into a savings account.
If you can't do that out of your paycheck, find a way to take on an odd job to make up that difference.
It's stupid. It's tiny. It feels pointless.
It's incredibly important.
2: Learn how to live below your means. I don't care if you're a crypto millionaire or a homeless person living on the street, you have to find a way to live off of less than what you have and take the excess that you generate and put it into savings or investments of some type, something that can support you when shit gets bad bad.
3: When you find yourself with extra time, don't just sit around and binge watch TV or doom scroll.
Definitely get your binge watching and doom scrolling in at appropriate times, but if you find yourself with two or three hours with nothing to do, call up a friend and go try to hang out with them.
In your 20s, friends are popping out of the woodwork for you.
But only the ones that you cultivate and continuously put just a tiny little drop of effort into will still be there when you are 50 or 60.
And it's a lot of fun to hang out with your friends. It's far more rewarding than any doom-scrolling you will ever do.
If you find yourself without friends, for whatever reason, try to find something new to do that takes place in a specific location on a regular schedule.
Nothing makes friends faster than repeated interaction over a period of time.
Seconding cooking for sure. You have to eat, so you might as well find a way to enjoy it, save money, and stay healthy in the process.
Repairing things. Electronics, clothes, furniture, it doesn't matter what, but try to learn how to repair stuff. It eventually encourages you to buy less, but higher quality items. Also everyone likes if you fix their favorite thing.
Organizing people. This isnt often treated as a skill, but it really is. You'll find over time that in your group of friends, someone is always the person to try to put together the next activity. Try to be that person. That's super useful in all parts of life. Keep in mind that people will end up being lazy and expecting you to keep doing the work, but try not to take it personally.
Being able to repair also means you can usually buy dirt cheap quality products that are slightly broken and repair them completely yourself.
If you end up owning a home (or have parents that own one and won't be able to manage in their old age), general home maintenance and repair skills can save a fuck ton of money. Things like learning how to do drywall repair or replacement, fixing pipe leaks, or framing (if you're feeling a little extra) can go a long way. I learned electrical as well, but I'm hesitant to recommend this one unless you know what you're doing (you can burn down your house, or worse, die).
I did a bathroom remodel that would have cost a fortune to have contractors come in, as it required drywall, plumbing, and electrical. Labor costs have skyrocked in my area, it probably would've cost me over $15k if I hired out. In the end, I probably paid a few thousand dollars along with a large portion of my hairline.
Gardening, hiking, camping and hunting (if you believe the whole society is about to collapse)
Sewing and mending clothes (if you believe you wonβt be able to buy new clothes very often)
I've literally gotten jobs because of my homelabbing. Being able to talk about how I run services and why I enjoy them has helped more than most of my professional work
Around the house: cooking and meal prep, keeping a clean and neat living space if you donβt already. Basic home and car repairs. All of these will save you money in the long run. On the subject of money, learning to budget and manage your finances is also helpful. I recommend fitness to anyone. If the gym isnβt for you, find a sport you like, or at least go outside for walks.
As for studies, you can start with free online courses in things you think you might be interested in and assessing how you feel about them before going further.
Mediating, as in managing interactions between people who refuse to understand each other (or you for that matter). Being able to talk your way around, de-escalate, and just in general "make everyone happy enough" is going to both be super AI-proof but also make the journeys of you and those close to you much safer on this planet.
I believe it is a skill that can be learned. It's not really taught anywhere directly though.
If you're more technically inclined, whatever practical skills you need to live without money. Food, shelter, water, and energy related. If you can confidently and cheaply fix whatever necessity there's broken in a house, you'll be valued.
Don't learn skills that require complex equipment that you don't own and control yourself, because that equipment can be taken away from you at any time. Eg: most forms of AI usage
If you live in a region that snows seasonally then I'd say knitting. It can be a very therapeutic activity and when my wife wears her own knits she's never cold. Knitted gear can also make great gifts and if you're good enough it can earn some money on Etsy.
Definitely educate yourself on personal finance. That's the most important thing you can learn. Everything else follows after.
The basics of investing. Open a Roth IRA (or the closest equivalent if you're not in the US) and then try to max it out every year. Learning how to manage money for the long term now will save you a whole lot of hassle down the road.
what are you interested in? what do you find that you always end up doing, when youre alone? what do you think about? creative things? have any ideas about solutions to problems you find?
here is a random list of skills that ive developed since around that age:
cooking (working restaurants of various types and doing Food Not Bombs direct action stuff)
naturopathic medicine and herbal remedies (studied and worked with/for a family business that produced, marketed, and sold homeopathic/naturopathic medicines, tinctures, etc.
sustainable residential construction (started with learning building Earthships, moved to high-end custom carpentry, to conventional remodelling and construction)
Trail building and forestry (spent 2 years doing forest thinning for wildfire management and trail building on the Continental Divide)
edible landscaping/local agriculture (Nashville Foodscapes designed and implemented landscaping that used native plants and fruit bearing and edible plants as beautiful landscaping)
Music and art (im self taught musician and artist using various medium. woodwork, pen and ink, graphic design)
IT, software development, systems building (self taught and AI assisted projects building production apps for various business ideas, building tools to help me in my day to day, etc.)
Currently pursuing a Bachelor of Science Information Technology (I need the peice of paper that says im worth 100k salary)
Just do shit, dont think so hard. Follow your heart. If theres something youre interested in, go seek it out and immerse yourself. Then see where it takes you.
Ive travelled the world and USA building Earthships, met people from all over the world doing different things and the broader your experiences are the more oppurtunities you will find.
Vibe coding.
Public speaking. It always comes in useful.
a trade
Watchmaking, you can learn online there is not a big market for it but if you learn to restore old/luxury watches I believe you can make good money if you are good at it, just be careful to be good enough doing it before you start repairing other people watches, you can go to garage sells or flea markets and buy scrap watches to practice.
Basic investing. The short version is you want to regularly put a portion of every paycheck (5%+) into index funds. Leave them there for decades.
If you have credit card debt, get that paid off first. 8% per year looses to 27% interest. ;p