Based on a 2014 post on my old blog. Rewritten.

“An investment in knowledge pays the best interest.” — Benjamin Franklin

Franklin was a very smart man. If you haven’t read his autobiography, I recommend it.

There’s a tempting idea that the best kind of success is getting something for nothing: money that shows up without effort or skill behind it. I’ve never found that to be true. The returns that last come from knowing how to do something real.

Knowledge behaves like an investment with compound interest. What you learn this year makes next year’s learning faster and cheaper, because you have more to connect it to. Learning to frame a wall made it easier to read plans. Reading plans made estimating easier. Estimating taught me to think in systems, and thinking in systems made software and electronics easier to pick up. None of those steps were planned. Each one paid a dividend into the next.

It also holds its value when things change. Markets shift and industries change. Tools you depend on get discontinued. What you actually understand comes with you.

So when I’m deciding where to spend time, I ask a simple question: will this make me more capable a year from now? If yes, it’s probably worth it, even when it’s slow.