
Ask HN: What are some skills you have that are worth learning? - DavidSJ
I sometimes have the feeling, upon learning that someone hasn&#x27;t yet learned to program or do mathematics, that they&#x27;re missing out on a whole realm of opportunities.<p>What are other skills like this, that you have, that you expect many participants on Hacker News lack, and that have greatly expanded the possibilities available to you?
======
oldsklgdfth
Learn how to take care of yourself first. That includes:

* learning to cook and prepare your own food.

* learn proper sleeping habits and make a routine that feels comfortable.

* learn to exercise - pick an activity and do it consistently with some goals in mind.

* learn to budget money and manage expenses.

* learn to groom yourself and maintain a regular cleanliness routine

* learn to entertain yourself alone - without the internet (ex. reading a book, telling a story, etc)

* learn how devices you own work and how to troubleshoot/repair them (ex. fridge, ac, oven, car)

The general theme I have is that "the things you own, end up owning you", if
you are not accountable for them. Start with the things you can't get rid of
like your body and then question everything else you introduce into your life
to eliminate clutter.

Examples: \- if you don't know how to prepare food your diet depends on what
restaurants offer and you have little control over ingredients, portion size,
calorie intake...

\- if you pass out in front of the tv and wake up on the couch it is unlikely
that you will feel motivated in the morning. Likely you will pick up
McDonald's breakfast on the way to work cause you are running late.

\- if you give up on exercising your body you will quickly feel powerless when
you have to move something heavy.

~~~
kryogen1c
> learning to cook and prepare your own food.

> learn to budget money and manage expenses.

if you've never done this before, i very, very strongly suggest you look at
how much eating out is costing you.

my wife and i are saving literally thousands of dollars a month.

~~~
born_on_sega
How do you managed budget and food?

~~~
joshstrange
Not who you are replying to but I recently (2.5 months ago) started using YNAB
again and have fallen in love with it. The last time I tried it was when it
was desktop software but their newer web-based version with transaction
import/sync is a game changer for me.

As for food I can't really help there. I ended up writing my own app to
manage/track expiration dates for what I have but that's barely the tip of the
ice-burg. I hope to integrate with my recipe app (Paprika) to work on meal-
planning and picking recipes I like while trying to use up the stuff that will
go bad first.

~~~
abnercoimbre
Used YNAB a lot to develop discipline, then switched to Lunch Money [0]. It's
being worked on by a solopreneur; she's awesome.

The app is, I think, a natural evolution for the YNABer who got the discipline
and now doesn't need to track every single dollar all the time.

[0] [https://lunchmoney.app](https://lunchmoney.app)

~~~
jnfr
Thank you for the shoutout, and that's wonderful to hear! :D

------
sethammons
I'm reminded of:

“A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a
hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a
wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act
alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a
computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization
is for insects.” ~ Robert Anson Heinlein

~~~
MarxOk
All useful except butchering a hog - a human being does not need to eat hogs
to survive and thrive.

~~~
lemmonii
*In your current environment.

~~~
MarxOk
In the majority of human evolution (I'm vegan, and doing just fine :))

------
dcminter
If you're a shy person who would like to do better in social situations -
learn to dance.

Becoming a dancer opened up all sorts of doors for me. It made me comfortable
in social situations from small-talk in intimate groups to public speaking in
front of large ones.

I even ended up married and living in a foreign country. Currently I'm
learning the language and making some progress. All of which I can trace
fairly directly to learning to dance.

Caveats:

You need to like the music! So pick a form that's compatible with that (if
there is one).

Don't go into this looking for a hook-up. Those people are greatly disliked by
most of the people in the scene.

Obviously this is open to confident people too, but shy people will likely get
more out of it because the structured nature of dance classes compensates for
lack of confidence.

(Also, for all the "two left feet" people - if you can clap a rhythm to a
song, you can learn to dance just fine)

~~~
rypskar
What maybe surprised me most about learning to dance is how much you learn
about signaling and how important signaling is to get two individuals work as
one. Giving and reading signals was never my strong side, but it have improved
a lot after learning to use signals in dance. The way I hold my hand or some
light pressure on the back tells the one I'm dancing with what I plan for us
to do and it often even works when I do moves the partner have never done
before

~~~
082349872349872
Martial arts and partner dancing are two sides of the same coin: in the
former, one maintains distance and predicts movement so one can break synch
with an opponent by surprising, taking advantage of and increasing brief
errors. In the latter, one maintains distance and predicts movement so one can
synch with a partner by signalling, covering up for and decreasing brief
errors.

------
motohagiography
\- Learn to edit well, it's how to write well. Nothing opens doors like clear
writing. For sources of quality edited writing, read The Economist, Quanta,
and the first novels by authors who wrote 20th century literary fiction. Their
later ones had less editing.

\- Negotiation + game theory. Learn the traditional methods, and then forget
everything you know about them because the real world has changed and broken
the assumptions that went into the formal theories, but you need it as a
foundation.

\- Basic vehicle maintenance and repair. Even if it's just buying an ODBII
connector for fault reading and being able to trace fuse box connections.
Also, learn to drive stick, or be dependent in an emergency on someone who
does.

\- Learn confidence and humility by mastering a common physical skill like an
instrument, singing, or performing monologues, etc. Not stupid tricks, but
something where other people are objectively way better than you are and plan
to be embarrassingly bad at it for at least a decade.

~~~
Shared404
> \- Learn confidence and humility by mastering a common physical skill like
> an instrument, singing, or performing monologues, etc. Not stupid tricks,
> but something where other people are objectively way better than you are and
> plan to be embarrassingly bad at it for at least a decade.

I would personally recommend martial arts for this. You get a useful skill
(eventually), there is no skill ceiling, and there are always people better
than you.

~~~
86J8oyZv
I mean, whatever floats your boat really, but when exactly are martial arts
useful? The average person might use them once in a lifetime. A year's worth
of voice lessons and pretty much any non-trained person will love hearing you
sing along to any song, and you will make them want to sing. It's a way to
relate to people and make friends in nearly any social situation.

Even if you're just more into the kinesthetic work, dance will pay more
dividends and be more useful for basically the same reasons. Breaking is
especially fundamental and nearly always works.

Again, do whatever works for you. But martial arts are really very rarely a
useful thing to have learned. (And to be fair, performing monologues per the
OP's suggestion is about as un-useful as martial arts relative to singing and
dancing.)

~~~
Shared404
> The average person might use them once in a lifetime.

Depends on your perspective. On the one hand, I haven't had to fight anyone,
and would like to keep it that way. On the other, I'd like to be able to if
necessary.

Martial arts is the only activity other then programming in which I have
reached flow state. I suspect dancing/yoga/etc also reach this state, but I
don't know because I've never done any of these seriously enough to get to
that point.

Aside from these, like borroka said, it has an affect on your demeanour and
world view, which is honestly the biggest benefit.

> very rarely a useful thing to have learned.

Also, it makes good resume filler if you're just barely getting your career
started. Not quite as good as being an Eagle Scout, but non negligible.

I've just made a lot of personal improvement through martial arts, and figured
I'd bring it up in case someone else would enjoy it.

~~~
memexy
Good explanation of the benefits of practicing a martial art. I think any type
of activity that involves both coordinated motion and cardio is a good
candidate for achieving flow states.

Re: martial arts. What type do you recommend?

~~~
Shared404
I've only studied Okinawan Karate at an OSMKKF school, so I can't speak
personally to any others.

However, I have friends who have had good experiences with MMA, and Capoeira
is on my bucket list to learn.

I honestly don't think the particular style is as important as the fact that
you have proper training in that style.

------
StangeStars
This is not a skill but something I do everyday, that I found to be rewarding.

While I'm in bed and before sleeping, I take two minutes to be thankful for
the day. I would go from the beginning of the day and be thankful for things I
have. In this world where everyone seems to be so focused on achieving new
things, creating and being more productive. I believe we all should take some
time to be just thankful for what we have.

Have a fridge? be thankful for that. Got you uber to go to places? be
thankful. Got money to eat for the day? be thankful. Made a contribution to
make life better for other people? be thankful.

Once per day for 2mins, hit the pause button, stop thinking about productivity
and being a better version of yourself. Accept who you are and be thankful for
it.

The other benefits of this for me personally, is that I train my brain to
remember things I did during the day.

~~~
zigzaggy
Gratitude list! I started one a few years ago when life was very very tough
and it ended up being one of the things that kept me going.

I also made a timeline of my life with all the major events on it. Puts the
whole thing in perspective.

Both good tools, especially in tough times.

------
rayalez
\- Take an improv class. It's excellent for building confidence, meeting new
people, learning social skills, practicing creativity, being funnier, and
generally having a really fun evening once or twice per week.

\- Writing posts or making video tutorials is really great. Can be profitable,
lead to professional growth, but also it's a great hobby and a fun way to
create some value. Even if you don't become a successful/professional
blogger/youtuber, it feels awesome to record a tutorial, see the views go up,
and receive comments from people who found your video helpful. Also it
develops writing/speaking skills, motivates you to learn the topic in more
depth, clarifies your thoughts and understanding, gives you valuable feedback
from more experienced people, grows your audience.

\- Gamedev and Computer Graphics are REALLY fun to do. For people here I
recommend Godot and Houdini, it's incredibly interesting, entertaining, and
satisfying.

Here's a quick tutorial that I've made on procedurally generating a pretty
landscape with Houdini:

[https://youtube.com/watch?v=o3mbIRZhv20](https://youtube.com/watch?v=o3mbIRZhv20)

------
heelix
Learn a handful of knots. You don't need to know the entire boy scout manual,
but solid understanding of 4-5 knots - be it a trucker's hitch (adjustable),
improved clinch (fishing/permanent), half hitch, etc - will be the right tool
for the moment. When we go camping, we end up bringing a handful of tarps and
paracord. Always fun to see the monstrosities people come up with as we try to
string up a sun/rain shelter.

~~~
suyula
Learning the bowline, trucker's hitch, and double half-hitches will get you
the most value for your time in my opinion. They're all I've ever needed for
moving or camping.

~~~
greenie_beans
Figure eight! Learned it recently to tow a canoe. I was always towing them
with a two half-hitch and trucker’s hitch. I think I like the double figure
eighth to attach to the car better than two half hitch.

------
muzani
If I had to pick one, it would be engineering. Learn how to break down a large
problem into parts, and then tackle it. But everyone here likely knows that.

So my pick is sales. When I was presenting my thesis to the assessor, he was
unimpressed. It was a bachelor's thesis, technically simple, but it attacked
the problem from a different angle and had better progress than some PhD
students working on the same project. My supervisor congratulated me on the
presentation. I told him my assessor wasn't as impressed. He replied, "Maybe
you didn't sell it well enough."

Since then, I got a little obsessed in finding out how to sell things better.
A lot of people get the wrong impression of sales. They think it's an
overdressed guy trying to put their foot in the door and promise anything for
a sale.

Sales is simple. You have something that someone wants. Something other people
wish they had and probably even spent a lot of money trying to patch
themselves. They would happily part with money to get someone else to handle
it. The trick with sales is to simply to find those people and explain your
product in such a way that they throw money at you. There's no need to be good
with words or be charismatic. Just explain the product well and explain why
it's worth it.

It applies to many other parts of life too - getting a job, getting a date,
hiring, pitching for a startup or scholarship. The first step is understanding
what you have and why it's better. The rest is just articulating that well.

~~~
lowestprimate
Learning the art of influence/story telling is a super power. It doesn't even
have to be better as it could just be more confidence in that it is good
enough.

------
ideal_stingray
Learn to sew. And to repair and maintain your things more generally, but
sewing seems much more overlooked than e.g. car maintenance in this thread,
even though more people wear clothes than own cars. You can fix minor rips in
your clothes quickly before they turn into major issues. You can do basic
alterations by hand (e.g. hemming). I like to put loops in my towels so they
hang better on hooks and to embroider my initials on cloth items I might lose.
Recently, I repaired my roommate’s rocking chair — the seat is made of canvas,
which had torn along a stress point, so I sewed it back together by hand using
a thick piece of replacement canvas to add reinforcement. With a sewing
machine, I was also able to make a weighted blanket (much cheaper than it
would’ve been to buy) and a couple of cloth face masks. Learning a bit about
garment construction and fabric properties will help you evaluate clothes, so
you can tell if something won’t last just by looking at it in the store, so
you can spend less time buying clothes. You can also learn enough about basic
hand sewing to get started attaching fabric to other fabric in like 15
minutes.

Also, get some kind of physical hobby that doesn’t involve looking at a
computer. It’s nice to spend some time on evenings and weekends not staring at
a screen, and I find that doing things with my hands is grounding.

------
adventured
Being able to read and digest a profit & loss (P&L) statement and a balance
sheet. It's not a common skill and yet it's also not particularly difficult;
with a small bit of self-training you can do it extremely fast. You'll be able
to scan the financials for a public company in a minute or two and get a good
overview of its financial condition. It's a critical skill for investing and
financial independence over time. Nobody showed me how to do that and I didn't
have to read any technical books (I point that out because to some people it
can be a very mind-numbing, boring subject), I self-taught out of personal
interest in the stock market and business in general when I was young. With a
few hours of self-education pretty much anyone can learn how; with some
practice over time you'll get better and faster at it and reading financials
will become second nature. It's a few hours of effort to learn an important
part of a simple language (the language of financial literacy) that the vast
majority of humanity can't understand and yet it's one of the most valuable
languages in existence: the numbers & documents that make up the world of all
commerce.

~~~
alltakendamned
it's something I've been meaning to learn for a while but never quite found
out how to go about it. Pointers are welcome.

------
zjs
While it's not exactly a viable skill to learn at the moment, I found learning
a social partner dance to be eye opening.

(Slight aside: I started with Lindy Hop, which is typically danced to Jazz
music. It has its roots in a variety of Black dances and grew out of the Savoy
ballroom in Harlem starting in the late 20s. It's certainly not the only dance
that teaches these skills, but I think it's a good choice.)

At the core, it's about communication and collaboration; communication and
collaboration with the person you're dancing with is the essence of a partner
dance. You want to make space in the dance for a balance your ideas and your
partner's, and so whether you're leading (initiating movement) or following
(responding), you want to share your ideas and listen to your partner's. Non-
verbally. In real time. Over a lossy communication channel.

Beyond that, you're communicating and collaborating with other dancers sharing
the floor. Unlike some dances, there's no macro-level choreography that keeps
dancers from running into each other. You need to pay attention to your
surroundings, understand how your movements are going to affect others, and
adjust as the situation changes.

During classes or practice sessions, communication and collaboration with
peers and instructors is also important. It's silly, but dance classes were
the first time I ever _really_ learned how to listen to and give constructive
feedback in a kind and effective way.

All of that said: it's a bit like math. You'll start by counting (literally,
perhaps), not with an understanding algebra or combinatorics. It won't feel
revolutionary at first. You may not have any epiphanies until your instructors
take of the "kid gloves" and at least reveal that "improper" fractions are
just fractions and that it's a-okay to subtract a larger number from a smaller
number. (And just like math, you can go as deep down any rabbit hole as you'd
like. One day, after a few years of dancing and hundreds of hours of classes,
I spent a full hour-long lesson exploring the complex topic of: walking
forwards and backwards.)

------
pluto9
Surprised no one has mentioned learning a second language yet. I'm currently
learning Spanish (one of the easier ones for native English speakers like me
to learn, especially being from the American Southwest) and finding myself
suddenly understanding conversations between people I walk past at WalMart has
been one of the more gratifying experiences I've had.

It's hard to say whether this skill will afford me new opportunities in the
future, but it's immensely satisfying and I think it's useful because it has
changed the way I think about language in general. It's hard to explain, but
when I only knew English, words _were_ the concepts that they symbolized. Of
course I knew intellectually that "dog" is just a symbol for the animal, but I
couldn't separate them subconsciously, if that makes sense. Now that "perro"
is also a symbol for the animal, and it's ingrained in my mind enough that I
don't have to translate it to English, it's as if words and things have been
"decoupled". Unfortunately I'm finding it hard to articulate why that
revelation matters. Basically, learning another language expands your mind in
a unique way. It's just something you have to experience.

~~~
082349872349872
¿Hola, qué tal?

As to new opportunities, having multiple languages certainly makes it easier
to vote with one's feet. (two years to acclimatise as a fresh immigrant may
seem like a long time, but that may well be very short compared with the
timescale of political change in one's birth country.)

Languages can not only be explored in breadth or in depth, but also open up
side quests of culture, music, etc. I would say one of the most significant
benefits of attending an international school (presumably the Asker is past
this point, however) is learning to habitually rephrase, paraphrase, gesture,
etc. in order to accomplish things with people with whom one shares little
vocabulary and not necesarily much more culture. Surprisingly, one may find
these skills even come in handy when attempting to communicate with people who
nominally share one's mother tongue and national culture...

(It's also rewarding because the learning curve is relatively quick. At the
beginning, one is only able to understand the sorts of conversations mothers
have with very small children at WalMart, but before any of those children
reach university age, one has gained the ability to read authors in the
original.)

------
trcollinson
Learn to Knit or Crochet. There are a bunch of fun benefits! First, it's not
hard. Second, you really can make nice things that last a long time and are
useful. I personally have been on a sweater kick. Look or Aran and Gansey
sweaters, they are very fun. Third, it gives you something to do other than
endlessly scrolling on your phone.

With my hands and wrists (from being at a keyboard for years), I find knitting
to be more comfortable. Also, if you do it correctly, the motion is different
from typing and therefore actually helps with repetitive strain in the wrists.

------
Kaibeezy
One simple magic trick, no matter how cheezy, even if it uses a cheap prop
from a magic shop. Be able to do it smoothly and convincingly, while saying
you are rusty and out of practice.

It's not going to give you a "great expansion of possibilities", more like an
"occasional ability to charm your way into an improved situation". Bang for
the buck, though, I tellya.

~~~
Jtsummers
Card tricks are good for this one. My great-grandfather had one (that I've now
forgotten) that he'd use to entertain all of us as kids.

~~~
Kaibeezy
Yep, my one is a card trick. Two cards. I keep them in my wallet.

See also:

How to do 2 simple magic tricks--and why you should learn them -
[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/13/smarter-living/how-to-
do-...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/13/smarter-living/how-to-do-2-simple-
magic-tricks-and-why-you-should-learn-them.html)

[https://www.reddit.com/r/Magic/comments/6u42om/whats_in_your...](https://www.reddit.com/r/Magic/comments/6u42om/whats_in_your_edc/)

------
throwaway0a5e
Being handy and having the relevant tools turns a lot of multi thousand dollar
problems into hundred dollar problems and hundred dollar problems into non-
issues. Having fewer smaller problems makes life less stressful.

~~~
Cthulhu_
Does it need to be said that everyone should have a basic toolbox / toolset
and fasteners around? A set of screwdrivers, spanners, hammer, nails / screws,
glue, tape, pliers, etc shouldn't take up more space. A (cheap) multitool or
multifunctional pocket knife would already do most of those.

~~~
throwaway0a5e
I encourage everyone to develop at least a basic familiarity with the skills
required to maintain the things that keep our modern lifestyle humming along
but I was talking about making it to a substantially greater skill level than
that.

You can change a water heater with two shark-bite fittings, an adjustable
wrench (and a screwdriver if it's electric instead of gas) and maybe a little
help from YouTube and there's a ton of bang for your buck in that. There's
very little automotive maintenance you can't do with a basic socket set and
some screwdrivers and pliers and there's a ton of bang for your buck in that
as well. But those kinds of basic tasks can be gateway drugs into developing
more and more skills and as you develop more skills you wind up wanting the
tools that make application of those skills more efficient.

Eventually you wind up at a level of available skills and tools where your
only sources of expensive problems are people and not things, you are more
limited by time than money, you've considered registering an LLC so you don't
have to do as much lying when purchasing from companies that usually only sell
B2B and you've unsubscribed from the advice subreddits in several fields
because you realize that they're just full of idiots who can regurgitate
textbook advice but don't have sufficient understanding of the constraints the
people asking the questions are likely working under.

------
deoco
Learning to fight: or more precisely learning an alive martial art (one that
entails sparring)

Getting tapped out or beaten up over and over develops a kind of calmness and
humility that transfers well to other situations in life. After you've fought
someone on stage in front of friends and family, it's difficult to find other
experiences particularly scary.

It lets you tap into a number of deep and ancient aspects of being human, in a
safe and productive way (assuming you are able to find a good, disciplined
school, and not one run by people with egos).

------
lifeisstillgood
What I would like is a "LifeSkills LongTerm University". A lot of the things
recommended here I have learnt - only to forget again over time. CPR being one
such (and each time I learn it the song to play as you pump the heart gets
changed)

But the main point is, I could happily subscribe to a Sunday every 6 months,
for car maintenance, or for woodcraft fire lighting, or for knots and Maker
and ... and ...

I guess this post is the right question, but the next question is _where_ do I
learn these things - and a one stop shop would be ideal.

------
Shared404
Learn outdoor skills.

Go camping, hiking, trekking, canoeing etc. It keeps you in shape, and is
great to decompress and enjoy yourself.

~~~
ornornor
How do you get started? I never did that as a kid and now that I’m older
living in a beautiful place I’d like to try it out, but I have no idea how to
get started. I own hiking shoes that I barely ever used and a Swiss Army knife
but that’s it... no backpack, no tent, nothing. I wouldn’t even know where to
go or what to do when the night comes. I live in Switzerland.

~~~
Shared404
I would say start small. Find a hiking trail - a real hiking trail - withing
10-30 minutes drive, and walk it weekly or so. Once you're comfortable with
that trail, broaden your horizons for where you want to hike.

Eventually, you may want to do more/go on a hike further out then is a
reasonable drive. At that point, find a campground near where you want to
hike. If they offer rentals of some sort, great! If not, you may want to
purchase a tent. If you do this, be sure to test it for a night by your house.
Nothing quite as miserable as trying to figure out new gear in production
(Yeah, the phrasings weird, but I couldn't figure out the right way to say
it).

Most of this I kinda rephrased from my time in scouting, so my apologies if I
translated it to words badly.

~~~
Shared404
Here's a couple links. I glossed over them, and they seem like decent
resources.

[https://www.tripsavvy.com/setting-up-a-
campsite-498429](https://www.tripsavvy.com/setting-up-a-campsite-498429) \-
Setting up camp 101. Doesn't go over how to pitch a tent, but that'll get
covered with the tents documentation.

[https://veggievagabonds.com/camping-for-
beginners/](https://veggievagabonds.com/camping-for-beginners/) \- Camping
102, bit more in depth.

[https://thebackpackinghiker.com/hiking-and-wild-camping-
in-s...](https://thebackpackinghiker.com/hiking-and-wild-camping-in-
switzerland/) \- Assumes experience, but covers Switzerland specifically, so
you may find it useful.

[https://www.myswitzerland.com/en-us/destinations/swiss-
natio...](https://www.myswitzerland.com/en-us/destinations/swiss-national-
park/) \- The Swiss National Park appears to have campsites and hiking trails.
I've had good experiences with the US National Parks, but haven't been out of
the states (yet).

~~~
Shared404
The answers from 082349872349872 and BoiledCabbage are better then mine. Go
with their suggestions.

------
crownvic
Salesmanship. You have to sell yourself and your ideas in many life situations
anyway. Why not do it with a maximum impact? And it brings in money if you
choose a marketing/advertising job path or start your own business.

~~~
andai
More broadly, you also have to sell yourself at a job interview, and then sell
your ideas continuously at work.

------
austincheney
Behavior and empathy. People often have a reason for doing the things that
they do which differs wildly from the reason they state in words.

------
symmitchry
General fitness. I've exercised most of my life, and I am constantly helping
people start out. I am not a professional athlete, but I have a vast general
knowledge of anatomy, physiology, training plans, etc. It makes learning new
things ("I'd like to run a marathon") so much easier, safer and more efficient
if you have some foundational knowledge.

------
gitgud
-> Logical fallacies, being able to name the reasons why an argument has problems is a great skill to have and it's kind of interesting.

-> Linux terminal, amazing how much more fun using a computer is with just the terminal (also a browser to Google the commands)

-> Wood working, it's fun to cut timber and build things, especially if you have an office job like myself.

~~~
majewsky
> also a browser to Google the commands
    
    
      man man # :-P

~~~
xelxebar
Also

    
    
        $ info info
        $ help help

------
ogou
The ability to pause before reacting and realize you have the option of saying
nothing. It allows for more self awareness in a conversation. You don't always
have to have something to say. A lot of engineers I've worked with fail to
grasp this and come across as know-it-alls who over share.

Learn how to write a 650 word summary, pitch, or blog post. Really learn it
and focus on concise and engaging writing. My ability to write well at that
length has helped me so many times in my life with blog posts, cover letters,
documentation entries, marketing, raising money, and web content.

A surprising resource for this was a book called Manly Art: They Can Run-But
They Can't Hide by George Kimball. It's a collection of boxing writing.
Stories about boxing matches are usually quite short, about 650 words.
Conveying the stakes and action of a boxing match in short form is hard to do
well. This book demonstrates the balance between brevity and color.

------
RyanOD
Learn to swim well by going beyond just staying afloat.

Understand the physics of moving through the water. Learn to lean on your
chest to achieve proper balance in the water. Grasp how to "catch" the water
with a high elbow position. Breath properly on both sides. Etc.

It's fun to swim well and it will help you live a healthier life.

~~~
Jtsummers
Take lessons. I was a competent (but not good) swimmer, I even took a swimming
course in college (where I became good, but forgot it after years of not
swimming). At 30 or so I took a 4 week course with an instructor, and had
1-on-1 training (mostly, she had two true beginners there as well). I swam
laps working on specific details while she worked with them, I got dedicated
attention just before they arrived and after they left.

There were a lot of things about the mechanics of swimming I "knew", but had
not internalized (as evidenced by my form and approach to the water). It was a
good experience for me, and I ended up swimming for exercise for about 6
months after (shoulder injury took me out of it and I lost access to that
pool).

------
toto444
Economics.

Many people have no idea what economists actually work on. Economics is not
only Macroeconomics. It is a consistent theory of human behaviour. It tries to
understand social behaviour and human interactions using a very small number
of hypothesis.

It genuinely gives a new light on how you understand social phenomena.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Partner that with Statistics. There's little about statistics that's in line
with our expectations. From simple things like the Monty Hall problem, to
Markov chains or complex sampling.

------
sunstone
Basic therapeutic massage is a skill that will last a life time. Most people
(but not all) can pick this up easily and use it to ease sore shoulders, arms,
backs and lower back pain (stay away from the neck). It mostly involves
prodding around the muscles to find the tense/tight area that needs some
direct pressure applied by the thumb. This causes pain at first but after 10
minutes the muscles relax and the original pain is reduced.

The mildly irritating thing about this skill is that once you learn it you can
keep your friends and family up and running but, likely, no one will be able
to do the same for you.

------
superasn
Become proficient in CBT for yourself, especially the part that deals with
cognitive distortions - even if you're not depressed.

I have now internalized things like all of nothing thinking, mental filters,
personalization, etc that whenever my mind tries to pull a fast one on me I'm
able to quickly rationalize the negative thought by seeing the cognitive
distortions in it.

But like everything this requires a lot of practice to do mentally (I nearly
did it for 1 year with pen and paper first - actually I made a web app for
myself to do it but you have to write it down in the beginning)

------
yen223
For backend engineers out there, knowing how to build a simple GUI will help
make your tools more accessible to a wider audience. This makes your work more
visible, and therefore more valuable to stakeholders.

~~~
Cthulhu_
Applied a bit more broadly / generally: Dogfooding. Switch to being the client
/ consumer of what you're working on. Or just watch other people use your
stuff, be they other developers or end-users.

Statistics and bug reports only tell part of the story. I've learned a lot
just from watching someone else work with the app I worked on back when with a
camera mounted to the phone.

------
e19293001
Learn how to use emacs. Next learn how to use org-mode.

------
tofflos
Rhetoric.

Communicating effectively with others will open up more opportunities than any
other skill. It’s also a great way to learn more about others and yourself.

I expect many participants here to be strong in the logical aspects of
rhetoric and would suggest focusing on social interaction, understanding the
audience, playing with different presentational styles, receiving and giving
feedback, and the part I find most difficult, figuring out and acknowledging
what you want to achieve in a given interaction.

------
bluewalt
If I'd need to pick only one, I would say: "learn to learn". In the era of
internet, where every piece of knowledge is available, I'm so surprised to
meet so many people that are unable to learn things by themselves, relying on
other non-remote people.

Sometimes you can sound like an asshole when a friend asks you something very
specific and you answer: "why don't you Google it?", but IMHO you're doing him
a favor.

------
jonnycoder
Learn golf. On the surface, it just seems like a game but it has plenty to
teach about competing against yourself. Just as in life, the goal is to get a
tiny bit better as compared against yourself yesterday. Most of it is a mental
game. Patience and frustration will be the first things you will experience,
but unlike learning skiing you won't have to worry about hurting yourself.
It's an incredibly complex game simply because of the variety of skill
involved. Full swing shots, pitching and chipping, sand shots, uneven lies and
putting. Course management is also a strategic aspect that requires experience
and skill.

Most of the time you will be paired up to form a group of four, so you will
probably experience the feeling of being out of place and uncertain of how to
act (rules, etiquette). This will help with practicing dealing with
uncomfortable situations if you are more introverted. The reason why golf is
addicting for many of us is that once you get ok at the game, you start to
enjoy the improvement or just the addiction of hitting a great shot where you
had planned to hit it. The outdoor aspect is also a big bonus, especially if
you start walking 18 holes.

------
anotheruser11
Here are some things i'm thinking carefully about at the moment

Combination of: 1) Really thinking about what i value in life (and its
monetary cost) 2) Index funds and living cost efficiently (Learning the type
of risk here is important - i.e. volatility risk)

This is nothing new to many, but to me it was a revelation. When you start
plugging numbers into a calculator as opportunity costs of current purchasing
decisions the numbers are incredible. Ben felix - youtube (9/10) Mr money
mustache - blog (7/10) - imperfect but useful for putting things in context

The rates are debatable but often 7% yearly is quoted. Example, instead of
buying a 40,000 car, put it in stock market for 30 years and get just 6%
return you've got 229,000. Thats a large percentage of retirement for simply
deciding not to buy a new car

To me this seems like a cheat code for turning the difficulty down on life.
We've got enough things to worry about other than personal finance.

I personally feel strongly about this, some might disagree: News. Have a look
here: [https://www.statista.com/statistics/529060/uk-newspaper-
mark...](https://www.statista.com/statistics/529060/uk-newspaper-market-by-
circulation/)

Makes it clear why so much of the most read and quotes articles are of such
bad quality. (There are still many good news outlets!, just large swathes of
the largest ones are terrible) Something like 70% of the uk new market is
owned by 3 papers or something like that.

I'm sure you can quibble with some of the things ive written here but i feel
the general direction holds.

~~~
toto444
"The rates are debatable but often 7% yearly is quoted. Example, instead of
buying a 40,000 car, put it in stock market for 30 years and get just 6%
return you've got 229,000. Thats a large percentage of retirement for simply
deciding not to buy a new car"

I completely agree with you. Many people would like to have an extra activity
generating passive revenue but not spending and saving is exactly the same
thing. It can be hard to be consistently frugal though.

------
halfcat
The skill of energy. Energy is the one metric to optimize for by default.
Energy to me has been health and excitement. Health is sleep, nutrition,
movement, mindset, and relationships. Excitement is doing something that I
enjoy, often seemingly providing more energy than it takes.

The skill of recognizing the need for difficult conversations, then having
them. A 20 second awkward, difficult conversation saves 20 days or 20 months
of unfortunate use of my time. There is a general form of this, that if it’s
easy to arrive at the answer, but hard to act, that’s probably the right
direction. Or, the obstacle is the way.

The skill of recognizing that everything makes sense when I know the full
story. Especially in relation to other people. When someone else doesn’t make
sense to me, it’s almost always a problem with me, not having the full story.
I have not encountered an exception to this yet. This injects empathy and
objectivity at a broad level into one’s life.

The skill of habits and routines executed on priorities. This is the
difference between being busy doing stuff all day and never accomplishing
anything, to making consistent progress toward what’s important.

~~~
Cthulhu_
Re: energy, maybe add mood and a lot of things: Realize they are subtle, that
there is often no direct cause or correlation. Some issues are because of
experiences throughout the day accumulated, or something from hours ago (e.g.
food); others accumulate over months or years, e.g. stress, lack of sleep, a
nutritional deficiency.

------
vmurthy
For me : It has been being mindful around my son. I realised that me being
constantly distracted when he was playing was causing me a lot of stress and
him to throw a lot of tantrums. Instead, I now consciously bring my attention
back to him and I've noticed that I am a lot less stressed and so is he :) .
The mind does drift off as it is wont to do but bringing it back is key. Good
luck!

------
zyxzevn
Understanding Logical fallacies. In these days of bad news reporting, it is
good to recognize logical fallacies in reports. Instead of getting someone's
opinion, it helps to focus on the actual data that is mentioned in the report.
If the writer is using logical fallacies, they are trying to manipulate me. If
they have clear logic, they are trying to inform me.

Then as second step, you can evaluate the data yourself, or even question it.
See where you can find the source, or see other data. This step is more
checking if the statistical evaluations are correct, or if there is p-hacking
or any other problem. It must also follow basic common science. And if not,
this should be explained.

What I usually find (>90% of the articles that I find interesting) is that the
reports are conflicting and even the data is conflicting. The evidence/science
is often incomplete and filled in with unfounded theories. And knowing this,
it reduces the amount of information that is important in the articles.

So technically logical thinking is a way to compress all the data, without
loss of information.

------
jeffrallen
In American Boy Scouts, Pioneering merit badge. How to tie anything to
anything, how to make shelter, how to lever/hoist things.

------
DougN7
Although I hated Language Arts classes growing up, the skill of writing
clearly has been hugely beneficial to me in my career. I was the last to be
laid off from a company closing down and received a large retention bonus to
stay to the end because of my status reports. Technically, I was somewhat
junior on the team.

------
gorpovitch
First aid.

Become a volunteer as a first-aid responder. You will learn and practice how
to react in a lot of unusual situations (kids choking, burns, wounds, people
fainting...), learn more about healthcare-related subjects, and live
incredibly unusual experiences. It's a highly rewarding skillset.

------
stormdennis
Learn to play polo, to sail, hunt, fish and play golf. Those people all seem
to have plenty of money.

------
austincheney
* walking the DOM as a data structure, query strings wont get you that

* walking the file system recursively as a data structure

* regular expressions

* so much of any projects documentation can be automated

* once you fully appreciate an understanding of data structures algorithms write themselves

~~~
Minor49er
Seconding regular expressions. Even for non-developers, they can be hugely
useful in word processing and spreadsheets. If you ever need to find or
replace text that isn't exact, then you should check it out.

Ever had to do something like look for every timestamp in a document or every
word ending in -y or -ies, but it was tedious and time consuming? Regex can
turn the solution from minutes of manual checking into seconds.

This is a pretty good introduction: [https://blog.usejournal.com/regular-
expressions-a-complete-b...](https://blog.usejournal.com/regular-expressions-
a-complete-beginners-tutorial-c7327b9fd8eb)

------
snow_mac
* Cooking gourmet foods; risotto, steak, learning how to make specific dishes: carbonara, spaghetti, chicken cordon blue, bangers and mash etc.... (I like to cook and love to eat)

* Work on your own car; learn basics: changing oil, light bulbs, air filters, adding wiper fluid. Learn more advanced: brake pad and rotor changes, fluid flushes, keep building this skill and you'll have fun getting dirty and saving money

* Learn how to get your partner or preferred partner gender to cum; this could be fun and exciting for both of you

* Learn how you like to cum

* Learn about money, stocks, 401ks and budgeting basics

------
gadders
Being strong. It's like a secret super-power (not that I'm STRONG, just better
than average) and it strengthens your bones and makes your body more robust in
general:

“In robust training for this life, which is itself a continual fight with some
form of adversary or other, the aim should be to form that solid and
adamantine fiber which will endure long and serious attacks upon it, and come
out unharmed from them, rather than the ability to perform sudden and
brilliant feats, which often exhaust the powers in show, without doing any
substantial good.”

\-- Walt Whitman

------
dave_sid
Learn any martial art, to any level of competence, at any time of your life.
This will give you 100 times more self esteem and leave you feeling more
centred than any self-help book you could ever buy.

------
JoeAltmaier
Not a lot of these suggestions have anything to do with a partner. Mostly solo
skills, except maybe dance.

Maybe we could come up with some that would enhance ones time spent with a
partner/spouse?

~~~
andai
Foot massage? :)

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Music? Conversation? Toastmasters? Heck, wrestling, handball, pool.

------
joddystreet
\- aligning multi-party interests

\- understand and manage the complexity

\- finding a way to keep moving forward

\- keeping things in balance

\- knowing when to stop arguing

\- accepting better solutions

\- when stand corrected, have the courage to say "you are right, i was
mistaken"

------
greenseaqueen
I am a HN lurker. study biology. far from the tech world. but I love
following. far from everything on HN I understand in depth. however, I find a
community of people interested in the situation of the world, so although my
field of study is far from the usual insight perceived in this community, 0s
and 1s are not that far from the line of thought in molecular biology with
genetic backwards engineering of DNA ┌(・。・)┘

------
jitendrac
If you have a friend with mid/big grocery shop, I would highly recommend you
to hang there often. If you have free day and can spare it there, Try it. you
will learn tons of things from marketing, trading, negotiation, customer
service, etc. (by the way my family owns a grocery shop, and I have also spent
much of my free teen-age time at my uncle's grocery super-store which is kind
of a mini wall-mart with 15000+ skus.)

------
ebsp
Learn how to do things you would normally pay somebody else to do.

For example learn to service your car, repair your home, etc.

Your things may last longer, you can save a bunch of money, your better half
will be impressed, you learn how basic stuff in the real world works and
you’ll get some time off the screen.

~~~
oftenwrong
When I was 16 I worked part time at an auto mechanic's shop just doing odd
tasks, like sweeping, moving stuff, doing inspections. I didn't know much
about cars. One of the mechanics there was a fairly young guy. You could tell
just by looking at him that he was not happy to be there. He would smoke all
day in the shop - not very safe, and strictly forbidden. He was studying for
the CCNA exam, looking to get out and start a career. When he found out I
programmed and used linux, he was really excited. We would talk about
networking tech a lot. One time I told him I wanted to learn about cars so I
could do all of my own maintanence. He said, "Keep learning computers, so you
can make enough money to pay someone else to do it." At the time, that was a
disappointing non-answer, but I know now that there was wisdom in it.

------
alexpetralia
A Personal Knowledge Management (PKM) system has been invaluable to me
personally and professionally. It takes a decent amount of work, but it
doesn't feel like the knowledge I accrue slips through a sieve anymore, maybe
15% versus 50%.

~~~
andai
Do you use any special software for that?

~~~
alexpetralia
Nothing too specialized.

I use Google Bookmarks to "queue" up readings that I want to review; generally
I don't let this exceed ~10 (otherwise I know I'll never get to them). I use
Google Keep to jot down raw thoughts/notes (e.g. if I'm learning a new concept
or hear something interesting on a podcast) throughout the day. Then, every
weekend I review all of these notes (say between 10 and 60) and "structure"
them into organized domains (e.g. sociology, biology, finance, psychology,
history) and clean them up before putting them into OneNote.

I generally don't check my OneNote so often - except if I know I have notes
related to a topic and I'd like to review them (say antifragility or neural
annealing) - but the two-step process of writing down the notes, then
revisiting/refining them later tends to aid my retention substantially.

I'd say during an average week I spend about 1-2 hours on this process.
Sometimes, if I've been inundated with new information, it can be up to 4-6
hours, especially when I have a lot of queued readings to go through. Overall
though I've considered it well-worth the investment.

------
rxsel
Still trying to "master" this skill, but "learning" how to observe, learn,
shift through the noise, and apply that knowledge in a reasonable turnaround
time.

------
ochrist
Learn how to touch type. Honestly, it's worth it.

------
totally_a_human
Basic first aid (CPR, pressure bandage, etc.) to help yourself and others. And
repeat the course every once in a while to refresh the knowledge.

------
sys_64738
Get an MBA. It will open your eyes to business decision making and make you
chuckle next time people rant against them.

------
Charlie_26
Acting. It's given me so much confidence to tackle any problem. Luckily I have
a great Coach.

------
jlg23
Non-determinism. Hackers are so used to finding a logical, elegant solution
that we sometimes forget that social behaviour is not deterministic and that,
when judging others, we do neither have perfect knowledge nor we are entitled
to fully know and understand the motivations of others.

------
giantg2
I have no skills

------
b20000
negotiating maximum compensation for the difficult and challenging work you do
as a computer scientist

~~~
graham_paul
you mean lego brick worker?

------
vasergen
Learn how to negotiate

~~~
b20000
THIS

------
exabrial
* Fixing things

* Weightlifting

* Cardiovascular exercise

* Sewing

