Give Yourself The Gift Of Value
If a picture's worth a thousand words, then an analogy is worth at least ten times that.
The old saying "time is money" means that time is worth more than money. If you have $1,000 to spend and two people each offer to do something for you for an hour of your time, the person who offers $10 per hour will give you ten hours of their time if they complete the project in one hour while the person who offers $20 per hour will give you five hours of their time. In other words: spending less on this task saves you 50%.
Similarly, some things are "worth your value. " If you get a haircut from someone who's charging $5, you should expect that their time is worth about five of yours. If you can't get your haircut for less than $10, then the five dollars makes up for the extra half hour of your time.
Similarly, a typical working day for a college graduate takes about eight hours. A full day's work at minimum wage is worth about $30, so if you're getting paid less than that per hour, then you're selling yourself short.
One of the most important things about saying "value yourself" is that it doesn't mean "be worse off than you are now." What it means is to live your life knowing there are greater opportunities ahead.
If you don't believe that, then consider this: if you didn't have any money at all, would you be any happier? If the answer is no, then why not put yourself first and go after a higher-paying job? Or a better job? Or maybe even a better life position?
Value yourself at least enough to say "yes" to your goals. And whatever you're doing right now that's not working needs to change. We'll talk more about this later in the article.
With that said, here are some examples of things you can do to make yourself more valuable:
1. Take care of yourself. Eat well, exercise, and get plenty of sleep. As a nerd, it doesn't pay to be fat or unhealthy any more than it pays for smarts. There's a gradual loss of value for health that takes place when you're sick enough that doctors tell you to stay home from work and take time off. And when you're too sick, there's no telling how much your value will drop; it could be as much as 100%! Your employer may not be willing to pay all your medical bills without a legal fight just because they don't like the way you look while hospitalized.
2. Get a four-year degree and a college transcript that says you did well. It's not just the degree; it's the fact that employers and others who see your transcript will see that you were able to work hard and get good grades.
3. Get recommendations and references from old bosses, teachers, classmates, etc. Those are like saleable assets in a portfolio. You can sell them at any time, or you can trade them in for higher performance if they give you better value than they were worth to start with.
4. Get out of debt. This is a great way to gain bargaining power that could increase your value as much as 100% or more, depending on the kind of debt and the length of time you can keep it current. It's just common sense that being in $100,000 worth of credit card debt will pay you less than having no debt at all. Once you have it paid off and a track record demonstrating that you do things the smart way instead of the dumb way, people take notice.
5. Start saving for retirement early enough so that your savings are worth more than they would be if you started later. Compounded interest is your friend. So is keeping a big nest egg so that you have bargaining power at work.
6. Build an asset base (property, stocks, bonds, etc.) that will pay you every year and then some. This isn't always the easiest thing to do because most of us need to keep working in order to pay our bills while getting started with saving for retirement or building an asset base in our spare time. But with forethought and planning it's usually possible to build something valuable enough to help you increase your value over the course of those working years. One way to "buy" yourself more time is by buying a home or other property and then renting out rooms or basements or garages, etc. to others.
7. Consider going into business for yourself; be your own boss, etc., and you will gain greater value than someone who is not self-employed. I've mentioned this elsewhere in articles, but it's worth repeating here because it bears repeating: choosing to start your own business is like choosing to spend more money up front in exchange for a higher return at the end of the day. You trade money today for assets that pay off tomorrow and in years after that.
8 . Expand your education. One of the most common things people do in their lives is quit school, get a job, then start thinking about retiring. But starting out at an entry-level position until you can afford to finish school could actually increase your value as much as 100% or more because people like to see that you were able to finish school.
9 . Learn new skills and take on new responsibilities that would make you more valuable. I've been working on a retirement plan for several years now, but I wasn't able to do so until I was 40 years old because I was still carrying too much debt from when I started my first business. At my age now, I've been able to pay it off in only four years.
10 . Start a business of your own or open an opportunity for employment. These days, the only people who have the freedom to start their own business are those with no debts. If you have money-related debts (credit cards, student loans), then this might not be a good idea for you because it would make you less valuable overall. But if all of your debts are paid off and you have savings, buying a pizza franchise or starting up your own web site makes you more valuable by allowing others to see that you're more than just someone making minimum wage.
11 . Work as a volunteer for a service organization (i.e., the Red Cross, National Park Service, etc.) that has a good reputation. This would be another way to show your employer or potential employer that you are not just someone who works for money but that you are also willing to work for free to help other people or organizations.
12 . Become an expert in something that has value. It's easy to become an expert at something if you have the right kind of reference materials and people to coach you through the process of becoming an expert over time (i.e., don't try this alone).
Conclusion
Some people may still try to argue that the above suggestions don't add up to a lot of value in today's economy, especially if you're under 50. But they do. If you don't believe it, just think back on all of the things you've done to increase your value over your working years, and if it was anything like what I suggested here, then you'd probably agree that there are many ways in which making yourself more valuable can actually be more beneficial than not.
Want even more information about increasing your value through the things you do? The Art of Motivation has a much larger collection of articles about increasing your value by doing the right things.