I Don’t Believe You Have No Skills

How to Start Learning

Lately I keep seeing posts titled something like “I have no skills so I used Chat GPT to write an e-book that sells.” Fine, good for them if it worked. But I don’t buy this idea that someone has no skills. Everyone grows up somewhere, deals with something, learns something. Even if you lived in a cave your whole life, I’m pretty sure you’d still figure out how to make fire to keep yourself warm. That alone is a skill. So this whole “I have nothing to offer” mindset doesn’t hold up.

Photo by Vox Vento / Growth is a natural process

The real problem is comparison. People look at others online and suddenly their own skills feel small. Someone else knows more, has a cleaner resume, has a flashier title, so they assume their own experience doesn’t count. But your skills come from your background, your environment, your life. They’re not supposed to match anyone else’s. And the more different they are, the more valuable they can be.

If you still insist you have no skills, then fine, that’s at least an honest starting point. Acknowledgment is step one. The next step is obvious: you learn something. But this is where people freeze. They don’t know what direction to take, so they do nothing. They wait for a perfect answer to magically appear.

The easiest place to start is with what interests you. Learning against your own will is torture. If something naturally grabs your attention, go with that.

Yes, sometimes you don’t get a choice. You might have a job where the employer sends you to mandatory training because systems are changing and you have to adapt. You push through it. But in your own time, or if you work for yourself, you can finally pick what actually matters to you.

And since a lot of people here spend time writing, commenting, or posting somewhere online, improving writing skills is a basic place to start. You don’t need to pay for expensive programs. There are free courses you can take. If you want a certificate later, that’s your choice, but the learning itself is free.

Alison is one of those platforms with a huge range of topics, writing, management, digital skills, first aid, even cooking basics. Whatever direction you want to explore, there’s something there.

I’ll share a few links with you, if you wish to explore. Although these are affiliate links, it will not cost you anything to learn. However, as I said before diplomas and certificates are payable.

Creative writing courses on Alison

Writing skills courses on Alison

Business courses on Alison

Speaking of cooking, that’s another example. Don’t know how to cook? YouTube is full of channels that break down everything from simple meal prep to advanced techniques. And yes, that’s a skill too. People forget that life skills count.

Learn How To Cook in Under 25 Minutes

Food HACKS I Learned In Restaurants

Now let me bring my own situation into this. I’m turning 39 in a few weeks. I spent most of my life in catering and hospitality. I did a lot of things on the side too, airshows, ecommerce, random projects here and there. But the truth is, my health is forcing me to adapt. I’ve got old injuries from a car accident, plus years of long shifts in hospitality took a toll on my spine. Even though I’m still working as a manager, the shifts are physically demanding. They don’t get easier with age.

So now I’m trying to transition into writing. And I wasn’t one of those kids who wrote in journals or dreamed of publishing books. I never enjoyed writing until recently. But interests change with age, and so does the body. What you could handle physically in your twenties hits differently in your late thirties. I also have a lot of knowledge from hospitality, ecommerce, surviving in Africa, travels through Europe, from life in general. So why not use it?

I’m not perfect at writing, but I know I’ll improve because improvement comes from doing, not waiting. You write, you accept the feedback, you adjust, and you keep going. That’s how learning works.

So when people say they have no skills, I have a hard time accepting it. The only exceptions I understand are extreme cases, serious medical conditions that limit what someone can physically or mentally do. In those cases, yes, the range of skills they can gain is smaller. But even then, people adapt in ways others don’t notice.

Most of the time, the issue is not that someone has no skills. It’s that they haven’t recognized the skills they already have, and they haven’t given themselves a chance to build new ones. Learning isn’t something you finish in school. You keep learning your whole life. And the moment you stop comparing yourself to everyone else, you’ll see how much you already carry.

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