Stacking Skills Strategically for Freedom

TL;DR

• I spent years collecting skills that felt productive but didn't move me closer to freedom.
• Self-employment forced me to learn intentionally instead of reactively.
• The best investment isn't stocks, it's the S&Me 500: skills that compound together.
• Use 3 filters before learning any new skill: independence, compounding, and solving your next obstacle.
• A minimalist tech stack frees mental RAM for high-leverage business skills.
• Skills multiply, not add: coding × sales × marketing = exponential leverage.
• If you can't apply a skill in the next 14 days, don't learn it yet.
• Freedom comes from stacking the right skills + shipping, not just learning.

Intro

For the longest time, I was acting like a collector, not an investor.

I learned the way most developers do:

• because my job required it
• because I was curious
• or because Fireship convinced me that Svelte is the shit (which might be true).

I picked up anything that looked interesting:

• indie game development
• 3D modeling with Blender
• every new JavaScript framework that popped out of nowhere
• Forex trading
• Keycloak
• …the list goes on

I was very busy learning but without any direction.

Why? Because learning feels productive.

Everything is new. Everything is exciting.

It took me years to understand this:

Excitement isn't progress.

Then one day, you wake up and realize none of it actually brought you closer to the life you want.

That realization hit me surprisingly late, but once it did, my entire approach to learning flipped.

This article is the story of that shift and the framework I now use to decide exactly what to learn next so my skills compound into freedom instead of regret.

Self-Employment Changed Everything

When you're employed, your skill stack grows reactively.

Your team chooses your tech stack.
Your boss sets the direction.
The project dictates what you learn next.

You learn whatever is needed to deliver the ticket in front of you.

It's not intentional. It's environmental.

But the moment you go independent — everything changes.

You decide what you want your work and life to look like.
Your skills aren't just tools anymore. They're investments.

And you realize something nobody teaches you in school, bootcamps, or your first job:

The highest ROI investment you can make is in yourself.

Alex Hormozi calls it the S&Me 500. You'll earn more by investing in yourself than by investing in the S&P 500.

Investing in yourself strategically compounds faster than anything else.

But only if you invest in the right things.

Direction Before Skills

A few years ago, I finally got honest with myself:

What do I actually want?

Not in a vague "follow your passion" way. But concretely.

My North Star:

I wanted freedom.
I didn't want to build someone else's dream anymore.
I wanted to build my own.

I want to be an independent software developer and entrepreneur. Build my own products. Work on my own terms. Make a living without depending on a boss or a single client. Create assets, not just hours.

And with that clarity, something funny happened — the "important" skills revealed themselves, while the "fun but useless" skills became obvious distractions.

Without direction, every skill looks interesting.
With direction, most skills look irrelevant.

The Freedom-First Framework: 3 Filters for Every Skill

Once I had direction, I needed a system to stay accountable. So I created a three-question filter to evaluate what to learn next.

Every skill I consider must answer yes to all three:

1. Does this skill increase my independence?

Will it help me earn on my own, ship faster, build products, or create assets?

If it makes me more dependent on employers, teams, or external systems — it fails.

2. Does this skill compound with what I already know?

Does it multiply my existing skills, or does it reset me back to zero?

Learning Forex reset me to zero. Learning sales multiplied my coding. That's the difference.

3. Do I actually need it right now to move forward?

Not "will I use this someday".
Not "could this be cool".
But: Do I need to learn this to unblock myself in the next 14 days?

If I can't apply it to something I'm shipping this week, I'm not allowed to learn it yet.

This is just-in-time learning. This is the S&Me 500 in action.

Here’s how it looks in real life for me:

• “Learn Rust because it’s cool” → fails all three filters right now.
• “Learn to write a simple landing page with solid copy for my next product” → increases independence, compounds with my dev skills, and I’ll use it this week. It passes.

Invest in skills that compound. Ignore the ones that don't.

My 3 Biggest Dead Ends

The price I paid because I had no direction.

Here's what hurts: I'm turning 40 next year. When I see 25-year-old entrepreneurs hitting their first million on YouTube, the comparison stings. Not because I'm jealous but because I realize how much time I burned chasing skills that went nowhere.

That's the real cost of learning without direction: regret.

Not the skills themselves. The years.

1. Framework Hopping

Every new JavaScript framework felt like progress. Angular, React, Vue, Svelte... I kept telling myself that mastering all of them would give me more opportunities.

The Real Reason: I didn't want to miss out on the latest trends. Learning the hot new thing felt more exciting than shipping something with what I already knew.

The Trap: I was using "learning" as productive procrastination. Tutorials were safe. Shipping had stakes. So I stayed in tutorial land, collecting frameworks like badges, never becoming dangerous with any of them.

The Opportunity Cost: Instead of building a portfolio of shipped products, I built a shallow competence in five stacks. It didn't lead to better clients, better projects, or more freedom. It led to analysis paralysis and impostor syndrome.

2. 3D Modeling with Blender

I spent weeks learning Blender because I wanted to explore creative work beyond coding. The idea of combining 3D art with game development felt like the perfect blend (pun intended 🤓): a way to build something visual and interactive.

The Reality: It was fun. But fun isn't the same as strategic. I never shipped a game. I didn't have a project that needed 3D skills. Within two weeks of stopping, I forgot everything.

The Trap: I thought being good at many things sounded better than being great at one thing. But breadth without depth is just expensive curiosity. I was avoiding the scarier work: talking to real customers about real problems.

The Lesson: If you're not applying a skill to something you're shipping, you're not learning. You're just entertaining yourself.

3. Forex Trading

I wanted to build income outside my day job. YouTube and Udemy kept serving me "financial freedom through Forex" courses. The promise was seductive: trade from anywhere, make money while you sleep, be your own boss.

The Reality: I was competing against hedge funds with PhD-level quants in a zero-sum game. Every dollar I made, someone else lost... and usually, I was the one losing.

The Trap: I was chasing a shortcut to freedom instead of building leverage with my unfair advantage as a developer. Software is a positive-sum game. Forex is not.

The Verdict: Months of study on the side of my day job. Minimal returns. Negative ROI on time, energy, and focus. I should have spent that time building one tiny product.

---

The pattern? All three dead ends had one thing in common:

I was learning reactively to external trends (frameworks), romantically about creative identity (Blender), or desperately for a quick escape (Forex).

None of them were strategic.
None of them compounded.
And none of them moved me closer to independence.

Tech Stack Minimalism = Strategic Focus

After years of framework hopping, I made a radical decision: one stack, mastered deeply.

Today, my tech stack is intentionally small:

• One language: TypeScript
• One full-stack framework: Next.js
• One design system: Tailwind CSS
• One cloud platform: Firebase
• One IDE: Cursor
• One design tool: Figma

That's it. I'm not chasing new frameworks. I'm not trying fancy stuff because it's trending.

Why?

Because I didn't pick this stack because it's "the best". I picked it because it gives me the widest surface area to solve business problems based on industry standards.

For example, when a client needs a simple SaaS-style dashboard and a marketing site, I don’t waste time choosing tools. Next.js + Tailwind + Firebase cover the whole thing — from landing page to auth to data — so I can focus on the offer, pricing, and launch.

It allows me to say "Yes" to valuable client requests and ship my own products without fighting my tools.

Minimalist tech → maximal focus on entrepreneurial skills.

Simplicity creates speed.
Consistency creates depth.
Speed + depth = compounding results.

A minimal stack frees up mental RAM for the skills that actually create freedom:

• writing offers and landing pages
• talking to customers
• pricing and positioning
• building assets that generate income without trading time

This is the shift that changed everything for me.

The Real Leverage Skills (And Why You Must Apply Them Immediately)

After more than 20 years of writing code, here's the truth:

The skills that will give you freedom aren't technical — they are entrepreneurial.

Skills like:

• offer creation
• positioning
• pricing
• content + publishing
• market testing
• writing landing pages
• packaging knowledge into tools, templates, and products
• understanding customer pain
• talking to customers

These skills multiply each other. Every new one makes the previous ones more powerful.

This is the exponential curve. This is how your earning power grows faster than your hours.

These are the skills that turn you from a good developer into a dangerous one.

And surprisingly? It's fun. After spending years purely in code, learning these skills feels like unlocking a second superpower.

But here's the catch:

For years, I learned things I never used.

A cool tutorial here. A new framework there. A random Udemy course "just in case".

The uncomfortable truth:

If you can't apply a skill immediately, you won't remember it. And if it doesn't solve a problem you have right now, it won't move you forward.

Learning feels productive. Application is productive.

Tutorials are safe.
No commitment, no stakes, no outcomes.

Shipping has stakes.
Shipping forces decisions.
Shipping exposes the real gaps in your knowledge.

That's when learning becomes powerful.

The 14-day rule I follow today:

If I cannot use this skill in a project I am shipping in the next 14 days, I am not allowed to learn it yet.

Not someday. Not for a hypothetical future project. Not because it "might be useful".

Right now. On the next thing I ship.

When I shifted to this "apply immediately or don't learn it" rule, everything changed:

• I stopped wasting time on skills I'd forget
• I only learned what actually pushed my projects forward
• My stack became sharper, not bigger
• The things I shipped increased in quality and speed
• Momentum finally kicked in

Freedom doesn't come from consuming more information.
It comes from applying the right information at the right time.

And the right time is almost always: right now.

Why Skills Multiply (Not Add)

Let me show you why skill stacking changes the math entirely.

Imagine two developers building the exact same landing page:

Developer A (Tech Skills Only):
They wait for a design and content.
They code it up in 10 hours.
Rate: $50/hr.
Total Income: $500.

Developer B (Tech + Marketing + Sales):
They don't just wait for a spec.
They spot that the client needs leads, not just code.
They pitch a "High-Converting Landing Page Package" that includes copy, strategy, and implementation.
Because they're selling a business solution — not just code — they charge a fixed price of $5,000.

Even if Developer B takes 20 hours to do the extra work (writing & strategy), look at the effective hourly rate:
$5,000 / 20 hours = $250/hr.

Same code. Compounding skill stack. 5x the leverage.

Here's what just happened:

Developer A added skills:

• Learn React → +1
• Learn Next.js → +1
• Learn Tailwind → +1

Linear growth. One skill = one unit of improvement.

Developer B compounded skills:

• Coding × Copywriting × Sales × Strategy = Exponential leverage

No one skill is powerful on its own. But together, they create leverage.

This is why:

• Developers stay stuck when they only learn tech
• Freelancers make more when they learn delivery
• Entrepreneurs break free when they learn business + distribution
• Creators scale when they create assets

Once you start stacking the right skills, your growth curve changes:

Flat → Linear → Exponential

That's the S&Me 500 in action. Not incremental upgrades. Compounding upgrades.

This is the part schools and bootcamps never teach you.

Stacking Skills For Freedom

Skill stacking isn’t random.

There’s a natural progression most developers go through when they want more freedom, more autonomy, and eventually — entrepreneurship.

If I had known this path earlier, I would’ve saved myself years.

Here’s the blueprint:

1. Craft Skills (The Developer Foundation)

You learn the technical skills that let you build things:

• JavaScript / TypeScript
• React, Next.js, Astro
• APIs & data modeling
• Databases
• DevOps basics
• Architecture fundamentals

Craft skills get you your first job. They make you dangerous enough to ship things.

But here's the truth:

Craft skills alone don't lead to freedom — they lead to employment.

Necessary? Yes. Sufficient? No.

⚠️ The Trap: Most developers spend 10+ years here, collecting frameworks like Pokémon cards, never realizing the game has changed. You can know 15 frameworks and still be stuck trading time for money.

2. Delivery Skills (The Freelancing Layer)

This is where independence actually begins.

You learn how to:

• communicate clearly
• estimate projects
• scope features
• manage expectations
• talk to clients
• deliver without handholding

This is how you turn your technical ability into income you control.

These skills alone can double your earning power without learning a single new framework.

⚠️ The Trap: You learn to charge hourly, which feels like progress until you realize you've just built a cage with a higher ceiling. You're still trading time for money. You're just doing it on your own terms.

3. Value Creation Skills (The Business Layer)

This is where skill stacking stops being linear and starts being exponential.

You learn how to:

• write and refine offers
• understand customer pain
• talk to users
• price your work
• write landing pages
• validate ideas
• package your skills into solutions, not hours

It shifts you from:

"I can code anything." → "I solve a specific problem people pay for."

This is leverage.

⚠️ The Trap: You build great solutions but have no idea how to price them, so you undercharge and resent your clients. Or worse — you build things nobody asked for because you never learned to validate demand first.

4. Distribution Skills (The Audience Layer)

You can be great at what you do, but if nobody sees it, it doesn't matter.

This layer is all about attention and trust:

• content creation
• writing
• publishing
• documenting your work
• sharing lessons
• building in public

This is how clients find you.
This is how opportunities land in your inbox.
This is where you stop chasing and start attracting.

⚠️ The Trap: You post content but never make offers. You build an audience but monetize nothing. You confuse "being visible" with "creating value". Attention without conversion is just vanity metrics.

5. Asset Skills (The Entrepreneur Layer)

This is the top of the stack.

This is where you move from time → leverage → scale.

You learn how to build things that:

• make money while you sleep
• sell without your involvement
• scale past your own hours
• turn your knowledge into something other people can use

Assets like:

• productized services
• templates
• APIs
• courses
• books
• communities
• micro-SaaS

This is where freedom stops being a dream and becomes a system.

⚠️ The Trap: You build the product before you build the audience. You launch to crickets. You spend 6 months building something nobody buys because you skipped layers 3 and 4.

---

The whole ladder in one line:

Craft → Delivery → Value → Distribution → Assets

That's the path from developer to entrepreneur.

Each layer builds on the previous one. Skip a layer, and you'll feel the friction. Master each layer, and you unlock compounding leverage.

The One Question That Changes Everything

Your skills are your personal investment portfolio.

They determine your earning power, your optionality, your confidence, your independence, and your ability to create assets that break the time-for-money cycle.

So choose them intentionally. Be selective. Be strategic.

Invest in yourself like you're the highest-performing stock on the planet, because you are.

Before learning anything new, ask:

"Does this skill increase my independence, compound with what I already know, and help me overcome the next obstacle — or is it just a shiny distraction?"

That question alone can save you months. Maybe years.

Here's Your Micro-Action:

Open your to-do list right now.

Look at the "learning" tasks you've been putting off. Which ones pass the three-question filter? Which ones are just excitement disguised as strategy?

Delete one shiny-object skill and replace it with one leverage skill you can apply in the next 14 days.

That's the first compounding decision.

Because freedom doesn't come from learning more.

It comes from learning the right things and applying them immediately.

Stop collecting skills.
Start stacking them.