Outside of roleplay and leveling up by XP gain, you can grow the Skills list on your character card!
To begin learning a new Skill or Ability, first one must find a teacher. Some Skills can be self-taught (without a teacher), but almost always it will incur an XP penalty between 25-50% of the base XP needed for the Skill. A teacher will require a fee of Units (in-game currency), which is to be paid at the time of learning the Skill. And when you are ready to begin learning, you and the teacher must complete a Learn Card on site. Skills and Abilities cannot be started between events and a Learn Card MUST be completed.
Each character has 4 learn slots. The number of learn slots used at one time will increase the amount of time it takes to learn your Skill. You can use up to 2 slots with 0 penalty – meaning you can learn two things with no increase in learn times.
1 Slot Used = 0 Penalty
2 Slots Used = 0 Penalty
3 Slots Used = 33% Learn Time Increase across all skills
4 Slots Used = 66% Learn Time Increase across all skills
You are allowed to self-teach one skill at a time with no learn time penalty. A self-taught skill will require the self-teach XP cost.
Self-Teaching a second thing = takes up two learn slots
Self-Teaching a third skill takes three slots, etc..