1. Play a lot.
2. Watch videos (essential RIO membership has an excellent cost/value ratio).
3. Mark hands, express your confusion and try to figure out a way to make your approach better (posting hands on forums, asking advice from better players/coaches...)

great I will get to studying

Finding Skype groups and people to sweat you + play with has helped me immensely.

This journey is hard enough by itself, don't go alone.

Honestly I lucked into mine through a friend of a friend. I am sure you can post here, ask some of the big cats or look into 2+2 I imagine.

There is no BEST WAY. just like there is no BEST WAY to become successful in life. You got to put in the effort, work, and time. Try and experiment with different things. Push your self. if you dont understand something, ask, google, Forum search ECT. If there was one single way to become a great player - everyone would be doing it.. Find out whats best for you.
For example.. me personally I enjoy reading. i like reading articles, replies to videos, hand histories, books, ect. I also find Session review videos to be more helpful than theory and live play videos.. not that those arent good or that i dont learn anything from those either, but i prefer session reviews more personally.

If ur going to try something dont try it for 1 day or so and be like well fuck this is boring and not working. Also one of the most repeated replies and may be the hardest thing in poker is to not become results oriented. Yes we want results, yes we play to have fun and make money along the way and to improve.. but you can have multiple break even streaks or even streaks of loosing money but still playing well. You can do everything right and still run bad.

Try to always get takeaways from what you study. Try to apply those things to HHs a few times over a few days. Failure to try to get specific takeaways will generally lead to you forgetting most of the things you just studied. Failure to practice applying what you've studied without time constraints will make ut difficult to apply at the tables what you have been studying.

Hey here are my top tips
1) Become an essential member here ( Yes I am an essential coach and I genuinely think 10$ a month is insane value for money)
2) Network with other poker players and find people to study with
3) Have a study plan and try to see each session as the testing of your strategy. Do not think about the money if possible, challenge yourself to improve your strategy.
4) Take your time and enjoy it, poker should be fun!

PS - I know some study groups with lower stakes players so you can add me on skype iain.salter3 if you like and i'll link you with some lower limit players

Good luck!

$10 a month is indeed unbelievable value vs. cost.

Its just like anything, You need to put in the effort and enjoy the process if you want to become better and improve your game. You cant just sit down and hop into a 5/10 online cash game and expect to be a wining player.
Find what works best for you, Enjoy the process and Enjoy the game. The moment you feel like its just an endless grind and ur going no where and loose that passion..is the point where u loose motivation and care for the game

Any known Cash Skype groups here?

HI Mark, I have been playing poker professionally for almost 4 years now, all online. If you have any questions you would like to run by me regarding the game feel free to message me, happy to help out pal.