Despite growing up with a financial planner for a father, the idea of investing intimidated me well into my adulthood. From my point of view, investing seemed like a mysterious process. Not only was this magical money-making exercise conducted in an arcane language (what exactly is a NASDAQ, and why does it sound like something you treat with a special cream?), but it also required my dad to keep the TV in his office tuned to the worlds most mind-numbing broadcast, even though cartoons were just a channel away.Its no wonder I grew up thinking that investing was boring and impossible to understand. And investment ambivalence is pretty common. A recent NerdWallet financial angst report found that 79% of Americans feel intimidated by at least one financial topic, and 30% of those surveyed named investing as the most daunting one of all.But investing is a crucial part of money management. If you dont invest your money, youre committing yourself to working for every dollar, rather than letting your money do the heavy lifting.The good news is that investing isnt as incomprehensible or boring as you might believe. Heres what you need to know to make investing part of your financial life.Why investing is importantIf you type the words compound interest into Google, youre likely to come across the following quote, falsely attributed to Albert Einstein: Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world. He who understands it, earns it . . . he who doesnt, pays it.Incorrect attribution aside, whoever put these words in Einsteins mouth was onto something. Compound interest is an incredible economic force that you can use to build wealth.Heres how it works: When you invest, the money you have invested earns interest. But that interest compounds periodically, meaning that the interest you have earned is added to your principal, and you then start to earn interest on both your original investment and on the interest youve earned, until it compounds again.This process is the reason why youll see those calculations that say $10,000 invested today in a mutual fund earning an average of 8% per year could be worth more than $100,000 in 30 years, even if you dont add another penny to it. The process of compounding interest can create exponential growth.The power of compound interest is why we all should be investing. Investing your money lets the money grow without you having to work for it.(The flip side of compound interest is what happens when borrowers dont pay enough each month to cover accrued interest on high interest loans and credit cards. You do not want to be on that side of the compounding equation.)Getting started with investingBack when I was still a cartoon-loving kid whose eyes glazed over upon hearing the words Dow Jones, I learned about the potential growth available to anyone who got themselves some compound interest.As a budding money nerd, I wanted in on that action.As someone who did not think of mutual fund prospectuses as riveting beach reads, I had zero idea how I was supposed to get in on that action.Not only were the sheer number of potential investments dizzying, but I also felt like I had no clue how to evaluate whether an investment was a good idea. The intimidation and dread I felt is why I carried my invest-i-phobia into my 30suntil I learned two valuable investing strategies that everyone should know.Timeline your goalsJoe Saul-Sehy, host of The Stacking Benjamins Show podcast (and my coauthor), taught me how timing can help you narrow down your investing options. Specifically, Saul-Sehy suggests that every investor should place financial goals on a timeline, including the age at which youd like to meet those goals.For instance, lets say a 25-year-old wants to buy a house by age 35. They have been putting $150 per month into a savings account and already have $3,000 saved. Theyd like to have at least $40,000 for a down payment. If they keep setting aside $150 per month, it would take nearly 20 years to reach their goal. But investing that money would allow the money to earn compounding interest, making the 10-year time frame more possible.To figure out the interest rate needed to reach $40,000 in 10 years, use this compound interest calculator from Investor.gov. You already have the initial investment ($3,000), the monthly contribution ($150), and the length of time in years (10 years). With those numbers plugged in, you can play around with potential interest rates (also known as rates of return) to find the rate you need to reach your goal.In this case, the 25-year-old would need an investment with at least a 10.5% rate of return to make their $40,000 goal within ten years. Unfortunately, that is not a realistic rate of return. The stock market as a whole has historically seen an 8.5% annual return over time (adjusted for inflation). A stable investmentmeaning one that wont suddenly lose value overnightshouldnt expect a higher return than 8%.The future homeowner can either extend their timeline, increase their monthly contribution, or reduce their goal number. Shifting the goal back to 12 years instead of 10, increasing the monthly contribution to $200 instead of $150, or aiming for a $32,000 down payment instead of $40,000 would all allow this investor to reach their goal with a rate of return of 8% or lower.Choose the investment to fit your timelined goalHaving a reasonable rate of return in mind for your investment makes it much easier to choose where to put your money. Instead of trying to find The Best Investment, you only need to find an investment that will meet your specific goals and needs. Typically, a newbie investor may want to check out mutual funds, exchange traded funds (ETFs), index funds, or target date funds. These funds invest broadly, spreading out your risk.There are a number of sites that aggregate best of investment lists and allow you to look up information about various investment options, including important information about fees (described as a percentage called expense ratio), minimum investment requirements, and historical performance. (Just remember that theres a reason why all financial professionals have historical performance is no guarantee of future returns tattooed on their foreheads. Looking at how an investment has done in the past doesnt give anyone a crystal ball about its future performance.)One other important criteria to consider is the investments potential volatility. Yahoo! Finance allows investors to look at a Mountain Chart that shows the historical movement of the investment over time. A more volatile investment may look like your money is riding Space Mountain, while a more stable investment may look more like its chilling through the alpine section of Its a Small World.Typically, higher levels of volatility correlate with higher potential for growth, but investors need to have the stomach for it. If just the idea of a major investment drop has you reaching for the Mylanta, you might want to stick to the tamer rideseven though it may mean smaller returns.Once youve chosen your investment, you can open a brokerage account and start letting your money do some of the work.Jump in! The investment waters fineAmbivalence over investing keeps many of us from putting our money to work. But leveraging the power of compound interest is much easier than having to work for every single dollar you earn.To get started with investing, figure out what financial goals you have and give yourself a timeline for achieving them, as well as a monthly contribution you can afford to put toward it. With those numbers in mind, you can use Investor.govs compound interest calculator to figure out what rate of return you will need to reach your goal.From there, you can find an investment that fits your goal, looking at the historical rate of return (which is no guarantee of future performance), the fees, minimum contribution, and volatility, to narrow down your options.Doing this kind of investment planning will only take a couple of hours of your time and it isnt nearly as scary or difficult as you might believe.Best of all, you can even watch cartoons while youre doing it.