Hannah, even if you don't become a professional pilot, learning to fly will teach you important skills for success in your future life:
- you learn not only to plan strategically and proactively, but also to optimise your plans in real time, making small adaptations as you go;
- you learn to process several streams of information in parallel and verify them against each other.
These skills are especially valuable if you ever decide to run your own business.
That's true, but that's not really an argument to spend a fortune on flying lessons. You can get the same experience, but for free, if you become a Boy Scout/Girl Guides leader for instance. At least for me, the skills I gained in 15+ years of leadership there have been far more valuable to me than the skills I gained in flying. Those are generally very, very specialized. Learning to work with people is far more valuable in todays society than learning to work with complex machinery.
If you really want to fly, and need to do it cheaply, gliding is probably the way to go. And I also know a boy who got involved in the real flying world by flying simulators on-line, acting as ATC. He regularly visits our club, particularly if we have events, brings his simulator, demonstrates things, and generally gets a free ride out of that.