Pilot skills vanish over time if not constantly exercised. As a pilot you never stop learning, and you never know everything. A way to keep flying is to get someone else to pay for it...until you earn enough money to fly your own plane...personally I have always let the company pay for my flying...I have no desire to have my own airplane...different strokes for different folks.
For everyone else out there wondering if they can be a pilot...everyone can go out and learn to operate an aircraft...not everyone can afford all the ratings, not everyone will be able to pass the physical to get a licence...not everyone will have the motivation to continue training through the hard times when it seems you aren't progressing...but everyone can get out there and operate the controls of an aircraft in flight.
"For once you have tasted flight you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skywards, for there you have been and there you will long to return."