Choosing your investment based on your aspirations

Financial Independence, Goals, investment, money

I have written earlier in most of my posts on your financial freedom that you should choose to use the investment to get life experiences.

Today I was watching ETNow Swadesh. Its a business channel in India. I am always looking out for pieces of wisdom from people who are much smarter than me. So there was an interview going on with Sunil Subramaniam. He is the CEO of one the Sundaram Asset Management (Mutual Fund)company which runs mutual funds.

While everyone talks about creating buckets for different life goals while making the investments and choosing the type of investments. He came up with a unique logic which is more attributable to people who live in developing countries like India. Our currency on an average depreciates by about 5% every year with respect to the US dollar.

So in case your aspiration list is about visiting multiple countries, like mine is, his logic is, to invest in global funds where the depreciation of your local currency will not have an impact. Otherwise your buying power falls by that amount compared to the USD.

If you are in the US/Canada/Eurozone/UK then this logic will not be of too much benefit to you because your currencies are typically pegged to the USD. But if you are from a developing nation and if its legal in your country, then you should look at this logic.

Since I practice what I preach, most of my investments happen as SIPs (Systematic Investment Plan) I need to figure out how this logic would work because as the currency depreciates, my ability to buy US stocks becomes weaker, so how are my returns going to be protected.

Till I figure that out.

Carpe Diem!!!

Financial Freedom – gain the experiences

charity, experiences, Financial Independence, investment, Karma, travel

I have written multiple times in different posts about how my father had an agenda to make us get different experiences to make us better human beings. Today is his birth anniversary and I thought of visiting his philosophy again.

My father wanted to ensure that both my brother and I had a more than our share of areas to excel. He was a self made man. Our grandfather had lost his job during India’s fight for freedom from the British rule. Being the eldest in the family he had the responsibility to ensure that the family stayed afloat and prospered. Eventually all the brothers and sisters actually turned out to be very good in their individual professions and retired and eventually left behind a great legacy.

My father always had this idea of “giving” in whatever form to help others. His view was that when you give, the world conspires to give you back multiple times over. If you have been following my blog then, my thoughts on the Karmic cycle come from there. Always do good in whatever way you can.

The other one, which I didn’t understand till much later in life was taking us to different parts of the world after he had finished showing us most of India. Each time you go to a new place and you see the historical sites, the way people move, the marvels of different cultures your mind tends to expand. All these experiences helped me get a much wider appreciation of different cultures in the world, which I found missing in most of my peers. That was one of the reasons, I could relate and do business with people in countries across all continents except maybe Latin America ( Visiting places especially to see the ruins of the Mayan and Aztec and other ancient civilisations in that continent is on my bucket list incidentally)

I have written a lot of times why you need to get financial freedom, so that you are no longer a slave of money. Money starts to work for you. This does not mean that you need to become a miser and only try to scrimp every piece to save. What is life if you don’t get the experiences that money can buy. You have to enjoy the journey, otherwise you will end up living an unfulfilled life.

Learn to put some money into investments that can periodically help you get to enjoy your life. For my father and me it has been travel to different places. If you like to go hiking, do that. If you like to go surfing, do that.

The money that works for you, should help you get experiences, which will make you happier, live longer with less disease.

Till next time then….target the experiences, not the outcomes.

Carpe Diem!!!

Financial freedom – expand your mind

Abundance, experiences, Financial Independence, Happiness

I have always had this opinion that you need to get new experiences and expand your mind. Once your mind expands, it does not go back to its old state.

Do you even remember that you used to crawl once upon a time. Today you will actually find it very difficult to crawl. But there was a time when walking was a dream, but when you learnt how to balance on your two feet, you quickly forgot what it was to be on your knees and hands crawling. That was because once your brain gets new experiences it expands its ability and tends to forget the old ones.

I got this ability to think for getting new experiences from my father. He was of the view that saving money for itself had no significance if you didn’t get new experiences. New experiences also make you happier and give you a feeling of abundance.

While some experiences you can get without spending too much money, for most of them you need to have the financial backing. That’s where investing helps. After a certain period of time, when the magic of compounding starts to come into play, you need to take out money to sponsor these experiences.

Once the mind starts expanding it also gets the ability to think better. Then you are also in a position to think how you can increase your income further and invest more to earn even more and expand your mind even further. This becomes a virtuous cycle.

Till next time then.

Carpe Diem!!!

How experiences change our thinking

experiences, Human Brain, Thinking, travel

Most of us like the idea of going on holidays. Some of us to explore new places, some to just relax and get out of the rat race. Some go with our families, some with friends and family and some alone.

The idea for taking a holiday is to get a change from our regular setup. If I have time at my disposal I prefer to go to a new place (along with some old ones as well) with my family, so that we can get some new experiences.

Since childhood my father had made it a point to show us many places around India as well as around the world. His view was that by showing us the world it would help expand our horizons and our ability to think.

As a kid it never occurred to me that by seeing new places and meeting new people, I could actually be improving my ability to interact with people and think at a different level.

But research on the brain has shown that experiences have an ability to think, see and observe things differently. Depending on what you have experienced, especially the good experiences, you tend to observe things accordingly.

While my father was an aircraft engineer and did read quite a lot, not sure if he knew about this research on the brain. But he did have experiential data and therefore took our whole family to different destinations across the world.

I initially was following in his footsteps, but now I also have research data to prove that experiences can change our whole ability to think and work.

Till next time then….go get yourself some amazing experiences.

Carpe Diem!!!