Subramoney » ramayana http://www.subramoney.com Personal Finance Sat, 11 Feb 2012 00:59:43 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Financial advisors: The other side: part 2 http://www.subramoney.com/2009/10/financial-advisors-the-other-side-part-2/ http://www.subramoney.com/2009/10/financial-advisors-the-other-side-part-2/#comments Sun, 04 Oct 2009 23:20:07 +0000 subra http://www.subramoney.com/?p=2402 Financial advisors – the media’s new villans have a view point too. A few friends and relatives ‘claim’ that they listen to my financial advise. One of them is my cousin who has now retired. Last week when I met him I realised that all his money was in $ denominated fixed deposits – and have been like that for the past 20+ years.  He has bought 2 houses and surely the returns in those ‘investments’ are sub-optimal.

Another ‘friend’ just called up to ask -” I have invested Rs. 20 L in a Hdfc Standard life pension plan last year, should I pay the premium for the current year?”. I flipped. Did not know what to say…then he added..actually 3 of us in the office have bought it. I did a somersault again. Then I told them a story of Kumbhakarna.

On an assumption that you all know the Ramayana, let me start from the middle! Rama has reached the sea shore with a huge monkey army and Ravana is worried. He wakes up Kumbhakarna and asks him “Rama has come to the shores …should we go to war with him”. Kumbhakarna asks for the details – and Ravana says “There was this beautiful woman called Sita – I forcibly brought her here. Now her husband has come to fight – what should I do?”

Kumbhakarna says “you should have asked me, BEFORE you brought her here”. Now her husband is bound to come to fight with you.

This is largely the essence of the problem. I have a great homeopathy doctor (Dr. Sunil Balinge @ Vashi) – he has kept me off medicines for a couple of decades +! However, I have been a great patient too – I have listened to what he said and stayed that way. So finding a good advisor is only part of the solution. The other part is to hear him out. Listen to him. Understand. Implement. Monitor and keep records. That completes the process.

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]]> http://www.subramoney.com/2009/10/financial-advisors-the-other-side-part-2/feed/ 3 Hindu mythology and learning… http://www.subramoney.com/2008/10/hindu-mythology-and-learning/ http://www.subramoney.com/2008/10/hindu-mythology-and-learning/#comments Wed, 15 Oct 2008 02:30:51 +0000 subra http://www.subramoney.com/?p=595 Many people know that Saraswathi (Saraswati) is the Goddess of Learning. Learning of course is important. On google you will find a lot of articles which say “what i learnt from Warren Buffet”, “what I learnt from Peter Lynch” or what I learnt from Rakesh Jhunjhunwala” or “what I learnt from Charles Munger” or “What I learnt from Vallabh Bhansali”. Good learning is always a nice thing, but is it enough?

Many people know that Hanuman is the Guru according to Hindu mythology (for the very philosophically minded, Hanuman caused the Atma (Sita) to join the Parmatma (Ram) – and that is the essence of Ramayana. So you need a Guru to teach you from the learnings of all the great people mentioned above. However is that enough?

Many people know – and many others may not know – that Parvati (Uma) is the Hindu Goddess of Wisdom. Wisdom is about doing what you know. This is the crucial link. Training, Learning is all fine – but for it to translate into action, you need wisdom. That is the crux.

So knowing that compounding creates wealth, living a simple life gives peace, tobacco free, alcohol free, stress free living gives peace is not enough.

Seeking a simple life, doing a simple sip (and sitting tight during turbulent times), having a term insurance, one credit card, IS ABOUT DOING all that you know. That will give you nirvana. So as Nike says, Just Do it.

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