Life

When Long-Term Thinking is a Terrible Idea

During my evening walk yesterday, I was with a 75-year old gentleman who seemed fitter than I am, walked faster than me, had a wider smile than I can ever manage, and talked much more than I do in a few days.

During the ninety minutes we walked together, we talked about our lives, careers, and investing.

“What do you do for a living, young man?” he asked me.

“I am a blogger and an investor,” I replied.

“What kind of an investor are you?” he asked back.

“Well, a long term investor in the stock market,” I said.

“Long term? Great! Even I have been a long term investor all my life,” he told me. “Long term investing makes a lot of sense.”

“Yeah it does,” I said. “Having a long-term thinking is always good.”

“Well, not always, son!” he replied.

“Why do you say so?” I asked.

The 37th Lesson

On this very day last year, I had shared with you 36 lessons from 36 years of my life. Today, I complete 37 years in the present state of being, and thus wish to share with you the 37th lesson I have learned in the year gone by – one of the most powerful lessons that I believe has the ability to turn me into a better person and a better investor going forward.

That lesson is of mindfulness, or a state of active, open attention on the present.

When you are mindful, you observe your thoughts and feelings from a distance, without judging them good or bad. Instead of letting your life pass you by, mindfulness means living in the moment and awakening to experience.

“Oh, that’s same as meditation, right?” you might wonder like I did when I came across this practice some time back. Well, meditation is a tool to help you learn to be mindful.

[Read more…] about The 37th Lesson

Why Good People Do Bad Things: A Conversation With My Daughter

Volkswagen, the world’s third largest in terms of vehicle sales, recently admitted to cheating on emissions data for 11 million of its diesel engine cars sold between 2009 and 2015.

As I was explaining the scandal to my daughter, the first question she asked was – “Why do they do such wrong things, Papa? Aren’t they already rich?”

“Good question Kavya,” I said. “It’s especially good to know that you understand what they did i.e., cheat their customers, was wrong.”

“But they are good people, right Papa?” she asked.

“Yes the people who created the scandal must have come from good families,” I replied, “…and must have been good with their family and friends.”

“So why good people do bad things?” she asked again, this time combining all her questions into one.

“Let me tell you a story, Kavya,” I said, “…story of a young girl named Barbie.”

“Wow, Barbie is my favorite doll,” she exclaimed with a smile.

“Yeah, but for the time being, let’s forget that she is a doll and let’s focus on the story.”

5 Things I Learned from Elon Musk on Life, Business and Investing

Here’s a simple question someone asked on Quora – Will I become a billionaire if I am determined to be one and put in the necessary work required?

Here’s how a lady answered this –

No.

One of the many qualities that separate self-made billionaires from the rest of us is their ability to ask the right questions.

This is not the right question.

(Which is not to say it’s a bad question. It just won’t get that deep part of your mind working to help you — mulling things over when you think you’re thinking about something else — sending up flares of insight.)

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My Most Powerful Tool for Thinking and Decision Making

Note: This is an updated version of the article that was part of the May 2015 issue of our premium newsletter, Value Investing Almanack.

When historian Charles Weiner looked over a pile of Richard Feynman’s notebooks, he called them a wonderful ‘record of his day-to-day work’.

“No, no!”, Feynman objected strongly. [1]

“They aren’t a record of my thinking process. They are my thinking process. I actually did the work on the paper.”

“Well,” Weiner said, “The work was done in your head, but the record of it is still here.”

“No, it’s not a record, not really. It’s working. You have to work on paper and this is the paper. Okay?”, Feynman explained.

Richard Feynman, who won the Nobel prize for Physics, understood that writing his equations and ideas on paper was crucial to his thought.

Let me ask you this – how many times it has happened that, after reading a book, you thought you understood the idea but found it difficult to explain it to others? The idea seemed pretty clear in your head but the moment you had to verbalise it you discovered that either you didn’t have a proper grasp on the idea at the first place or you were unable to explain it in a logical coherent way to a third person.

The Tale of Two Fathers

First, please ignore the “father” in the headline because this is a story about “parents”. But I couldn’t find a better headline, and thus this one.

Anyways, over the past four days, I’ve read two contrasting stories on the relationship between parents and children.

The first came from Aninda Baruah, who wrote about Google’s new CEO Sundar Pichai, who was born and bred in India. Aninda wrote about how Sundar’s parents sacrificed a lot to ensure that he got all the facilities for education. Almost all the money that his parents had saved was used to buy tickets for Sundar to fly to the US for his scholarship Master’s degree. [1]

He concluded his story thus…

…Sundar Pichai (or for that matter Satya Nadella, Indra Nooyi, Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen), does not just owe his success to his IIT engineering degree, or Stanford University or Google. He owes it to that entire generation, including his parents, that created the culture of extreme personal sacrifice in favour of educating us.

Reading Sundar’s story, I’m sure his parents not only used their money to help their son, but also sacrificed their time to be with him through the most important times of his upbringing.

Anyways, the second story I read was from Devdutt Pattanaik, who wrote about Samba, the son of Lord Krishna and Jambavati. [2]

Dear Jealousy

Dear Jealousy,

I ask for an apology in advance because you may not like what you will read in this letter below.

You see, we have lived together in peace for years now. But, off late, I have started feeling dizzy having you on my side. Please don’t feel bad because I will soon explain my reasons for what I’m feeling now with respect to our relationship.

I remember you as early as the age of five, when you clouded my mind as soon as I saw my richer cousins with remote-controlled cars, nicer clothes, and bigger houses.

You stayed with me even as I was passing through high school. Those years, you made me jealous of my friends who scored higher marks then me and thus got a greater appreciation from the girls in the class. Then, when I was in college, you held my hand tight as I saw other classmates who arrived in their own cars while I took rickety buses. When I saw them also having cell phones, I felt your hug even tighter.

There were also times I found myself jealous of people who had no conscience and were famous for that. You made me think that I should become just like them. Thank God I didn’t!

[Read more…] about Dear Jealousy

36 Lessons from 36 Years of My Life

I completed 36 years in my present state of existence yesterday (7th December). That’s 13,150 days, or around 55% of the average life expectancy of an Indian male.

While spiritualists would want me to believe that I have existed from anadi (before the beginning of cosmos) and will exist till ananta (infinity), I see thirty-six years as a good enough time to find some meaning in one’s life. At least, my greying hair help me realize that.

Now, while it amazes me that I’ve been around that long — I feel like I’ve barely begun.

I’m not usually one to make a big deal about my birthday, but as always, it has given me an opportunity to reflect.

I thought I’d share a handful of lessons I’ve learned — lessons on life, work, family, health, and money – which may serve as a helpful guide for those just starting out.

These are just a few of the many lessons that I have learned in my life, and you may find no wisdom in them. Even I realize that wisdom doesn’t necessarily come with age. Sometimes age just shows up all by itself.

Also, as you get older, three things happen. The first is your memory goes, and I can’t remember the other two. 😉

So before I forget the lessons I learned in thirty-six years of my life, let me start right away.

The Happiest Man I’ve Ever Met

I was recently in Nagpur for my True Wealth Workshop. I had a few free hours prior to the Workshop and decided to spend it touring the Orange City.

It turned out to be a wise decision not only because I loved what I saw of Nagpur, but also because I came to know about Ramesh Shet, an auto-rickshaw driver who took me around the best places in the city. Why meeting Ramesh was a great thing, you’ll come to know in a bit.

“You’ve come here for the first time, Sir?” Ramesh started the conversation as we started on the journey.

“Yeah,” I answered.

“It’s a very nice city. I’m sure you’ll love it,” he said.

I asked him about his family, his work, and income. “So how much do you earn daily?”

“Rs 300 on an average per day,” he replied.

“Is Rs 300 good enough for you and your family?” I asked.

When I Had Plenty of Money, But Not Much Wealth

Most of what we think we know about people with a lot of money – the enviable lifestyle of the rich and famous – comes from television, movies and novels. A lot of it is inaccurate.

Apart from the happiness that is showcased, financially well-to-do people have their own set of concerns – uncertainty over their relationships, anxiety about their children, fear of isolation and, of course, fear of losing their financial wealth.

In fact, I have known plenty of such “poor rich” people over the last few years, who have lots of money and assets…but not much else.

They are financially wealthy but emotionally, physically, spiritually, mentally and even socially, bankrupt.

Imagine your own life. If you own one big house (or even five) but you live in an unhealthy, stressed, over-worked, sleep-deprived, over-medicated body that’s going to die twenty or thirty years too soon (as many do), are you really wealthy?

So maybe health equals wealth.

Or if you’re a millionaire but you live in an unhealthy marriage with a spouse you haven’t spoken (heartily) to for a year and kids who never see you invest time into their lives, are you really rich or do you just have lots of money?