top of page

An unaddressed stress in our lives, personal finance

  • Writer: Seema Singh
    Seema Singh
  • Jun 14, 2021
  • 3 min read


Financial independence. Is it not something we all want? In most societies, it is THE measure of success.


A conventional student or college graduate takes up a job and starts making money. And then we start thinking of saving and investing. Who do we look up to for our first investment advice? Our parents. And are we satisfied with this advice? Mostly not. So what's the problem here?


In an average middle-class income family, there are no talks of investment. It is all about SAVING, saving for the rainy day. Isn't it? Fixed deposit and complicated savings schemes are all we hear. And we all know the interest rates these days. It sometimes even fails to beat the inflation rate.


We are not taught personal finance in schools. The school did not teach us how to save. If we are somehow good with saving money because of cultural impressions, we do not know what next? I do vaguely remember chapters on shares and debentures, income tax from school. But nothing that I can directly use.


So how do we go about investing? How do we make money work for us? How do we grow rich? We turn to the internet, the new age teacher. But the abundance of information debilitates us. Again because we never learnt how to swim in this ocean of information. And so, we move to something more comforting for our minds.


Here is how my story with money begins.

I started with investing using the instruments known to me, Recurring Deposits and Fixed Deposits. It was more the start of my saving journey rather than my investing journey. I started with this habit because I wanted to buy a scooter, a phone and a laptop, all at the same time 😎.

That was the first year me making some money.


And then, because of lack of better financial awareness, I kept on with the Fixed Deposit saga for a while in inertia. Slowly I entered the mutual funds ELSS market for saving some taxes. To this date, I would have hardly checked the fund value even five times in about five years.


And then, I entered the stock market with my Father's and Brother's guidance. Though I was reading some stuff, everything was way too complex. I had not executed one single decision based on my knowledge. I became a passive investor with no clue of what was happening. And as the portfolio grew, I was asked to make decisions. My little brain had no clue how to do that. I lacked the knowledge, and hence, the courage to take financial decisions. At times, I felt like being an educated illiterate, a financial ignorant.

I slowly stopped tracking the money. It was cumbersome tracking across different savings accounts, Demat account, fixed deposits, provident funds. Logging into multiple accounts is one of the internet's biggest challenges. Money is still a taboo topic. Talking about it made everyone uncomfortable. Reading made things more complicated. There was all this information that I would consume as input but still lacking the courage or decisiveness for any action as output.


Slowly I reduced my consumption, noted action items and acted on them before consuming a new "Get rich in your 20s" or "How to invest in your 20s" video. I often feel I am too late. And then I awaken the philosopher in me to reiterate, "It is never too late". While writing this blog, I have somewhat started feeling that I have done a decent job making myself financially aware. But this was WORK.


Tell me how you started your investment journey and one breakthrough moment along the way. What have been your challenges with money?


This one is the first post in the series of my adventures in investment. I plan on publishing one blog in the personal finance category every week. Subscribe for a step by step process for learning all about personal finance. Let's talk money.


1 Comment


alakarath17
May 14, 2023

Wow... beautifully written and unspoken word of mind u have beautifully put..thank you for sharing

Like
Join our mailing list

Never miss an update

Thanks for submitting!

  • LinkedIn

© 2021 by Tidal Thoughts.

bottom of page