A Busy Life

I have been doing a lot of reading of late. Primarily on the subjects of finance and investing, yup the tax man scared me and robbed me.

One of the books i read was Rich Dad, Poor Dad.  The author gives a lot of sensible advice,  about the necessity for financial education.  The book also has a lot of stuff about liabilities and assets and the importance of building a strong asset column.

After reading the book i pondered, if everyone else has read this book and if others are following the advice, then i will just be another unknown in the crowd. Also i had a lot of questions about where do you get the initial amount for investment, salary is out because it is taxed by the government, and no one can expect to become rich by investing parts of their salary.

Author Robert Kiyosaki’s emphasis is on 2 things, through out the book

1. Financial education – Begin early and learn throughout your life.
2. Investment – Do this regularly

Though i do wonder how both these goals can be achieved in the Indian context ? There are lots of millionaires and business women/men in India, but we don’t know how they did it. There is also a dearth of knowledge about the Indian Tax/Finance laws and how to take maximum advantage of them. To satiate my curiosity i did some lazy searches , unfortunately the Indian success story is not well documented. If you know of any book, website or person who can give information about investment in India, please do share it in the comments.

Robert Kiyosaki started a business to sell Velcro Wallets to surfers, this business was an instant hit and provided him with a good sum of money for later investments.
One thing that i did learn from the book , investment is a lot about information and people management as it is about financial education. It is important to know smart people who will help you make the correct decisions. Almost all the billionaires in the world are backed by very smart and dedicated people. These people advice the rich about where to invest and how to invest.

Curious to know more about Finance and investing i read a few blogs. Interestingly, all of them suggested : start a business to make money.

I do wonder though if making money is really that important to live a fulfilling life. It would be enough to say that very few billionaires have a steady relationship in their life.

Then i read another book called “The 4-hour work week” by Timothy Ferriss. This book was a real eye opener. The author says that he is not rich in US but he still lives a life of luxury.

How does he do that ?

He has a nutrition supplement business in the US that generated money. And he spends the money outside US. Most of his work is outsourced to cheaper countries like India. Of course that makes a lot of sense to, since 10$ is 400 Rupees in India.

Timothy Ferriss exploits, smartly and successfully, the currency and cost of living difference in various geographical locations to live a life of luxury on about a 100,000$ per annum.

A common take away from all the books, set up a system to generate money for you. It might be a business or assets.

I am still curious to find out, how can we do this in India. Any thoughts ???

Tags: Finance, investment, random rambling, book review

photo by phauly

expert (http://definr.com/expert)

         n : a person with special knowledge or ability who performs
         skillfully

experts
how important is it to be one.. i wonder
Then i realized that an expert is a person who knows a little more about the subject than you. Thus, if you are discussing about ,lets say, writing a blog, the person who has written a few blogs is an expert over you, if you have never written a blog.

Its as simple as that. of course, this definition has its pitfalls too. The biggest one is, meeting someone who knows more about the subject than you do. In front of that person, all you are saying is just plain bullshit.

I have had the misfortune of interacting with some of these self proclaimed experts. First time i talked to some of these people, i was impressed. But then, i also got curious about the subject. So, i googled the subject and read about it. The more i read, i realized that “the experts” had taken their material from the same place as i was reading. Sad but true.

In the age of internet its really tough to become an expert. Anybody can read what is written on webpages.

So what makes an expert. A college degree? A PhD?
Certainly, all the PhDs are experts in there field. But what happens if the field is different from what you have studied and researched ? Do you still call yourself an expert, because you have a degree ? Many people do, till they are ridiculed by a school kid who has read the same material on the internet.

So that leaves us with couple of challenges.

1. How do you learn more about a subject in the internet era ?
2. How do you stay ahead of what is published on the net every second ?

There is no one solution to these solutions. There can be multiple approaches. Some of them are:

1. Pick a niche area, and learn about the latest happenings in that niche. – Of course the question is how do you choose a niche area ? And isnt it same as studying for a degree? Yup in some ways it is. But then again, no degree is going to make you an expert in areas like “cars and there designs”, “mobile phones and there features” or “the latest super-duper hollywood flick and how it is better than all others”
2. Do quick micro-experiments in the area of interest – This is easier than most people think it is. You want to know about the latest hollywood flick and the special effects ? Talk to a kid. Then watch the trailers of the movies. Simple.

Of course it takes hands on experience for you to comment about your personal experience in any area. i think micro-experiments are a great way to do that.

Do you have any better way of learning new things, staying ahead of most of the crowd and being an expert? Share them with me, i will be glad to hear about them.

Tags: expert