Hi everyone. This is my last post for 2016. I really enjoy writing my posts, but more enjoyable are the comments that I receive from all of you. Time is our most valuable resource and I want to thank you for spending a part of that resource reading my posts.

I will continue to write more posts in the next year and more years to come. I hope to get your support going forward.

I would like to wish you and your family Happy and Prosperous New Year.

Good morning all. Last night we watched the movie Sully. If you have not seen it, I highly recommend it. Just to give you a brief overview, on January 15, 2009, US Air Flight 1549 took off from New York’s La Guardia Airport headed to Charlotte, North Carolina. The plane was piloted by Captain Sullenburger (Sully) and first officer Zaslow. But within minutes of taking off, they had a bird strike which severely damaged both engines. They were only at 2800 feet over Manhattan. Control tower was telling  them to return to La Guardia, but Sully thought he would not make it. Then the tower told him to go to Newark airport, Teterboro airport all within a few miles of La Guardia, but Sully refused and said he was going to land on the Hudson river. He did. There were 155 people on board including the crew and all of them survived. Some people had minor injuries. Within 24 minutes of landing on the Hudson, everyone was rescued by New York police and ferries. The movie starts with the National Transportation Safety Board investigating the incident. They keep telling Sully that based on computer simulations he would have made it back to either La Guardia or Teterboro. Airbus, the maker of the airplane also confirmed that computer simulation showed that they would have made it back to an airport instead of landing in the water. I don’t want to give the whole story away in case you want to see the movie. Being a private pilot myself, I practiced simulated engine out and how to land the airplane. But no matter how many times you train for this, when it actually happens, you have to go with your gut instinct. Besides Sully had to worry about 154 people on board as well as millions of people living in Manhattan. So here is what I learned. No matter how many times you practice something, when it happens for real, you have to go with your gut instinct. If the information you have is incomplete, you have to make the best decision based on what you have and then believe in it and be prepared to defend it. Finally machines can predict an outcome, but human factor can never be simulated.

Hi everyone. I have not posted lately. But today I was inspired to post something. I saw a Hindi movie last night called Dangal. For my non-Indian readers, the name of the movie means Wrestling. It is based on a true story about a Indian national wrestling champion, Mahavir Phogat. Mahavir wins the national championship and wants to compete internationally, but his father says he has to get a job. So gives up his dream. But he thinks that he can realize his dream through his son. However, he and his wife end up with four daughters. But one day a neighbor complains that his two elder daughters beat the crap out of their sons. It is then that Mahavir realizes that he can train his daughters to become wrestlers. Now considering that Mahavir is from a remote village in the Indian state of Haryana and the movie is set in the 1970-1980 timeframe, this is very radical. In spite of a lot of opposition from his community he trains his daughters. There is no girls wrestling and so he makes his daughters wrestle against boys. Finally both his daughters become national champions and they win gold and silver medals in international competition. One of the biggest lessons I learned was that you have to step out of your comfort zone to be successful. Both Mahavir and his daughters did something way out of their comfort zone. Second, you have to challenge the status quo. It was not normal for girls to wrestle, but Mahavir found a way.

Third, you have to  have a laser focus. For 10 years, Mahavir and his daughters only focused on wrestling. In his community, from a young age, girls were brought up to cook, clean and bear children. Girls were often looked upon as a burden and were married off at a young age. Mahavir would have none of that. Having focus means cutting out distractions. There is one scene in the movie where his daughters tell him that constant wrestling in the mud is causing lice in their hair and they want to stop. Instead Mahavir tells a barber to cut the girls hair very short.

Even if you are not Indian, I would hope that you identify with the lessons, because they are applicable in any situation. In a couple of days, we will usher in a new year. Please keep these lessons in mind. Happy New Year!

Hi everyone. I started this blog to write about health wealth and wisdom. But I have noticed that when I write about wealth, I get very few views. Health gets more views than wealth, but my posts on wisdom get the most views. So I have decided that I will concentrate more on wisdom. But from time to time, I will write about other two things as well.

That brings me to today’s post. I have often wondered what my true calling is. I always remember the line from the movie Forrest Gump. In the movie, Forrest Gump is a very simple person and often thought of as stupid. His mother is dying and she say’s it was her destiny to be his mother. So Forrest asks her “What is my destiny, Mama?”. I suspect many of you have had this question at some time or other. There is a saying “If you love what you do, you will not work a day in your life” meaning, if you love your job or profession, then it is not work. But most people are not in that situation. I read about trying to find your true calling and what I found out was that it is an intersection of three things: Your strengths, interests and what benefits others. So what we need to do is identify those three things. Each of us knows what we are good at. There are always some things we do better than others. Perhaps we cook better, we manage money better, we are organized etc. So that is our strength(s). There are resources on the internet that can help you find your strengths. Next interest, which could be we like to travel, we like to take photographs, we like to buy clothes etc. If you identify these two things, you are perhaps ahead of 50-60% of the people who are trying to find their true calling. But that is not enough. You have to find how those two things can benefit others. Perhaps you can work with children or senior citizens. Perhaps you can build things. Then bring the three things together. Let us say that you are a teacher, who likes to travel. Then you could volunteer for the peace corps and go to some location where you can teach children. This will fulfill all three criteria. Or you are an engineer who likes to build things. Work with organizations that build housing for under privileged people. The point is, we have one life to live. Find your true calling and live a full life.

Hi everyone. Here is a post about investing in precious metals. Again here is the disclaimer. The information in my post should not be considered investing advice. Please contact a licensed professional before investing in precious metals. Also please do thorough research on how and where to buy precious metals because there are a lot of scams out there.

I remember when I was a kid, my parents used to buy a little bit of gold at every religious event or festival. India and many other Asian countries are the biggest consumers of gold. In addition to investing in stocks and other assets, experts recommend investing in precious metals. The reason is that the precious metals are used as a hedge against bad economic times. That means when the economy is bad, price of precious metals goes up. I don’t know if many people know this but until the 1970’s the US dollar was backed by solid deposits of gold stored at Fort Knox, Kentucky. But in the 1970’s President Nixon took the US off the gold standard. Now the US dollar is backed by the good faith in the US. Getting back to precious metals being a hedge, conversely when the economy is good, the price of gold goes down. But this is when smart investors use dollar cost averaging to buy more gold. Dollar cost averaging means you invest a fixed amount of money into some asset regardless of the price. So for example let us say that price of gold is $1000 an ounce. Say you invest $1000 every month, you will buy an ounce of gold every month. Say the economy worsens and the price of gold goes up to $1500 an ounce. That month you will buy 2/3 ounce. Finally if the economy improves and the price of gold goes down to $500, you will buy 2 ounces. But for the whole year you will have paid an average price of $1000 per ounce. Now this is a very simple illustration, but I hope you get the idea. So price of precious metals is inversely proportional to the economy. These metals are called precious metals because they are rare and extracting them in pure form requires a lot of work. So rarer the metal, the harder it is to extract in pure form and the higher the price. The three precious metals usually invested in consist of silver, gold and platinum. Obviously silver is more abundant, so it is cheaper. It is also used in many industrial applications. So it is consumed faster. Gold is not as abundant as silver, but more abundant than platinum. So they are priced accordingly.

Anyway, my point is if you are investing in assets, consider precious metals. It will help you diversify. Also make sure that you invest in physical metal like gold bullion and not gold company stocks. Do your research before investing and buy from reputable dealers.

Hi everyone. In the same theme of protecting assets, here is a post about choosing the right business entity. Again here is the disclaimer. The information in my post should not be considered legal or financial advice. Please contact a licensed professional or an attorney before choosing the right business entity. If you have a part-time business or thinking of starting one, then you should consider forming a business entity. The reason is that it provides significant tax advantages and also separates your personal income from business income. For example as an individual with a job, the government takes tax out of your paycheck before you get paid. In a business, you pay taxes after all other things are paid, like salaries, office costs, mileage etc. So naturally you are paying less taxes. What type of business entity is good for you? Well it depends on what kind of tax advantages you are looking for and what type of business it is. Are you going to be the sole proprietor or are you going to partner with someone. In the US there are four major entities you can create. The Limited Liability Company (LLC), which is by far the most common and popular, S corporation, C corporation and Limited Liability Partnership. Only a professional can help you make that choice. It makes sense if you are in a service business like catering etc. The reason is that if someone gets food poisoning after eating food you catered, they cannot sue you, they will sue the corporation. Besides many banks and financial institutions are more open to lending money to a business rather than individuals. In my county, you cannot get certain licenses unless you are a business. If you are partnering with someone, even if it is your family member of your best friend, get a legal agreement in place. It will protect both of you and will keep everything in the open. In certain partnerships, you will be responsible for things that your partner does. Again, consult a professional to put an agreement in place. Look you work hard to earn money, why not keep more of it.

Hi everyone. Before I go into my post, a disclaimer. I am not an attorney or financial advisor. My post should not be construed as legal or financial advice. You should find a licensed professional to handle these matters.

Regardless of what anyone says, we want to make money. Our motivation and means of making money maybe different, but objective is the same. But many of us (including myself) don’t take steps to protect our assets. You don’t have to be a business owner to protect your assets, as an individual, you need to do that too. About 10 years ago, my wife and I were both traveling a lot for work and our daughter was about 4 years old. Our financial advisor told us to get a will. Now I was brought up in India and we were always told that the only reason a father has a will is if he does not think his children will behave fairly with each other. Also in India and most countries, assets automatically pass on to the surviving spouse. But it may not be necessarily true everywhere. Besides what if both parents died in an accident? In the US and other countries, if both parents are killed in an accident, the children become the responsibility of the government and it can do whatever it pleases with your assets to take care of your children, unless a will is in place. So my recommendation would be to find a good attorney who specializes in wills and get one made.  Don’t download one from the net.

The other thing is getting insurance. Make sure you have life insurance and designate the beneficiaries. Most people don’t have adequate life insurance. They have it through their employer, but you can get additional life insurance. Another thing our advisor told us was to get an umbrella liability policy against lawsuits. For example if I don’t clean the snow off my sidewalk and someone slips and falls, if they have an injury, they can sue you for damages. By having an umbrella policy in place will protect my personal assets like my house, my car etc. You can also put your assets into a trust so that they cannot come after them. So moral of the story is make sure you talk to a licensed professional about asset protection and do it soon.

Hi everyone. Believe it or not, each one of us has a financial thermostat. As everyone knows, a thermostat is supposed to maintain the temperature of the room in a certain range around the set point. This is exactly how our financial thermostat works. This is not my finding, but many people like Robert Kiyosaki (the author of Rich Dad Poor Dad), Mark Ford and others have talked about it. Basically each of us has a certain amount of money that we feel we should have. If we get a raise or we get an unexpected inheritance, we tend to spend that money. I know I have done that some times. But those of us with lower financial thermostats tend to struggle with money. For many of us, the value of our financial thermostat is developed over the years because of the upbringing we have had. Now I am not the kind of person that blames my problems on my upbringing, but it does play a very strong role in how we perceive money. I grew up hearing that money cannot buy you happiness, money is the root of all evil etc. And so we tend to dislike money. Also many experts have said that there are certain laws of nature that influence us. One of them is the law of attraction. You tend to attract things based on your thoughts. So if our thoughts are about disliking money, we will not attract money. So how do you adjust your financial thermostat. Well for one, get used to having extra money. One suggestion would be to start carrying large sums of cash in your pocket/purse but not having the urge to spend it. Other suggestion is to pay yourself first. If you get a raise or unexpected inheritance, take a portion of that and put into a separate account where it will be difficult to get to. Then you can use the rest of money for other things. Stop having negative thoughts about money, so you will start attracting money. Just like we can adjust the room thermostat to maintain whatever temperature we want, similarly we can adjust our financial thermostat to feel comfortable with any amount of money.

Good morning everyone. I was recently at a training course and I learned some powerful things. The power of hand written thank you notes. We had a speaker called Roger Salam. Roger is originally from Bangladesh and he came to the US for higher education. When he first came to the university in the US, a local American couple invited all the new international students for dinner. Everyone had a good time and went home. But Roger wrote a thank you note to the hostess. Guess what, he was the only one invited to the Thanksgiving dinner. Another story Roger shared was  he was traveling to the UK to give a talk. He reached late and he was staying at a bed and breakfast. He went to his room and unpacked. He realized that he had forgotten his shaving kit. In a panic he went to the front desk and asked the young lady if they had any shaving cream and razor. She said they did not. Roger asked if there was a store open where he could buy it. Unfortunately, no store close by was open. But then the young lady told him that since he was tired, she should go back to his room. She told him there was a gas station further down from the bed and breakfast and she would go and buy it for him. She left the items outside his door. Roger used them the next morning and was able to go to his talk. He wrote a thank you note and wanted to drop it off, but her shift was over. So he gave the note to the manager. Next evening, when he came back to the bed and breakfast, the young lady was there. She told him that because of his note, the manager had decided to give her a raise. Roger shared many such stories with us.

So I want to close this post by saying thank you to all my family, friends and acquaintances who read my blog and who are in my life. I will never take your love or friendship for granted. I would like to encourage you to write a thank you note for someone who is in your life or someone who has helped you or provide a service. You will realize the power of a hand written thank you note.