Owen Rask shares 25 things he will teach his son, Charlie.
This article first appeared in Owen Rask’s free weekly investor newsletter. Over 50,000 Australian investors read it every Sunday. If you like this discussion, create a free Rask account and join us.
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This week, we welcomed our son to the Rask family.
Right now, his life is milk, sleep and Huggies.
But sooner or later, we’ll need to teach him about the world. Here are 25 things I’ll share with him.
- Congrats. You just won the lottery. Australia is the best country on Earth. And it was pure luck.
- Treat everyone like a friend. People remember how you make them feel.
- Be physically strong. As strong as you can be. Your confidence will multiply.
- Acknowledging your weakness is the easiest way to be strong. Most men I’ve met haven’t figured this out.
- Take as much risk as you can. Just know the risk you’re taking.
- Seek out data that disconfirms your strongest beliefs. Nobody has all the answers.
- To understand people, listen. To think better, write. To learn, read.
- Strong religious, political and ideological beliefs cabbage your brain. Be careful.
- If you have the power to help, you must. Even if it costs. It’s what our family does.
- Things can be bad and getting better. For example, the world is a wonderful place, and it’s getting better.
- Your time, effort, money and love have limits. Invest them wisely.
- Happiness is not a destination, it’s a journey with many intersections.
- It’s good to be scared. I am too.
- Don’t be unreliable. If you say it, do it.
- Help as many people as you can, so they can help others. Your life will have immense impact.
- Green heals blue. Get into nature as often as you can.
- Hard work is a privilege.
- Hard work isn’t everything. Work smarter than anyone you know.
- Stay away from negative people. Your life will be miserable, and they’ll find a problem to every solution.
- If you need to change your habits, change places.
- Apologise. Often. And especially when it hurts.
- The hardest decision is often the right one. Delaying will make it harder.
- You can’t fall off the floor. Pull yourself up, or ask for help.
- Love is hard.
- You are loved.
Welcome to this wonderful world, Charlie.
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Psst. Here’s how we’ll help Charlie invest:
- He’ll open a Rask Invest Luna account in the next two months. Most likely via our family trust.
- He’ll dollar-cost average every three months, every birthday and Christmas.
- We/he don’t care about the tax consequences of investing for kids. Combining Luna and our family trust will be extremely helpful but the tax really doesn’t matter to us. Getting started is more important.
- Charlie will invest in direct shares of companies he loves because worldly education is far more important than percentage returns (note: he probably won’t understand the concept of investing until 9-10, so this won’t come for another decade).
- He won’t invest entirely in index funds, as we aren’t convinced index funds will provide the same level of returns for the next generation as the last. Plus, see point #4.
- We will deliberately budget and talk about our money, our salaries, property, level of donations, our share portfolio, business financial and taxes in front of him, then ask what he thinks.
- We won’t pay for a fancy private school. Based on the data, we think it’s a waste of money in Australia, and it might have unexpected negative consequences. Plus, it’s horrible capital allocation: we think he would learn more from 2 European holidays per year than from us spending $50,000 + inflation on school fees (FYI – that’s $80,000+ before tax). Plus, being home for dinner is important to us.
- We’ll remind him regularly why we love our job.
- We’ll encourage him to write, so he thinks better.
- We’ll encourage him to donate, every time he budgets.
