Today is Dhanteras. First day of Diwali celebrations.
This day belongs to Goddess Lakshmi. Homes are cleaned and decorated with rangoli.
Lakshmi pujan is conducted in the evening to welcome home this goddess of wealth and prosperity.
However, Dhanteras is actually celebrated in honour of God Dhanvantari. He is the god who imparted wisdom of Ayurveda for mankind's well being and to help them get rid of the suffering of diseases. (Wikipedia University)
But being an investor and a bania, I'll stick with the Lakshmi version of this festival :).
As per our family ritual, we worship wealth of our house, symbolized by old silver and other coins handed over by our great great grand parents. Coins of Ganpati, Lakshmi...
This year, I had a closer look at our family's coins collection. Apart from worshiping gods, we have also been worshiping ...
King George VI... and other British India coins dating as back as 1925!
We have also been worshiping Gandhi ji for last 40-50 years...
and also coins from the princely state of Hyderabad... from the days when it was ruled by Nizam!! (My grandmother's family home is in Hyderabad)
There are whole bunch of coins in our family gullak, old paisa to naya paisa. Each generation has added their coins to it. We have been worshiping our family "wealth" of at least last 100 odd years or around 4-5 generations.
Times have changed, regimes have changed, faces on coins have changed. These coins are probably worthless now (though some may fetch antique value in today's money).
But we continue worshiping and inviting Lakshmi to our home each year in whatever form she takes.
There is a little story about Lakshmi and her sister Alakshmi that I would like to share.
Alakshmi is visualized as an owl seated beside Lakshmi, Alakshmi is a secret goddess, invisible to all. The only way to see her is to have Saraswati, goddess of knowledge and good sense by your side. But Lakshmi will never let Saraswati stay in the same house as her. She will go wherever there is Saraswati and kick her out, making room for Alakshmi.
Why does she do that, one wonders. But then one is told that Lakshmi is a whimsical goddess, she does not like to stay in one place too long. By kicking Saraswati out and by getting Alakshmi in, she ensures there is a fight in the house and when there is a fight, wealth invariably moves out of a house. But if Saraswati is in the house, good sense prevails, fights do not take place and Lakshmi is unable to move out.
Source: Devdutt Pattnaik https://devdutt.com/articles/the-rise-of-alakshmi/
That's the nature of wealth. It likes to flow and does not like to sit idle or does not like to be hoarded. It's not in our interest as well to hoard it.
Value of money is when it is exchanged.
So this Dhanteras, understand Lakshmi's nature. Let her flow. Spend money for the benefit of others. Invest money for the benefit of others. Don't let her sit around. We are nothing but trustees of whatever wealth we hold, for the brief time that we are here on earth.
Else, our grand kids will be left with such metal pieces. Or worse, in today's digital world, some useless algorithms..
Happy Dhanteras! May you stay blessed with HEALTH (first) and WEALTH.
The End...
If you are not bored, you can continue. Something for the investing nerds...
I will contradict a bit myself now.
I don't know the value of these coins today, but they have probably done their job of holding their value. Back then, coins represented value of their metal constituents. So a silver coin of 1 gram had equivalent value vs. say 10 coins of copper weighing 10 gms. This ratio was largely held with most of them linked to gold. I believe value of those metals still holds the same in today's money terms.
Then came currency notes which promised to pay the bearer some fixed amount of gold.
But that changed post 1971 when money or rather currency became fiat. Earlier, currency was backed by real gold or their value was at least linked to gold. Post US President Richard Nixon's announcement in 1971, currency was no longer money. (read this again)...
Pre-Nixon $ was convertible into gold Post Nixon, it is "Ram Bharose" (pun intended)
Money used to be decentralized for 5000 years of its existence i.e. no one told us the value of it nor anyone controlled supply of it.
Now it is centralized. Today a currency note or coin is used as money because government says it is money. One fine day, government can decide that X is not money, but Y is. And you have to live with that. You wealth is at the whims of government. Remember demonetisation?
But people have continued to treat currency as money.
Anyways, as we have seen above, times change, regimes change and what is considered as money can also change.
But one commodity has stood test of time for 5000 years.
That's Gold.
What has not changed is how people view gold as. Even during the time of demonetisation, gold was money. Even when government bans it, gold will remain a currency. (remember 70s movies smuggling in gold?)
Directly or indirectly, it is still considered as money. A hedge against money printing by government. Gold price grew by CAGR of 12% over last 20 years in INR terms. Bank credit growth (~money printing) has been around 13-14% during the same period!
In today's world of global uncertainties where central bankers and governments are doing stupid things and are being careless about money, it is prudent to have a reasonable portion of your family wealth, especially out of your cash and fixed income allocation, towards gold.
May be that's why gold buying is part of Dhanteras ritual. Our ancestors have probably seen many such foolish kings and governments.
May Lakshmi keep paying you visit...
Final The End...
This day belongs to Goddess Lakshmi. Homes are cleaned and decorated with rangoli.
Lakshmi pujan is conducted in the evening to welcome home this goddess of wealth and prosperity.
However, Dhanteras is actually celebrated in honour of God Dhanvantari. He is the god who imparted wisdom of Ayurveda for mankind's well being and to help them get rid of the suffering of diseases. (Wikipedia University)
But being an investor and a bania, I'll stick with the Lakshmi version of this festival :).
As per our family ritual, we worship wealth of our house, symbolized by old silver and other coins handed over by our great great grand parents. Coins of Ganpati, Lakshmi...
This year, I had a closer look at our family's coins collection. Apart from worshiping gods, we have also been worshiping ...
King George VI... and other British India coins dating as back as 1925!
We have also been worshiping Gandhi ji for last 40-50 years...
and also coins from the princely state of Hyderabad... from the days when it was ruled by Nizam!! (My grandmother's family home is in Hyderabad)
There are whole bunch of coins in our family gullak, old paisa to naya paisa. Each generation has added their coins to it. We have been worshiping our family "wealth" of at least last 100 odd years or around 4-5 generations.
Times have changed, regimes have changed, faces on coins have changed. These coins are probably worthless now (though some may fetch antique value in today's money).
But we continue worshiping and inviting Lakshmi to our home each year in whatever form she takes.
There is a little story about Lakshmi and her sister Alakshmi that I would like to share.
Alakshmi is visualized as an owl seated beside Lakshmi, Alakshmi is a secret goddess, invisible to all. The only way to see her is to have Saraswati, goddess of knowledge and good sense by your side. But Lakshmi will never let Saraswati stay in the same house as her. She will go wherever there is Saraswati and kick her out, making room for Alakshmi.
Why does she do that, one wonders. But then one is told that Lakshmi is a whimsical goddess, she does not like to stay in one place too long. By kicking Saraswati out and by getting Alakshmi in, she ensures there is a fight in the house and when there is a fight, wealth invariably moves out of a house. But if Saraswati is in the house, good sense prevails, fights do not take place and Lakshmi is unable to move out.
Source: Devdutt Pattnaik https://devdutt.com/articles/the-rise-of-alakshmi/
That's the nature of wealth. It likes to flow and does not like to sit idle or does not like to be hoarded. It's not in our interest as well to hoard it.
Value of money is when it is exchanged.
So this Dhanteras, understand Lakshmi's nature. Let her flow. Spend money for the benefit of others. Invest money for the benefit of others. Don't let her sit around. We are nothing but trustees of whatever wealth we hold, for the brief time that we are here on earth.
Else, our grand kids will be left with such metal pieces. Or worse, in today's digital world, some useless algorithms..
Happy Dhanteras! May you stay blessed with HEALTH (first) and WEALTH.
The End...
If you are not bored, you can continue. Something for the investing nerds...
I will contradict a bit myself now.
I don't know the value of these coins today, but they have probably done their job of holding their value. Back then, coins represented value of their metal constituents. So a silver coin of 1 gram had equivalent value vs. say 10 coins of copper weighing 10 gms. This ratio was largely held with most of them linked to gold. I believe value of those metals still holds the same in today's money terms.
Then came currency notes which promised to pay the bearer some fixed amount of gold.
But that changed post 1971 when money or rather currency became fiat. Earlier, currency was backed by real gold or their value was at least linked to gold. Post US President Richard Nixon's announcement in 1971, currency was no longer money. (read this again)...
Pre-Nixon $ was convertible into gold Post Nixon, it is "Ram Bharose" (pun intended)
Money used to be decentralized for 5000 years of its existence i.e. no one told us the value of it nor anyone controlled supply of it.
Now it is centralized. Today a currency note or coin is used as money because government says it is money. One fine day, government can decide that X is not money, but Y is. And you have to live with that. You wealth is at the whims of government. Remember demonetisation?
But people have continued to treat currency as money.
Anyways, as we have seen above, times change, regimes change and what is considered as money can also change.
But one commodity has stood test of time for 5000 years.
That's Gold.
What has not changed is how people view gold as. Even during the time of demonetisation, gold was money. Even when government bans it, gold will remain a currency. (remember 70s movies smuggling in gold?)
Directly or indirectly, it is still considered as money. A hedge against money printing by government. Gold price grew by CAGR of 12% over last 20 years in INR terms. Bank credit growth (~money printing) has been around 13-14% during the same period!
In today's world of global uncertainties where central bankers and governments are doing stupid things and are being careless about money, it is prudent to have a reasonable portion of your family wealth, especially out of your cash and fixed income allocation, towards gold.
May be that's why gold buying is part of Dhanteras ritual. Our ancestors have probably seen many such foolish kings and governments.
May Lakshmi keep paying you visit...
Final The End...
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