Parents #DoYourHomework!

Yesterday my best friend called me to check if I would be interested in enrolling for the mother toddler class, and the question totally took me by surprise because I hadn't ever thought about it seriously. It got me thinking as to how prepared we have to be from such an early stage of our child’s life. I took this up with PS and the discussion went from the mother toddler class to pre-school planning to school then college, and then we were stumped as it’s really not possible to plan so much as we can’t predict as to what profession our daughter will pursue when she grows up.

As parents we do talk a lot about our child but do we have a plan for child’s future is a question that is still unanswered. We don’t have all the ducks lined up. Every generation gets the opportunity to do something different, my grandfather was a lawyer, my father chose to be an engineer and I chose to be a media professional and each one of us were supported by their respective parents to achieve our dream. Three generations and three different professions, which makes me realize that it’s not going to be really easy to plan for my own child’s future.

However what I can definitely do is my research on how well I can manage the financial part of the problem. Both PS and I decided to talk to our parents, young parents (friends and relatives) in order to understand how they planned for such things, and what has been their experience. Fundamentally everyone saved a part of their earnings and invested it to grow into a fund that will suffice the requirement when needed. However life is full of surprises and one needs to plan for contingencies. Everyone agreed it is very difficult to know what their child will want to be while they are growing up and you can't wait till they decide as you may be left with very little time to generate sufficient funds to meet the need of funds when required. What finally came to our rescue are tools like the The Homework App by Axis Mutual Fund for young parents like me and PS, to get a fair idea of how much needs to be invested.

For every parent it is very important to understand their children’s aspirations so that they can guide and support them in achieving their goals.  No matter what Aryaa decides, we will always be there to support and encourage her. My advice to every parent is to do your homework and be as prepared as you can be, both emotionally and financially, as you cannot predict how much and what kind of support your child will want from you tomorrow. But when they do, you should be ready to guide them just like our parents did when we needed them :)

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