Every parent hopes that one day their children will turn out to be wealth creators just like themselves. But hope is not a strategy especially when money is involved. The only way for parents to reproduce wealth creators in subsequent generation and prolong the longevity of their wealth beyond their lifetime is for parents to strategically create a viable family environment that support the development of a wealth creator.
Children, who create wealth, manage wealth and steward existing wealth well and those who squander wealth do not just fall from the sky they are made, and the environment that makes them is the family environment. If this family environment has a limited supply of wealth, a child has the appropriate dose of pain it needs to develop into a wealth creator.
However, if the family environment is surrounded by the trappings of wealth, it can fuel dysfunction and this is how spoiled children are made. Wealth Creators are a rare breed in subsequent generation, not because one is not born every day but because parent creates dysfunctional family environments and shield their children from real life pain that transforms potential wealth creators into dependent beneficiaries. Wealth itself brings certain complexities to families and at certain levels of wealth parenting a child into a wealth creator becomes harder not easier.
The only way to make the creation of wealth creators possible across subsequent generations is for parents to introduce into the lives of their children some of the pain factors that drove them to wealth
Pain is critical for the development of a wealth creator. At certain levels of discomfort a person is naturally driven to strive towards wealth. Unfortunately, parents who created wealth from scratch are more prone to create a perfect family environment and life for their children.
However, what children seldom need to grow into wealth creators is a perfect and painless life devoid of hardship. To reproduce wealth creators across subsequent generations’ parent must brace up for the hard work of resisting the temptation to buy their children happiness and success rather than let them earn it. Children can earn their own success even in the midst of wealth when the right structures are put in place.
Raising financially responsible children in the midst of abundant wealth especially within the traditional family system is almost an impossible feat. In most wealthy families, money is given away for free, loans are given without accountability, money is lost without consequences, safety nets are created to shield children from pain and money is bestowed rather than earned. This creates dysfunctional family members who depend on existing wealth rather than create their own wealth. The more wealth is experienced within a family environment the more dependent children will be created.
To begin the process of turning things around, parents must begin to ask important questions like-Will giving my child the kind of life I did not have make it easier or harder for my child to succeed?, How do I make sure that wealth has a positive impact and not a negative impact on my child? How can I help my child learn some of the valuable lessons life has thought me?. Can raising a child in the midst of abundant wealth compound a child’s problem? And so on. Parents must redefine what it means to help their children without ruining them.
But how can parents reproduce wealth creators across subsequent generation-A Family Bank system is the answer.
A family bank is not a “bank” in the formal sense of it but a private financial system set up by families of means. In a Traditional family bank system parents or grandparents form a trust that designates a portion of the family’s wealth for the financial support of family members’. This type of traditional family bank system comes with a number of challenges.
First, it breeds beneficiaries rather than wealth creators. A beneficiary is someone (a child) who derives benefits or advantages from the hard work of somebody else (the wealth creator.) In such traditional family bank systems children get financial support in exchange for nothing but for the fact that they are bloodline heirs of the wealth creator. Money bestowed this way cannot lead to the development of a wealth creator. To develop a wealth creator, parents must shift focus from the traditional family bank system to the new family bank system.
The new family bank system is focused on the development of a wealth creator. Unlike the traditional family bank system that dole out cash to beneficiaries, the new family bank system is designed to expose children to some of the real life situations that supported the growth and development of their parents. Children under this new system learn how to create their own money, practice savings, learn about investing, and are held accountable for their financial decisions. Children also engage in collaborative activities with their siblings that help them acquire leadership, interpersonal, financial and entrepreneurship skills.
This new family bank system help to groom financially responsible, business savvy and leadership effective children across multiple generations. So rather than give children financial support for free as is evident in the traditional family bank system, financial support within the new family bank system is tied to a series of developmental activities that introduces hard work, delayed gratification, critical thinking, financial intelligence and the ability to work with other siblings in a way that foster stronger family bonds.
If parents have come to value money only because the creation of wealth cost them a lot of sacrifice then, this is the only way children will also come to create a healthy value for money. If children must become responsible wealth creators, they must truly work hard and earn their own wealth. Earning their own wealth takes away the guilt of free money, makes them derive fulfilment from their own hard work, and helps them put the money to more productive use because their sense of value for money is improved.
Money that is beneficial is never bestowed. To perpetuate wealth within a family, the human beings in that family must be wealth creators and not beneficiaries. If these human beings are beneficiaries, wealth will ultimately dissipate. With the new family bank system parents can now integrate some of the life experiences that supported their own development as wealth creators into the lives of their children and reproduce their own kind across subsequent generations.
To get more information about our ‘Wealth Creator focused Family Bank System’ and how you can set one up for your family and create more financially responsible behavior in your children kindly text “Wealth Creator Family Bank” to 08101860042 to get started.
Raising children that are self-reliant, responsible and independent is seldom achieved by making free money abundantly available to them. Related News
Grace Agada
