By David Choo
After close to 40 years in the financial advisory and wealth management industry in Singapore, I have often asked and been asked “What is true wealth?”
The emphasis is on “true” although wealth is the subject of interest.
I have heard all kinds of answers. And warnings too.
“Wealth is good but do not trade health for wealth.”
“The love of money is the root of all evil.”
“Own wealth but don’t let wealth own you.”
“Wealth is not worth anything unless you have self-worth.”
“Wealth is more than riches but not without riches.”
The rejoinder: “Don’t give me poverty or riches. Give me just enough.”
But what is riches? What is wealth? What is enough? Is poverty bad, a curse? And who gets to decide who is right or wrong? Or to each his own? Man, what really is true wealth?
My family started poor. Not so poor as to starve. We had simple meals and no one was skin and bones, and no one was obese too. My father first worked as a labourer in civil service. During my growing up years, he was a caretaker. He cooked for and served the doctors who were stationed in St John’s Island which was a quarantine station then. My mom was a homemaker and raised a brood of seven of us. But my parents were happy and fulfilled and held their heads high. My dad believed that there was nothing bad about being poor if you earn an honest day’s wage for an honest day’s work. My parents were not really religious then but were moral and ethical. They set a good example of marital fidelity and parental responsibility at great personal sacrifice of their time
The thing is that our family was poor then but we considered ourselves rich because we have a loving family, and we had good conscience and good sleep, and the simple joys of simple healthy living. Our values about life are shaped by our early experience. For me, family is wealth, now more so as I am in my senior years. I wonder why family is so dear to some while others think it is too dear or costly to start a family?