Each day of ‘Navratri’ festival of nine nights is dedicated to nine Avatars of Goddess Durga that she had morphed into while battling the demon Mahishasura, along with the wisdom and prosperity dedicated to Goddess Saraswati and Goddess Lakshmi. This festival is all about good prevailing over evil. Similarly we should also consider getting rid of our evil financial habits and start working on correcting them. Here are nine valuable investment lessons that we can learn from this culturally rich festival.
1.Get Disciplined With Finances
Just like in Navratri, when many people fast for nine days, which requires resilience. In the same way, your finances also need discipline and patience to reach stability. .
2.Set Goals
Similar to the nine avatars of the Goddess signifying various weapons she used to kill the demon. Similarly, set SMART(Specific, Measurable, Adjustable, Realistic and Time-bound) investment goals and execute the plan. Also, classify goals into short/ medium/ long term and assign time frames.
3.Think of the Future and Invest
For investing, the first thing is to save by controlling expenditure. Therefore, slay the demons of your impulse spending by maneuvering your thoughts to invest prudently from the savings to create an investment portfolio.
4.Diversify
Similar to farmers planting a variety of crops like cereals, pulses, food grains etc based on their resources, soil and regional characteristics. Your strategic portfolio should be built considering your personal life goals, risk profile, investment horizon and financial condition. By optimally utilising the different and specific attributes of asset classes to ensure balance, growth and safety in market volatility.
5.Always stay focused on the journey of wealth creation
As Goddess Durga slayed the demon for the good future of all humanity. Likewise, for your future financial well-being, it is imperative for you to remain focused on your financial goals and not get swayed by market turbulence/ temporary aberrations.
6.Monitor,Review and Realign
Each step of the popular Navratri dance form “Garba”represents self-realisation and joy. Wherein with each step of Garba, you experience joy to bring you back to your first point after dancing so many steps without any worry. Similarly, you should review your portfolio regularly to assess performance, weed out the underperforming and replace/ look for new opportunities.
7.Take optimum Insurance
While offering puja to the Goddess during Navratri, we focus on the divine power of the deity. Similarly, we should focus on our inner power and insure against risk with adequate term and health insurance cover to indemnify risk from any untoward event.
8.Prepare for the Unexpected
In every avatar Goddess Durga is seen holding various weapons and is always prepared to fight. Similarly, you should maintain an adequate emergency corpus and be prepared for emergencies like job loss/ hospitalisation, after considering your income stability, medical records etc.
9.Acquire Knowledge and Seek Guidance
In Navratri religious scriptures and holy books are referred to chant mantras or perform puja and many times we also appoint a Pundit to guide us to perform Puja. In a similar way one should gain knowledge and/ or seek guidance from financial experts when one can’t figure out how to go about investing. Because a proficient financial expert will not only guide you but will also handhold you in your financial decision-making process by providing an unbiased and research-oriented solution.
Just like the 10th Day called Dussehra or ‘Vijayadashmi’ signifying the end of evil and new beginnings. This year, end your bad financial habits and begin a new journey with focus, discipline, and a positive outlook which can brighten up your financial future.
Happy Navratri!
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Col Sandeep Mahalwar (Retd) MSc, MBA(Finance), IIM Ahmedabad Alumni has vast experience of managing finances. While serving in the Indian Army he handled budget and Finance planning at national level for Government departments. Imparted training and coaching to stakeholders on matters concerning Finance. Post retirement he is running a Delhi based fintech startup “Finvision Financial Services”. His company provides, Customised Investment, Insurance, Finance and Tax solutions. He can be reached at
+91-7508055826/ 8279677698 & sandeep@finvision.in
Sandeep is a highly accomplished Financial Planner who has a very deep understanding of numbers and potential earnings. One can count on him to give u a very balanced perspective.
Very true, I agree 100%.