Thoughts on Father’s Day
Father’s Day has come and gone. For me, it’s been a day of reflection. My daughter is fourteen, only four years from adulthood. Meanwhile, I’m lamenting the lost opportunities, and trying to figure out how to make the best of the years to come.
I hadn’t realised how quickly Madison would grow up.
From five years old, to nine, to fourteen—the years flashed by. As adults, we pretend our personalities are pretty much set. From twenty-five to fifty-five we don’t change much. That’s untrue, of course. But change unfolds gradually over those thirty years.
In comparison, our kids are sponges. Continually learning, acquiring new interests and friends, adapting themselves to a challenging world. It’s our job as parents to keep up. If we don’t, we lose touch. At worst, we lose their trust.
Then when puberty hits, everything changes. There’s an explosion of hormones, a burst of chaos, and a young adult begins to emerge. For parents that’s scary, especially for those who haven’t resolved their own psychological issues.
As Madison was growing up, I focussed on building my business. Like all entrepreneurs, I’d experienced my own setbacks. No, let’s be honest—I’d lost so much money at one point that I thought I’d never be able to dig myself out of the hole. That’s traumatic. I believed I needed to work hard to recover the money I’d lost, to give my wife and daughter the lives I thought they deserved.
We soak up trauma in our bodies. I made it a rule to never show my emotions to my clients. I kept a tight grip. When clients complained to me about how unfairly they’d been treated, I kept my stories to myself. I felt empathy for others, but none for myself. As a result I seemed distant—even to those who loved me the most.
Why am I telling you this? Because I don’t want to see others making the same mistakes I’ve made. These lessons seem commonplace, but generation after generation of men fall into the same trap. Work hard to provide for their family, miss too many of those special occasions, and wind up as strangers in their own living rooms.
There’s a solution, of course. Spread the load. Engage people to assist and support you. Now, I work with a handpicked team to keep growing my business. That’s brilliant—but I really needed that team when I was twenty-five. The right mix of mentors and professionals to keep me on track, to maximise my strengths and compensate for my weaknesses.
You know who I needed at the centre of that team, thirty years ago? A financial concierge. Much more than just an accountant, a financial concierge can help establish the right business structure, gather and analyse the data you need to grow, plan a lifetime strategy for building wealth, then help you sell the business for its full value when you decide to retire.
Sounds expensive? Maybe. But now I’ve reached my mid-fifties, I find myself in a sweet spot financially. With wise guidance I’d have arrived here sooner, and with less pain. Looking back, I realise I could have afforded that support, even if it felt like a stretch. Learning the hard way was much more expensive.
So if you have a young entrepreneur in your family, help them find the professional support they need to guide them through their early years in business. Make sure they receive some compassionate counsel on balancing their career and their family.
Because some day thirty years from now, they’ll be sitting at the top table at their son or daughter’s wedding. They’ll know they were hands-on parents who savoured every moment of their children’s lives. And when they stand to toast the happy couple, all other concerns will fade away. To me, that’s the measure of a life well lived.