{"id":1687,"date":"2025-08-04T09:36:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-04T09:36:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/primassure.in\/blogs\/?p=1687"},"modified":"2025-08-04T11:17:38","modified_gmt":"2025-08-04T11:17:38","slug":"kavita-bothra-the-power-of-three","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/primassure.in\/blogs\/kavita-bothra-the-power-of-three\/","title":{"rendered":"Kavita Bothra – The Power Of Three"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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\u201cThe cost of something is the amount of life you exchange for it.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0\u2013 Henry David Thoreau<\/strong><\/span>
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Dear Investors & Friends:<\/span>
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Welcome to this week\u2019s\u00a0SundayReads<\/span>.<\/span>
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A few months ago, Neha sat across from me at our favourite coffee shop in Matunga, stirring her cold coffee more than sipping it.<\/span>
She was restless. A 29-year-old software engineer, she had just been offered a senior role at a promising startup in Bangalore. Better pay, better exposure. On paper, it looked perfect.<\/span>
\u201cBut\u2026\u201d she hesitated, \u201cMy parents are here. Dad\u2019s health is unpredictable. And honestly, I don\u2019t know if I\u2019m ready to uproot everything.\u201d<\/span>
I smiled and said, \u201cNeha, every big decision in life\u2014and in money\u2014comes with a cost. Let\u2019s see this through three simple lenses I use even in financial planning:<\/span>


Compared with what? And then what? At the expense of what?<\/strong>\u201d<\/span>
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She leaned in.<\/span>
The first question \u2013\u00a0Compared with what?<\/em>\u00a0\u2013 made her pause. She\u2019d been so focused on the glamour of the startup that she hadn\u2019t weighed the life she\u2019d be leaving behind: the support system, the comfort, the joy of coming home to her mother\u2019s cooking.<\/span>

It reminded me of clients who rush to buy a new car without asking:\u00a0Compared with what?<\/em><\/span>
Maybe the same EMI could fuel a SIP that compounds into a house down payment in five years.<\/span>
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The second question \u2013\u00a0And then what?<\/em>\u00a0\u2013 forced her to see beyond the excitement of the first month. If she moved, then what? New city, new skills\u2014but also lonely festivals and guilt calls home. In finance, I often ask clients this same question before a big purchase:\u00a0And then what?<\/em>\u00a0That gadget or impulsive splurge feels good today, but what\u2019s the next consequence? Lost liquidity? Delayed goal?<\/span>
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The third lens \u2013\u00a0At the expense of what?<\/em>\u00a0\u2013 was the clincher. Any choice meant giving something up. Neha realised moving meant sacrificing daily family time; staying meant slower career growth. In money too, every \u201cyes\u201d is a \u201cno\u201d to something else. Every FD locked for five years is\u00a0at the expense of<\/em>\u00a0liquidity. Every delayed SIP is\u00a0at the expense of<\/em>\u00a0compounding.<\/span>
She didn\u2019t give me an answer that day. But a week later, she texted:<\/span>
\u201cTook the job. Negotiated remote weeks. And please increase SIP now that the salary is higher. Those three questions changed how I decide.\u201d<\/span>
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A few weeks later, I used the same framework with\u00a0Vikram<\/strong>, a client in Pune running a manufacturing unit. He wanted to invest in automation but feared the cost and its impact on long-term staff.<\/span>
We walked through the lenses:<\/span>


Compared with what?<\/em>\u00a0Staying manual risked losing contracts.<\/span>


And then what?<\/em>\u00a0Automation could boost profits, but would need retraining.<\/span>


At the expense of what?<\/em>\u00a0A chunk of reserves and possibly a few jobs.<\/span>
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He chose a phased plan\u2014automate gradually, retrain his team, and invest the surplus profits in a corporate bond ladder to secure liquidity. Like any financial decision, it wasn\u2019t painless, but it was\u00a0conscious<\/em>.<\/span>
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Over the years, I\u2019ve realised that\u00a0using mental models like this is a winner every time<\/strong>. Each time I read Shane Parrish\u2019s Farnam Street blog, I come back with a practical takeaway that makes me a better decision-maker\u2014for myself and for my clients. I\u2019ve been doing this for some time now, and the pattern is clear:\u00a0decisions made through these lenses are calmer, clearer, and far less regretful.<\/strong>\u00a0And most important – it\u2019s about being intentional.<\/span>
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So the next time you\u2019re facing a financial choice\u2014or even a life one\u2014pause and ask:<\/span>
Compared with what? And then what? At the expense of what?<\/strong><\/span>
It always helps.<\/span>
Until the next week and the next\u00a0SundayRead<\/span>, Ciao<\/span>
\u00a0<\/span>
Warmly,<\/span>


Kavita Bothra<\/span>

Helping you think thoughts you may not have thought before.<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe cost of something is the amount of life you exchange for it.\u201d\u00a0\u2013 Henry David Thoreau\u00a0Dear Investors & Friends:\u00a0Welcome to this week\u2019s\u00a0SundayReads.\u00a0A few months ago, Neha sat across from me at our favourite coffee shop in Matunga, stirring her cold coffee more than sipping it.She was restless. A 29-year-old software engineer, she had just been […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/primassure.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/primassure.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/primassure.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/primassure.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/primassure.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1687"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/primassure.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1687\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1695,"href":"https:\/\/primassure.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1687\/revisions\/1695"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/primassure.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/primassure.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/primassure.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}