Life Question: How to Raise Your Children When You're Well-off?

[Beauregard]

Originally Posted by JasonBetts

Now here comes the dilemma, if you belong to the second category, born and raised in the middle-class family and worked your butt off to get a nice life, how do you raise your children to avoid the pitfall of the first category?

Boom. This is what I ponder while watching my two young sons play with all the amazing toys I never had. And really, the only answer I come up with is "raise them with love and a sense of stewardship and it will turn out just fine."

I ran away from home at 15, never graduated high school, hustled and did whatever it took to climb out of my destiny and ended up retiring at 48 after selling my share of a company I helped found to Heineken for an obscene amount of money. My wife's father has a story not at all unlike mine and she was raised with everything she wanted and needed, and a lot of love. And she came out just fine. So did her brother. Neither is spoiled, on the contrary they are really well put together people full of joy and drive. So maybe our kids have a chance to be great people despite being raised well-off.

Probably more info than you needed but that's the way I see it, and what I'm kind of counting on.

[Sarosh]

I was an only child so from a very early age my parents provided well for me. We were not rich, nowhere near, but they did their best to give me what they never had. I remember as a very young child staying awake till 10pm some nights waiting for my dad to come home from work. Never realising how much he was doing for the family. My parents sacrificed a lot for me. That was a lesson I learnt from them. Selfless sacrifice for your own blood.

Not sure if and when I will have children. But if I do, I will teach them that money does not grow on trees. It needs to be earned with hard work and diligence. I respect my parents so much for teaching me such valuable lessons in life.

The past shapes the future in my opinion, and my parents were great examples of people who started at the bottom and worked their way up. I value my money and possessions more because I know how much sweat blood and tears have gone into achieving them.

[Speedbird-1]

Lead by example.

[DonRickles]

Someone should just write a book......

Super sarcasm...

Remove the "well off" and you should find that raising children to become good adults, has very little to do with money. IMO

[superdog]

Originally Posted by DonRickles

Someone should just write a book......

Super sarcasm...

Remove the "well off" and you should find that raising children to become good adults, has very little to do with money. IMO

Good post.

Agree with the others that parents should lead by example.

But my folks were great examples. My brother and I are night and day. Couldn’t be more different.