Are You Being a Good Ancestor? The Importance of Creative and Financial Inheritance

Last month my father died.

It makes me ponder how my life is steadily turning into a curriculum. It seems that everything I go through turns into a lesson for my students, clients and for myself. So here goes my latest lesson…

My father was a smart man. He, like my mother, were the first to go to college in their entire family. He continued to defy the odds and graduated with his dentistry degree from UCLA back when many blacks were not present there. He practiced dentistry and, in 1988, he realized it wasn’t his passion and closed his practice.

He wanted to be a writer and a teacher of philosophy and of metaphysics. While selling cars on the side, he started using social media (when it became available) to share his revelations and philosophical thoughts on existence. His work was profound. He published one book called Prudence: Hierophant Extraordinaire.

Though he wasn’t often present  in my childhood, we became closer in my adult life. He wasn’t a perfect man but he was my dad and I loved him.

Then when he passed, I realized another aspect of the financial discussion that no one is talking about. Not only do we have a lack of financial literacy in schools during a child’s formative years before they head off into adulthood but there is also a lack of discussing  how importance passing on an inheritance for your children and grandchildren is to building wealth.

Four grandparents are gone and my siblings and I have received nothing (in the financial sense). We did receive a great deal when it came to other critical areas in life but I’m not talking about those elements now (that’s written about here).

Though houses were owned at one time, there was nothing passed on to us. My grandparents owned a shotgun house six blocks from the French Quarter and it was taken by the bank. I didn’t know then what I know now about finances, wealth and property.

This is yet another cost of generational ignorance.

Now I have had one parent that has passed and the same result prevails. This seems to be the norm in our community and it didn’t strike me as odd until I had a friend who received over $50,000 after her father passed. This was enough capital to put down a down payment on a home in a nice area in southern California.

That’s when I woke up and thought, “You cannot talk about building wealth and closing the wealth gap without talking about financial inheritance!!”’

PASSING THE BATON

Track and field was my life for ten years. The sweet smell of fresh cut grass told me Spring was here and my track shoes were jumping up and down, so ready for the season. Being able to glide through the air forced me to fall in love with the jump events but every now and then my coach would pull me to run the relay.

I loathed the relay.

It wasn’t just the tiny matching underwear briefs we all had to wear, it was the fact that I wasn’t in full control of my outcome. Our performance all rest on our team’s ability to get that baton around the track as fast as possible. No matter how fast an individual ran, if they were clumsy with passing the baton, it all went up in smoke.

Building generational wealth is the same way.

We need to start thinking generationally if we are to uplift our communities of color and position our families to build wealth. When I look at my son, I’m thinking about the entities that I am now creating that will bless his grandchildren. Yes!! I’m thinking that far ahead.

One of the major setbacks for people of color and for people don’t come from wealth is that we start with nothing with the onset of every generation. That is a result of having nothing left at the end of our lives. For some we, have less than nothing. We leave debt. With this student loan crisis, that will be the story for many.

This seems to be our norm because no one bestowed to us any inheritance therefore we are not being mindful to set up our estates to give to our descendants. We’re not aware of the importance of this critical move.

And the cycle continues. SO this is causing me to ask…

Are you being a good ancestor or will you leave your children and grandchildren debt?

CREATIVE INHERITANCE

But on the other side of the coin, I want to introduce a new concept called Creative Inheritance. As I mentioned before, my father became a writer. I can’t blame him for leaving dentistry because even though it was a more financially lucrative profession, his love was writing and teaching about profound phenomena cause him to come alive. What can I say? I take after him!

He was creative and he was A creative. He helped people solve the mind boggling problems of their existence. Who am I? Why am I here? What can I do? Through this journey, he began to create and produce.

His first book Prudence: Hierophant Extraordinaire is about a woman named Prudence, a French woman who lived in the mid-1800’s. Under the guidance of her mentor, Melca, Prudence learns wisdom that leads to her own awakening. However, no one is quite ready for the impact that Prudence is to have on those who come under her influence.

Instead of an ‘How To’ self help book on philosophy and better living, he used the elements of storytelling to convey his message of enlightenment. He utilized this character to teach wisdom and how to understand the principles of wise living.

After my father passed, I flew to Georgia and found myself in his little apartment. Family pictures hung for dear life by cracked tape off the fridge. His Old Spice scent lingered in the air. I was greeted by his journals, hundreds and hundreds of pages bound together in the back and white composition books, consisting of his writing, his thoughts and his experiences through life. I even found the entry of my wedding date and what he wrote made husband smile. I brought them back to California and I am now surrounded by his essence.

He did leave us something after all. He left us his ideas.

As I continue my intense research on creativity and the power of ideas, I am blessed to be in possession of his most profound thoughts on life.

Ideas are the most powerful force on earth. Think about it. Our country is still running off the ideas of a selected few who lived hundreds of years ago.

YOU OUTLIVING YOU

Once I am able, I will work on publishing his works for his students and others who wish to continue to learn from him. Ideas never die. And who knows, he may become a best-selling author posthumously. Van Gogh only sold one painting during his life and now his paintings go for millions. Whether or not my father’s creative works garner any financial success, is not the point. The point is he took the time to be creative and produce. It doesn’t take away the value of them whether they become famous or not.

So I ask you. What are you leaving behind that is a product of your creative ideas? What are you producing that will outlive you?

These two areas, creative inheritance and financial inheritance are two areas we should be aware of when we look at our descendants, whether they be our actual children, our nieces and nephews, or organizations that we want to donate to upon our passing. Let’s pass the baton better, both creatively and financially.

Let’s work at being good ancestors for those yet to come.

Love you Daddy.

All is well.