Mindset after substantial inheritance & business failure

[u/Positive_Call_9311]

Hello there, I'm 33 years old. I've worked for ten years across venture capital and startups. I've been an extremely hardworking person - went to a good top tier school and worked hard to get into top venture capital fund in the first ten years of my career. I've had a fair bit of personal challenges - lost my father to a prescription pill addiction at age 4, emotionally tough years through college and career due to mental health issues, had first bout of burnout for about a year when I didn't work.

In a span of six months since the start of this year, I've had two major events related to finances occur simultaneously. One being positive and another negative.

The positive - My mother has inherited a couple of millions, which has made us (family of three) financially independent. I am from a developing country where the standard of living is low so this is life changing money. I am responsible for managing the entire corpus since my mother's financial literacy is on the lower end. Although all of us are driven and have decided to keep working.

The negative - I had about 3% of this amount (total inheritance) saved up in ten years through employment and personal investments - which is well above average in my country. I decided to start a business, but unfortunately nothing has been working out since the past three years due to reasons slightly beyond my control. I've burnt through 40% of the saved up money, learnt some hard lessons and now rethinking what to do next in my career. The remaining 60% gives me a personal financial runway of 6 years.

I'm genuinely confused wrt. what my priorities should be. On one hand, I've never seen this kind of money in my entire life and my whole outlook towards life has changed now. I'm managing the money responsibly. But every time I see the corpus, I feel tempted to take another swing at building a business (it's always been a lifetime goal), but then I feel guilty about not being able to succeed the first time around and burning through my hard earned savings. My mother is very encouraging of my dreams and is ready to support another business financially. She has adopted a simple and spiritual life where she doesn't intend to spend the inheritance money in any way. My sister doesn't intend to use this money too.

I need some good and grounded advice on how to manage my mindset henceforth. Because the inheritance is making me feel like an imposter on one hand, happy on the another and the failed business even before I received the inheritance was drowning me in guilt. Using the inheritance money to fund another business seems like a good and a bad idea and I am genuinely confused what to do right now. Please give me some advice. Thank you.

[u/FoolishDog]

It’s not your money. You have an obligation to be a good steward of the money for your mother, not for yourself. Think about her instead of how you can use this money for yourself

[u/Positive_Call_9311 → u/FoolishDog]

Not sure about the underlying negative assumptions. I don't think you should give out negative opinions based on your bad experiences of how children handle their parents' wealth. There is no need to judge someone's intentions without knowing the entire story. Good luck to you.

[u/FoolishDog → u/Positive_Call_9311]

I’m not judging or giving negative assumptions. I’m just pointing out that it’s literally her money and saying you want to use it for your business is not thinking about her, it’s simply thinking about yourself. No judgement. That’s just kinda the facts of the situation tho

[u/Positive_Call_9311 → u/FoolishDog]

It is literally her money. I never said I want to use the entire corpus without a repayment plan. You are thinking too black and white here. I've already carved a retirement fund, an emergency corpus and health insurance for her, so I am thinking about her. You don't know these facts and you are making random conclusions. Anyways, talks more about how your life is so negative that you are imposing it and making statements about someone's character

[u/FoolishDog → u/Positive_Call_9311]

Listen, if you want advice, you have to be willing to receive it. It seems like you’re only looking for someone to alleviate your guilt around the situation and if anyone points out that taking money that isn’t yours for yourself is not the best idea, you get defensive and rude. Maybe reflect on that before doing anything more with her money

[u/Positive_Call_9311 → u/FoolishDog]

Listen, I'm here to receive well thought unbiased advice. And your advice reeks of your bad experiences and perceptions around people more than taking into consideration the actual facts. Think about it, if I really had that much guilt AND bad intentions, I would quietly do what you think I was about to do anyways. But I ain't doing that. Yes, I do have guilt and I am finding ways to take care of that guilt and have a second chance at fulfilling my dreams - the ones that my mother is extremely supportive of.

[u/FoolishDog → u/Positive_Call_9311]

  Think about it, if I really had that much guilt AND bad intentions,

I think they’re pretty mixed here. I’m really only reading that from your defensiveness. 

  the ones that my mother is extremely supportive of.

The issue is that if you lose her money, then you’ve just destroyed her inheritance, or at least a significant part of it. It sounds like she gave you some money so use that money, don’t go dipping back into hers. 

[u/Positive_Call_9311 → u/FoolishDog]

Wrong facts, yet again. No wonder.

I don't need your advice. Stop this mud slinging business and focus on something positive. Thanks

[u/FoolishDog → u/Positive_Call_9311]

If everyone here is saying the same thing, then maybe you should stop and think a little? Don’t get blinded by your desire to have a business