A Year of Gratitude

By Reid Abedeen

A wise person once said, “We should certainly count our blessings, but we should also make our blessings count.”

This season of gratitude gives us a chance to reflect on what we’re thankful for and share our blessings in meaningful ways. At Safeguard Investment, we’re deeply grateful for the privilege of guiding so many families on their journey to a secure and fulfilling retirement. Helping families become more informed and prepared is how we strive to make our blessings count.

As I reflect back, I am grateful for many aspects of good fortune in my life that led me to my life’s work of helping create amazing retirements, one family at a time. We see ourselves as educators first, wealth advisors second.

This emphasis on family and education comes from my parents, Dr. Mustafa Abedeen and Dr. Hickman Shabi. My father was a dean of a university. My mother was an MD who had her own clinic. Financially they were doing well.  I remember going with my father as a youngster every few years to Kuwait, and he would get a new car. They had a big house, traveled regularly, and did everything that they wanted to do.

But they gave it all up for the love of their children.

I am grateful that when a war started in the 1980s between Iraq and Iran, my father was able to have the family escape Iraq to the United Kingdom. It was primarily because of me that the family left Iraq. That was because the government was putting boys my age on the front lines as the war dragged out.

In the U.K., I was blessed with a fine education. I attended middle school, high school and some college in Scotland and Yorkshire. There I studied the classics of English literature, including Charles Dickens who wrote: “Reflect upon your present blessings – of which every man has many – not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some.”

In the U.K., unlike the United States and Canada, we did not celebrate Thanksgiving.  The U.K. does have a Harvest Festival in September, where we would contribute canned goods to a collection for the needy.

After our time in the U.K., our family was then blessed to be allowed to emigrate to the United States, where we learned of the traditions of thanksgiving and sharing what makes you grateful.

Today, I am grateful my career in financial planning is a combination of lessons from my mother and father. It is a blessing that I am able to share valuable insights from my parents through the educational work of Safeguard Investments.

My mother taught me the value of a business that serves people. She said that a business needs to be profitable so it can stay in business to serve people.  A further financial lesson my mother gave me was: “It doesn’t matter how much money you make,” she said. “If you cannot put your head on the pillow at night and fall asleep, it means nothing.”

My father, the educator, gave me two gifts I am grateful for. One was a love of chess, and the other was the importance of math and being able to calculate. This has greatly influenced our work at Safeguard Investments.

My father’s number one lesson in chess; don’t make a mistake. But the number two lesson in chess was if I do make a mistake or my opponent makes a really good move, I will be able to recover. Sometimes you need to have a new course. We often help the families we serve to calculate financial decisions so they can make the best moves.

My father also taught me as a teenager: “Never to do anything just for money. Earn money, but be careful of the person who offers you something for nothing.” Sometimes we need to help our families be wary of investments that sound too good to be true.

On behalf of the entire growing team of Safeguard financial advisors and staff, thank you for the wonderful year we have enjoyed together. We consider it a blessing and an honor to be able to educate our clients on how to best grow their retirement nest eggs. We look forward to another great year of growth for our team and the number of families we are able to serve.

Thank you for letting us share financial insights with you through our writings and seminars. In the words of financial advisor and author W. Clement Stone, “If you are really thankful, what do you do? You share.”