Investing in equities and equity funds, for a lot of investors is all about stepping way outside their comfort zone. You may have been used to a diet of endowment insurance policies and bank FDs, but they are unlikely to work when it comes to long term wealth creation. Instead, take the risk of equities, which hardly costs you anything over the long term. At the same time, it can create wealth that you cannot imagine creating with conservative sources of investments like bonds and endowments. Quite often, taking the risk of equities entails short term volatility, but that is really immaterial if you have a long term perspective. Don’t try to wager your money on equity funds if you have a one year perspective. But over the longer run, the risk of not being in equities is a lot riskier. By investing in equities, as we saw in the case of Alpha, the reward is greater than the risk.