Getting Starts With Giving |
Posted: January 19, 2014 |
I've been doing a lot of cleaning up the past to make room for the future both on the inside and with the external world. This process has been ongoing for a while now as I left the real estate world as a developer and transitiioned into the Internet world as the Founder of Storeboard.com. Internally, I have had to adjust to a completely different lifestyle - a new neighborhood, new friends, and a lot less "things." My most important possession these days is by far my MacBook Pro. However, I used to have a lot of stuff and it seems that whenever I'v had to move, I move the stuff around and downsize (ie get rid of stuff). At the same time I am moving stuff, I am evaluating if its worth the time and energy to transport it somewhere else versus alternative means of disposal. I hate to throw out things that other people may be able to use. If I see other people throwing stuff out that could be used by others, I try to get it into the hands of people who can use it. It has become a hobby of mine. Recently, Storeboard opened a sales office and I used it as opportunity to get rid of more of my things. I forced myself to go through all my books and set a limit as to how many I could keep. This resulted in about 4 crates of books to be given away. I was almost going to bring them to the Salvation Army but then I just decided to put them on the sidewalk with a sign saying "Free Books." For about 3-4 days the books continued to disappear like bird feed on a bird feeder. I couldn't wait to check on the crates every few hours. I reminisced about all the people scurrying home to read their books and their growing knowledge. I shunned the thought they these people would just put them on a shelf and never look at them again. Researchers at Berkley conducted a study which confirmed that giving makes people happy. In this study, people were given between $5 and $20 with a note to half of the people to use the money to buy something for themself or their family and the other half to give it away to someone who could use it. After this process with hundreds of people, the researchers found that the group that gave away the money was much happier about giving than the group who spend the money on themselves. http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_to_make_giving_feel_good "This experiment suggests that spending as little as five dollars to help someone else can increase your own happiness. Similarly, in a representative sample of more than 600 Americans, the amount of money individuals devoted to themselves was unrelated to their overall happiness; what did predict happiness was the amount of money they gave away: The more they invested in others, the happier they were. This relationship between prosocial spending and happiness held up even after taking into account individuals’ income." I did the same thing with about 4 bags of clothes and even stood on the sidewalk as the people passed acting as a barker encouraging them to overcome their natural embarrasment about picking through bags of clothes. Eventually, all the clothes were given away. Ahhh . . . another conquest! What did I get for my efforts which consisted of being faced with these things I no longer needed and hatching a plan to get them into other people's hands who can use them? I felt good. I felt really good - more than buying anything for myself, more than Storeboard having a great day of traffic (that's not true! Just seeing if you are paying attention!), and seriously just a very good overall feeling of well being. But there is one last part to this story. I got up this morning and took Miles - our wonderful, super intelligent toy poodle for his morning walk and low and behold I saw a porter readying a black leather/pleather chair for the garbage pick-up. It was exactly the type of chair I would have purchase from Staples for about $100 give or take (and it was assembled - priceless!). I asked the Porter if he was throwing it out and he said yes and I told him I'll take it and I'll return in ten minutes. Well I got it and here it is: It has some deterioration in the back but nothing that a little black duct tape can't handle (in my new state of austerity I can't tell you how much I value duct tape and how many various colors I have discovered it in!). I can't get over how life works - when you give you get! A friend of mine who is very generous told me that "getting starts with giving." And I see it all the time. We reap what we sow. This just confirmed it. As I was putting the chair into my trunk, I didnt' see the Porter and I was thinking to myself "well anyone could have taken it and the Porter wasn't really watching it at all. I am going to save $5 because I was going to give him a tip and now I don't have to (crazy how I think - notice I am not saying "we")." Well, suddenly, the Porter came out from the basement and stood next to me as I was putting the final touches on securing the trunk with a bungee cord and I thought to myself "hmmm . . . he is here for his tip." (notice the natural tendency to not want to give and to hold onto things even though I am writing this blog about giving! Remarkable). Then I proceeded to tell the Porter my little story about giving away the clothes and the books and how I just found this chair. I then said a remark about God and how gives us what we need. Then I handed the $5 to the Porter and after my little story and mentioning God, he felt uncomfortable about taking the money (who wouldn't have?) and said "no, no that's ok." But after two deflections with his hand, I saw his pocket and stuffed the five dollar bill in it. He said "thank you." But, before he left I took off my glove, extended my right hand, and asked the Porter his name and this is true. He responded: "Angel"!
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|