Toward a More Balanced View of Giving

April 14th, 2008

“Give freely and expect nothing in return.”

Many spiritual traditions hold charity to be one of the highest virtues. Rightfully so; at some point in our lives, most of us will come to need help of some sort, and hopefully there is someone willing to provide it. Likewise, if able to offer help in times of genuine need, this is a good thing to do.

I’m going to go out on a limb and state however, that the ideal of giving freely and expecting nothing in return is overly simplistic at the very least, but potentially flawed and unbalanced. If everyone was just as giving and mutually interdependent as everyone else, then this would be a self-sustaining way of life that everyone would be all the richer for. The unfortunate truth is that for every generous, compassionate and well-meaning individual, there is someone who will take freely, neither intending to give anything back, nor benefitting from what is given them.

There are in fact many who will simply feed on the good intentions and resources of others to support their own dependency. These types are especially dangerous to the truthseeker newly starting out on their path. With the best of intentions one can be drained dry by people who have no intention of improving their own situation or working toward independence. These people are naturally attracted to those who give freely and blindly, even to their own detriment. They’ll suck you dry and then leave you hanging, to find someone else who will support their dependency, their addictions, their selfish behavior. They will never change or improve, because as long as they have someone enabling them, they don’t need to. I learned this lesson the hard way; hopefully others will learn from my mistakes so they don’t have to. Much emphasis is put on generosity, which is important, but not enough is put on how to give, and to whom.

I knew someone who came to me in a state of apparent panic; she was unable to make rent that month, and her family was facing eviction. At the time I could easily afford it, and there was a young daughter involved, so I thought nothing of helping her out. There was an understanding that it would be paid back within a few months, at a time when I would need it. That aside, I figured that giving was a good thing, and if the individual couldn’t reciprocate, the universe would one way or another, right?

I later found out some things that caused the “rent” story to fall apart, after I had already cut this person out of my life for unrelated but equally shady reasons. Not only was her boyfriend making more than enough to afford rent, the rent in the part of Tennessee where they live is nowhere near as much as she claimed to need. Not only that, but she had gone to other mutual friends at different times, including Gehenna, claiming to need the same or even greater amounts for a variety of reasons. She had us all promise not to tell her boyfriend or each other because it would be “embarrassing” (read: so nobody would realize what she was up to). Needless to say, nobody is quite sure where all this money went, nor do we plan on seeing it again.

I refer to this incident because it was a huge eye opener, and dispelled a lot of naivety on my part. Before then I had assumed on some level (even if not consciously) that people were in many ways fundamentally the same, with the same needs and the same desire, and potential, for self improvement. If you had told me something like this would happen, my first reaction would be “no really, c’mon… who does that?!” But here was a person who knew what a balanced, healthy and mutually beneficial friendship was about at least well enough to not only fake it convincingly enough to fool quite a few people, but demand it of everyone else! The “demanding” part is important, as it can be used as one of the ways to spot this sort of person. More on that in a bit. For now the point is that there are people out there who are well aware of what you’re trying to accomplish with your generosity and good intentions, and pretend to be on the same page, meanwhile deliberately using you for a free ride. Money is by no means the only thing at stake here. One’s time, energy, emotional reserves, talents and abilities are all just as valuable; these are all resources we should be learning how to manage and put to their best possible use.

This situation was a valuable but hard-learned lesson for me (and Gehenna too for that matter). It hasn’t made me any less compassionate, but has caused me to reconsider my views on how and when to give. In short I have tempered the idea of “giving freely” with the rule that “nature abhors a vacuum.” The universe is one of abundance, but not of waste. It loves mutually beneficial situations that increase the well being of all involved. It’s not going to keep giving you resources to feed into the human equivalent of a black hole. Unfortunately by the time some people realize this, they’ve given of themselves to the point where they have nothing left; their ability to do good in the world is taken away and they have to struggle to regain their own foundation before they can be of any use, hopefully to those who will share their resources wisely. And that’s if they haven’t been driven to cynicism by the experience and become hostile to the idea of giving at all.

When we give in an unbalanced way, we’re actually taking something away from three different people. The first is ourselves; we’ve now parted with resources we could have used to improve our own ability to do good. Secondly, we’ve taken something from the person who squanders our resources, by denying them the opportunity for what they really needed, which is a wake-up call to the fact that dependency will not stand. Thirdly we deny someone who could have used those resources to build themselves a foundation from which they too would be in a position to help. If we make a habit of carrying others, we only weigh ourselves down, and they never learn to walk. I do recognize that sometimes we may be in a position where we aren’t able to walk on our own for a time, figuratively speaking. There are times to lean on each other; even carry each other. Sometimes the person we’re helping doesn’t have a lot to offer, but everyone can offer something. This can be simply the satisfaction of seeing them use what you’ve given in a genuine effort to do well for themselves, and that’s okay. The point is that energy and blessings are continually flowing one way or another, rather than hitting a dead end.

How then do we tell the difference between someone whose need is genuine and one who isn’t?

The key is to focus our efforts on acknowledging personal responsibility, and helping the other person empower themselves.

In my experience this shift in focus sorts out genuine need from the users and takers pretty quickly. The latter has no concept of personal responsibility, and will generally run screaming into the night at the first suggestion that they are ultimately responsible for their own life. I believe that just adopting this new approach has actually helped to sort this out without my actually having to DO anything more often than not, as I seem to not be attracting any of these people to begin with. When they do come along, I don’t let ‘em get away with nuttin’… and either they end up a little more empowered or I end up amused, but either way, at least somebody benefits.

Sometimes these people are members of our family, or come into our lives as friends and build rapport before revealing their true motives. In this case, their strategy is generally to push your boundaries gradually while trying to make you feel an increasing sense of obligation. In all cases where I have seen this happen or experienced it myself, once the person in question feels they have reached a position of security in your life, the increasingly frequent requests turn to demands. The more you give, the more frequent and larger the demands become. In the case of my experience above, not long after I helped out with the individual’s rent, I was accused of “never doing anything for them,” to which I replied by pointing out that I had indeed just helped her out of a tight spot not all that long ago (or so I thought!). At this she got very angry and guilt tripped me for daring to bring this up, and demanded that I never do so again (which among other things should have been a huge glaring red flag, but lesson learned, right?). In contrast, a genuine friend or family member acting in good faith with a need is never demanding and does not use guilt or obligation to get what they want. The only pushing involved is both people nudging each other to reach more of their own highest potential.

Nobody can improve their situation until they first take responsibility for their circumstances. Granted, sometimes things happen that are outside our control — but blaming external forces and other people won’t improve anybody’s position in life. Taking responsibility for what we can do NOW, will. Often our difficult circumstances are the result of poor choices, whether we knew that at the time or not. Until one takes responsibility for their choices and learns how to make better ones, no amount of donated resources is going to improve anything. This is why most people who win the lottery soon end up worse off than they started — they’ve never learned how to effectively manage resources, and having great wealth fall into their laps doesn’t change that. Thus in order to do the most good, all help needs to be focused, first and foremost, on helping the other person empower themselves.

The best use of our resources creates more opportunities, wealth, progress and growth for all involved. Knowing this we must never let ourselves be sidetracked by those who have no use for personal growth and would only seek to drag us down with them. I myself still need to find the ideal balance I’m sure, but my aim here has been to generate thought on this important issue.

I’ve said a lot about the kind of friend you don’t want in this piece, but I’ve been meaning to give credit to all our friends and loved ones who have supported Beyond Within in its early development, without which this project would not be nearly as successfull as it has been. Whether it’s web design help, requesting and recommending our services, linking to us or just letting us know you believe in and support what we’re doing, we couldn’t do it without you!

–Palehorse

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