Monday, September 10, 2007

'Tis Better to Give Than Receive

I have been thinking lately about the act of giving. As I watch Tyler commit more and more of himself to the restoration of Youngstown, I am bitten by the bug and want to join him.

I believe I've always been a generous person, and my Daddy was always generous—with me, with his friends, anywhere he saw need.

Is generosity genetic or learned? Obviously it wasn't something I gained genetically from my Daddy as we didn't share any genes. And I'll never know what I'm genetically predisposed to, so I can't find an answer in those facts.

I read recently about someone who claimed she had received a number of blessings as a direct result of paying her tithe to the church. I've heard those stories all my life and always consider them just so much hoo-hah.

But is it a fact and independent of the target of the giving? Is it simply the act of giving that boomerangs to yield receipts, regardless of the form of the receipts?

Here's today's quote that spurred this post:

"We make a living by what we get. We make a life by what we give."

— Sir Winston Churchill

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