Being generous improves the giver's life
"It is more blessed to give than it is to receive."
If you grew up in the Midwest like I did, you've heard that platitude so often it likely barely registers in your awareness.
To be honest, we also grew up in a culture that promotes giving to ourselves before we consider giving to anyone else. Which is what we usually do, if the statistics about charitable activities are any clue. In the cultural tug-of-war between selflessness and selfishness, the later seems to often win.
Believe it or not, a study reported in the Harvard Mental Health Newsletter actually suggests that it really can be better to give than to receive. Researchers looked at older couples over a five-year period. For their purposes they considered living longer to be "better," and they defined giving as "social support."
After factoring out things like personality traits, marital satisfaction, alcohol use, etc., the researchers discovered it was the people doing the giving who lived longer, not the people doing the receiving. Whether the giving involved running errands, baby-sitting grandchildren, helping with housework, or giving emotional support, people who gave on a regular basis lived longer than those who didn't.
Those of us who do counseling and psychotherapy have suspected this for a while. One of the better ways to help people with depression, anxiety or other emotional problems is to get them to focus on giving to the people around them. We usually start small - assigning to clients the task of performing a charitable act here and there for the benefit of a few select people - but often find that the positive emotions generated in the giver soon lead to the commitment and energy to make giving a major part of their lives. Such giving behaviors even can be helpful for alcoholics (Alcoholics Anonymous sponsors have known for a long time that helping others maintain their sobriety helps the sponsor as well).
Giving certainly isn't a cure-all, but I think it not only helps us live longer, but better as well. A life of giving - as long as that giving takes into account our own limits and needs - is promoted by all the world's major religions as a means to emotional, relational and spiritual health.
Maybe this is the ultimate argument for our too-often self-centered society. We are really giving to ourselves when we give to others. In fact, we likely benefit more in this giving than they do in the receiving. So, whether we are motivated by selflessness or selfishness, it truly is more blessed to give than to receive.
• Dr. Ken Potts is on the staff of Samaracare Counseling Center in Naperville and Downers Grove. He is the author of "Mix Don't Blend, A Guide to Dating, Engagement and Remarriage With Children."