Secrets of Spiritual Happiness
Secret #27 -- Be a Joyful Giver
By Sharon Janis
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Doing good to others is not a duty. It is a joy, for it increases your own health and happiness.
--Zoroaster
- Giving and receiving are like inhaling and exhaling your breath.
- However deeply you inhale and receive the air is also how deeply you are able to give and breathe out.
- However deeply you exhale and give what you have received, that is how deeply you will be able to inhale and receive.
- If you only want to receive and receive and hoard all that you've received, you'll suffocate.
- If you only want to give and give, without being open to receive, then you'll suffocate.
- Deep giving and deep receiving with all of your being will bring the most nourishment and health into your life and into the world.
You can tell how happy somebody is by how joyfully they give. When people are happy, they are naturally kind, patient, loving, and generous. Don't you find that it is much easier to be kind and patient when you're happy? If you're happy and someone takes a little extra time to go through the grocery line in front of you, it's no big deal. You're even able to allow someone to go ahead of you if they're in a hurry or have only a few items. Happy people are nice people. Happy people are effortless givers.
When you are happy, your gratitude wants to give something back, to lift someone else into happiness. Happiness is never petty or jealous. Happiness is loving and joyous. Happiness wishes to see good things happen to everyone.
If someone you know is not showing qualities of loving generosity, then - even if they seem to have more than you - your best call is to say a prayer on their behalf. Someone who cannot give cannot truly be happy. Even a multi-millionaire is but a pauper if he or she cannot give.
One of my favorite experiences of giving came while I was working at a Los Angeles news station that was owned by Disney.
Whenever there was a big disaster, the station executives would order in pizzas or sandwiches so that we could work without taking a full lunch break. Even now, when a disaster hits, I sometimes think of pizza.
One day, we were in the midst of one "breaking news" disaster or another, and the executive producers had ordered in sandwiches for the whole newsroom of about 60 or so people. They were always kind enough to order a vegetarian meal for me, and when my time came for a quick lunch, I sat down near the front door, picked up half of my sandwich, and began to eat.
In the meantime, the president and CEO of Disney, Michael Eisner, came in to visit our newsroom for the first time. I'd recently read several magazine articles about how Mr. Eisner had made tens of millions of dollars in stock options that year. He was standing right near me, chatting with the news director, when Mr. Eisner spotted the bag of sandwiches. I overheard him mentioning that he hadn't eaten all day, and that he was very hungry. Then, he asked if there were any vegetarian sandwiches available.
The news director glanced over at me chomping on my half-eaten sandwich - we both knew I had the only vegetarian meal in the place. I thought, "When else am I going to have a multi-billionaire beg half a sandwich from me?" I wrapped up the uneaten half and offered it to Mr. Eisner with a friendly smile. "Here's half of a vegetarian sandwich for you!" He accepted and gratefully ate the gift.
What can one person do? There's something going on in your workplace, in your family, in your life, where Spirit is saying, "I've got you uniquely placed, because there's something I would do through you. For this I have created you. For this I have called you into being. You are free, to be and do all that God created you to be."
- Mary Manin Morrissey
One of the best ways to increase your own spiritual happiness is to help someone in the right way. This doesn't mean helping them while thinking that they owe you anything, or thinking proudly "I am saving this person, I'm helping this person." Rather, you can help others with a sense of humility and gratitude that God is helping them through you. This will sanctify your gift, and will also sanctify your experience of giving. When you learn to taste the sweetness of being a joyful giver, then you're most certainly also developing a taste for the gourmet delicacy of spiritual happiness.
Helping somebody creates a whole different kind of feeling in your being. If you're having a hard time in life and don't think you are feeling happy, help somebody. If you can find happiness in helping others, then you'll always be able to find some way to create happiness, in any circumstance. When you help someone, your heart warms, and spiritual happiness shows its smiling face to you.
Try it today. The next time you're driving and somebody wants to come into your lane, feel honored to have the opportunity to serve that person and to help him or her to safely and easefully merge into your lane. Know that divinity exists in every person, every driver, every waiter, every cashier, and every security guard.
See God in each other.
- Baba Muktananda
Always strive to give more than you receive -- to people, to this world, and to God. Of course, outdoing God is ultimately impossible, since God is the giver of all -- but the striving will make you happy!
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