On Gifts

Dear Family,

I am super sad that I cannot be here with you guys for Christmas this year. This is the first time in my entire life actually that this has been the case. Either way, I will be there on Skype, there in spirit, and of course back next year and so grateful to be back with the people that matter to me most.

As you probably know, this year has really forced me to do a lot of thinking and a lot of learning. I have been forced to reconsider pretty much every single one of my values, which has been at the same time difficult and wonderful. One of the things I have had to really reconsider (especially around the holidays) was the way I think about gifts. But before I get started on gifts specifically, let me go on a little tangent. Trust me, it will all come together in the end.

Things

One thing I have thought about a lot during this trip are things. And by things, I mean physical objects that are not consumable and you would count as one of your “possessions”. This year I have been forced to hardly have any stuff and to live comfortably, long term, so this is one obvious reason why it’s been on my mind. But also because US culture has a certain way of looking at things, and other cultures have different ways, so it has been interesting to see and analyze the differences.

On top of that, “travel” as I had been accustomed to before this trip (which I now refer to as “vacation”) has its own strong associations with stuff. I can’t even count how many times we have been harassed by shop owners and locals to buy their stuff, anywhere from souvenirs to food to clothing, and it’s just because we look different so they know we are not local and therefore probably on vacation. Let’s face it, part of vacationing for many people is the acquisition of more things. Vacationing is typically viewed as a chance to relax and indulge in a little bit of luxury as a reward for hard work, and for almost everyone acquiring new shiny things is a luxury. We’ve met a bunch of people who go shopping specifically when they are on vacation, and indeed malls, businesses, and even airports have rallied around the concept and profited greatly.

Being so constantly surrounded by a culture that puts acquiring things in a high priority slot, then being yanked out of it really forces you to think about things and their value. One thing I have realized is that things themselves are not what make us happy, it’s the effects of things. For example, if you get a new razor and it gives you a nice smooth shave, you are not truly happy about the razor, you are happy that you look/feel clean (for a couple more hours at least). If you get a beautiful statue of an elephant from Africa, you are not truly happy about the statue, you are happy about the way that it improves the energy of your home (if it does, that is).

The Harm of More Things

The constant contrast between hardly having any stuff and being bombarded with so much consumerism has made me rethink whether having more things is good or bad, even at base value. I wrote a long piece about this recently, but in short my thoughts are that any things you have beyond things that take care of your basic needs and things that help you to be more productive towards accomplishing your life goals are almost certainly unnecessary. That is, you could not have that stuff and use the extra space/time/money that it would have consumed in order to invest in one of the above goals, and this would go much further towards making you happy.

Having more things can be a burden in more ways than one. If you have more things, it makes you less mobile if you ever need to move, which is inevitable. Things take up space in your home, space that could be used for awesome and productive things, or could just be clean and organized, giving your living space a better energy and putting you more at ease every day. Think of how many homes have attics that are full of junk that is never used. If all that junk was eliminated, the attic spaces could be converted into extra rooms that could be rented out or used for guests. They could be converted into little home gyms, reducing your gym costs and commute times. They could be converted into dedicated relaxing spaces, where you can have quiet time to reflect and relax, getting away from the chaos of normal life.

Having more things also ties up money. For every thing you have, if you do not use it, you could sell that thing and have more money to put towards things that you do use and make you happy, or saving it to become financially independent or for awesome life experiences, travel, and/or learning. And finally, having things that you don’t use or need takes those things away from people who might need and use them more. There are many people who cannot afford clothes, having a closet stuffed full of things you do not wear means the clothes are going to waste where they could be really making a difference in someone’s life.

Quantity & Quality

So let’s imagine that reading this has converted you and you now want to consciously try to live with fewer things. This means that the fewer things you have, you want to really be good quality things (another nice benefit of having less things). I’m not talking about designer handbags and such here, those are simply veblen goods, low value products in comparison to their price in exchange for trying to look more rich or fashionable. I’m talking about things that purely have very high value — a great price to quality ratio. Higher quality things, however, tend to come with a higher upfront price tag, which makes them a little more difficult to acquire. But they almost always they end up paying themselves off over time, as they slowly shave wasted time and extra stress off our lives, and outlast comparable poor quality things.

This also can tell us something about giving though. If you give someone a lower quality thing just because it’s in budget, often times this will do more harm than good. Why is this? Because once someone has a thing, they are more likely to satisfy themselves with that thing than to decide there’s another similar thing of higher quality, buy it, and throw out the original thing. Especially if it’s a gift, they would not want to offend the giver. So by giving people low quality things, you essentially are forcing a thing of lower value on them that they can’t easily give up. This, as a direct opposite of the benefits of good quality things, will slowly do harm by taking away little pieces of time and adding little pieces of stress to the receiver’s life.

The Real Meaning of Christmas

For our family in the past, and for the US in general, despite the well-known moral of the Grinch, Christmas is often centered around things. We spend hours agonizing over what to get people, making sure it arrives in time, painstakingly wrapping it all, and finally taking delight in their reactions. Let’s be honest, the church service is nice, but the process of giving and receiving things and its related feelings are typically what constitute the true meaning of Christmas for us year to year.

The part of this that I love is the generosity. It’s easy to see through personal history and numerous scientific studies that generosity is an enormously beneficial thing for us to practice. But at the same time, giving people things can end up with a negative result, unfortunately. If we are giving people more stuff that they might react to positively at the time, but eventually ends up just cluttering their space because they feel bad throwing it out, or ratcheting them a few more steps up the hedonic ladder, we are in reality doing them harm. But we continue doing so, as we feel the warm buzz of generosity and watch their happy reactions upon initially getting more things and to the fact that someone is thinking about and cares about them. And this warm buzz reinforces in us the feeling that what we have done is good, while at the same time we could subtly be pushing this person further from their true goals in the long term.

You might say that this problem could be solved by simply asking the person what things they want, or getting a “christmas list”, to ensure that you are getting them things that they think will bring them lasting value. But doesn’t this ruin the entire concept of a “gift” in the first place? You may as well just give them money, and they can just order up their list off amazon once they have collected money from everyone — it would be precisely the same result, and with the same element of surprise and delight. When you buy someone something that they have told you they want, the thoughtfulness and unique personal touch of the gift is removed. It’s basically just you buying something for someone, which is robotic and un-thoughtful entirely. A true gift from one person to another contains a piece of the gift giver — a bit of their opinions and values infused into what they think the receiver would enjoy. A surprise to the receiver, something they didn’t expect but may appreciate. And certainly not something that would be a burden or negative to them.

Non-Things

We’ve talked about getting things as gifts here, but what about non-things? In my mind, non-things you can give as gifts all boil down to knowledge, but they can be packaged as knowledge directly, experiences, or consumables. These are things you can give and aim towards the same goals of satisfying basic needs or becoming more productive in achieving life goals, but at the same time lack many of the potential negative consequences of physical things.

It’s still possible to do harm with a bad experience, knowledge that influences people in negative manners, consumables used in an unhealthy manner. Well, anything you give anyone has the potential to do harm, to be fair. But the fact that these non-things are non-physical puts them outside the range of many of the consequences of things we discussed earlier. They are “temporary” — you use them and then are finished with them. They do not take up space or money, they do not linger and produce guilt, they do not push us farther up the hedonic ladder, or reduce our mobility with more possessions.

For these reasons, I have decided to start giving almost exclusively non-things, unless I find an opportunity where I can give a high quality thing that I am confident will be frequently used and beneficial to someone, which is much more rare and difficult, and requires a lot more resources.

With knowledge and experiences, I have the opportunity to send a little of myself along with the gift. It can (and should) be something I feel that the receiver will enjoy, but also something I feel will push them in a positive direction and influence them to learn and/or grow as a person based on my own journey. The only place that they will need to carry the gift is in their minds, and if they choose to let it go, they can do so quietly and without harm or loss.

In fact, knowledge and experiences are designed to replace and improve themselves. Last year I gave Mom a voucher to go to a chocolate making class. When she eventually went, she said it was great and she learned a lot. But I don’t expect her to take the knowledge from the class and tuck it away in its original form indefinitely like a physical object. If making chocolate is something she enjoys, she will inevitably practice, learn from other sources, and it will evolve into something new and entirely better, with the class only representing a small piece of the history of her chocolate-making expertise. And if it is not something she enjoys, that’s entirely ok. At least she got to have an interesting experience and eat some chocolate, and can leave it as a nice memory without having to own or carry it in any specific manner.

Giving, Refined

When I think of a truly great gift, I think of the following qualities:

• The giver clearly put a lot of thought into the gift, and therefore into the receiver — whether they would enjoy it, and how it would affect their life.
• The gift contains a little piece of the giver’s thoughts, experiences, and views on life.
• The receiver can use the gift to cover their basic needs and/or make progress towards defining/achieving their life goals.
• If the gift doesn’t end up being exactly what the receiver needs, which is inevitable sometimes, its burden or negative effect is as minimal as possible.

Who doesn’t want to give great gifts, especially to people they truly care about? So I have decided to chase these ideals when giving gifts this year and into the future. But this also means that the nature of my gifts will change a little bit.

First, each gift will come delivered with a detailed note. What is the gift? Why do I think it’s important? How do I think it will fit into the receiver’s life?

Second, most gifts will not be “things”. Those that are not things will be knowledge or experiences, carried through books, events, classes, or consumable things.

Third, each gift will contain a piece of my own values. Altruism and generosity are core values to me, and I think it’s enormously important to always keep in mind how lucky we are and to try to help others in need. So any gift I send will also come with a donation to Watsi made in the receiver’s behalf.

I’m far from perfect and this is a new concept, so if I don’t hit the mark please let me know. I won’t take any offense at all, I promise, and next time I’ll use the feedback to improve. I really hope that this new style of giving inspires more happiness and generosity than ever before.

Finally I want to thank you, my lovely family, for everything you have given me. The impact that each of you have had on my life is immeasurable, and I cannot even express how much I appreciate the love, care, companionship, and trollings we have had over the years. Except for that one time that you called me “lumpykins”, Mom, that was really out of line. We’ll have to discuss this in more detail over dinner at a later date. I cannot wait to see you all again in February. Here’s to a warm and happy Christmas ✨🎄 ✨