6 Examples Of Giving: My Personal Experiments

I used to be pretty boxed in my thinking.  Giving only meant giving money to others as charity.  Sure that is one way of giving.  There are many other ways of giving, probably more valuable than giving money. Here are some that I have tried that have worked pretty well.  

1. Listen

My friend Ray called me. He told me one of his friends lost his job and wanted to find another one. He was having a tough time as he was in his mid-fifties now. Ray wondered if I would be willing to help his friend Robbie. I said, sure. Robbie called me after many, many days after this conversation. It was so long that I had forgotten the whole thing. It took me some time before I figured out who Robbie was. The thought that was going through my mind was, “Darn it, if you were so desperate what took you so long to call me?” And yet, I bit my tongue and listened. He was calling me for advice. So I tried giving it to him. I asked, “Did you try A?” And he had a perfectly rational reason why A would not work for him. Then I asked, “How about B?” But that would not work for him either, due to his special circumstance. Then C and D. By now I was getting pretty tired of this ping pong match. Somewhere in the back of my mind flashed a message, “Just shut up and listen to him. Maybe he wants a listener not a talker. And if you listen to him, maybe you will understand him and then maybe he will listen to you.” So I shut up. Half because of the reason that flashed in the back of my mind. Rest because I was simply tired of talking. I listened. I let him talk. And talk, he did. On and on. I listened attentively. I took notes because I respected him as a fellow human being. If I am going to spend my time with him on the phone, I am going to do it properly. I was nodding my head even though he could not see it. I said, “Hmm” or “Ok” or “Makes sense” thus encouraging him to keep talking.

Then something interesting happened. He started revisiting each of my questions or ideas: A, B, C and D. And he though they were all great ideas and he would try each of them as sincerely as he could. He thanked me and we hung up. I was flabbergasted. What the heck just happened? The magic of listening just happened, I realized. I saved my energy, behaved properly and actually communicated to him some ideas that had worked for others and I knew would work for him.

2. Encourage

“It has been a year. All my classmates got their jobs. I am the only one that hasn’t. I am so worried and depressed”, Gary said.

“Lets say there are 20 students in your class. You put those 20 students names into a hat. And randomly pick one name at a time. The one you pick gets a job. You happen to be the 20th. Is that because you are the worst student or is it the luck of the draw?”

“Luck of the draw, of course,” Gary smiling, with some hope returning to his eyes.

“The good news is you are next. You have been sitting in this mental room called ‘no job’. In that room, you don’t get a job. You have to move into another mental room called ‘I have a job’. That’s where you get a job. Can you mentally stay in this new room?”

“Yes, I can.”

Five weeks later he had an offer letter. Encourage them. Maybe no one else is.

3. Give money

I know this is the most common way of giving.  That does not necessarily reduce its value, when used properly. A mentor of mine had told me years ago, “Try to help those that are unable to help themselves.”

There is this old and retired music teacher in the Southern part of India. When I was young, I had studied music under his tutelage for a few months before giving it up as I realized my total lack of talent. Another friend of mine, who had an equal lack of talent, had found out that this teacher was now old and retired with absolutely no money to his name. He was living in abject poverty. He and his wife had no kids. A private music teacher with no kids means no pension and therefore absolutely no income of any sort. My heart went out for him and his wife. Some of us together supported this teacher from then on until the day he passed away. Whenever I think of him it makes my heart feel good.

4. Give time.

Years ago, at my wife’s behest, I read a book with a corny-sounding title, Five Love Languages. Despite the name, it is a books for guys and gals alike. I am glad I read it. It helped me understand myself, my wife, my kids and my parents: what is the language I should use to make them feel loved. My mother’s love language, as it turns out, is quality time. That means, if I spend time with her, she feels loved.

Every time I visit my parents in Bangalore, I seem to be busy, booked from morning until night. I return home exhausted. This continues for a few days. In those rare afternoons when I am home, I am usually sleeping. Given that I usually go there for a week or two, the time is up pretty soon and I am back. This time when I went home, I just stayed home. I sat with mom (and dad), as much as I could. I left home only at 7pm each evening. What did we do? Nothing earth shattering. We just sat together. We talked. We went through some old pictures or videos. We cut mangoes and wiped them and dried them to help my mother and sister make some delicious South Indian pickles. All in all I haven’t seen my mother so happy in years. She was just happy and peaceful.  All I had to "give" was my time.  And quite frankly, at the end of it all, I was confused about who gave and who received!

5. Give kindness.

A mentee called after some days of silence. I knew he was struggling with something. I did my usual. I bit my tongue and let him talk. He was feeling bad that he had not done many of the things he had promised me that he would do towards his job search. He felt as if he had let me down. That was the reason for his long silence.

“That’s not who you are. Lets take a slightly longer term look. I have known you for a little over 2 years. And would you say there were times when you were more accountable?”

“Yes,” came the response.

“Why don’t we give attention to that? Lets ignore our behaviors that we don’t want to repeat and replay over and over again those behaviors from our past that we do want to repeat.”

I could tell that my mentee was feeling so much better by the end of the call. I have found that happy people are more likely to take action. Now that this mentee of mine was feeling better, the chances of him taking action were significantly higher.

6. Give tough love

Greg is in sales. I have been his mentor on and off for a couple of years. His business has plateaued. I knew why. I knew he was not working at it hard enough. He was giving excuses: not to me but to himself.

In the middle of last month he calls me and says, “OK Kanth, I am ready. Ready to make it happen. Ready to grow my business to the next level.”

I said, “So what’s holding your business back?”

He said, “Well, I need to make 20 or more presentations a month and I have been averaging 10 a month.”

I said, “OK. Lets draw a line. Forget what you did or did not do until now. There is half a month left. Can you do 10 presentations this month?”

He said yes. The next time I heard from him was on the first of next month. He was talking about some other conference call. I already knew he had forgotten or missed his goal of 10 presentations. But I let him come to it. He said he did 9 presentations.

Normally I pat him on the back and say, “Its ok. I am sure you will get it done next month.”

Instead I remembered the power of negative motivation from the book, Bringing Out The Best In People by Alan Loy McGinnis. And I said, “Hmm. I thought you were serious.”

I could sense that he was shell-shocked. There were several seconds of silence. I bit my tongue and waited. Eventually he started, “I don’t know what to say. I will get it done next month.” To which I replied, “I will believe it when you complete it!”

Guess what? He was mad (he told me months later). Mad with me. Then mad with himself. He got it done. 20 presentations. I was mildly impressed, “Lets see if you can do this consistently.” He did. His business grew tremendously over he next couple of years and continues to do so.  And I learned a valuable lesson.

A mentor of mine would repeatedly say, “I am not a politician. I don’t need your vote. I don’t need you to like me 24x7. I am a mentor. I need your success. Its ok if you are temporarily mad with me. Eventually you will love me for what I am doing right now.”

These are just a few examples to get you started. You can give knowledge. You can give a smile. You can be a connector and connect A to B if you think they can benefit. Heck, you can just recommend a book. Maybe you experienced something. Write about it. Post it. Its so easy to post on LinkedIn. That’s why I post on LinkedIn. You can too. This is a form of giving as well.

Why don’t you “give” also? Lets have a goal. How about 100 comments below? Each comment gives each of us an idea, maybe a new idea from you on how we can give.