How Not to Be a Hot Mess - A Survival Guide for Modern Life - Craig Hase Page 0,19

take stock of what’s good in you and what’s good in those around you. And then see what happens. You might just find yourself more resourced, a tiny bit more whole, maybe even more ready to give a little.

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GIVING FEELS GOOD

Okay, so far in this chapter we’ve talked about not taking people’s stuff and seeing the good. Now we get to the best part: giving. Like I mentioned in the opening of this chapter, Buddhism tends to look at giving as the very foundation of a decent life. Not only does generosity ease up some of our calcified habits around wanting, which is a major reason we’re a hot mess, it’s also just plain fun. It brightens the mind and lightens the heart. It connects you with others. It boosts your self-worth. It’s all-around just about my favorite thing.

But let’s be honest: giving can actually be kind of hard. Sometimes I read stuff like this and I think, “Great, I’ll just go ahead and give more.” Then I end up running into all my stinginess, the tight little pockets of contraction, the I can’ts and maybe-not-right-nows—and then I feel bad about myself. Which is so obviously not the point.

So just to be clear: I’m not saying generosity is easy. And I’m not saying if you’re a little stingy, like I sometimes am, that you should become Mother Teresa overnight. But what I am saying is that we can train the mind to give. How? Three simple steps.

Convince yourself.

Try a generosity meditation.

Start giving.

So the first step, convince yourself. Before you kick off any new, oh-so-healthy habit, whether it’s exercise or veganism or random acts of kindness, you’ll need to first put all (or at least most) of your doubts to rest. And one great way to TKO your doubts is by hitting them hard with science. Here are just a few findings to start us off:

Generous people are healthier.1

Generous people live longer.2

Generous people are generally happier.3

Your blood pressure actually drops when you give a gift.4

Giving reduces stress.5

Just a single act of generosity boosts your mood.6

Simply thinking about giving can really improve your day.

Pretty convincing, right? Who doesn’t want to live longer and healthier and happier with lower blood pressure and better moods? Let’s drill down into one study7 done at the University of British Columbia, which features a bunch of undergrads who were, unsurprisingly, split into two groups.

The first group was put through a battery of tests and then given twenty dollars. They were told to go out and spend the money any way they wanted—as long as they spent it on themselves.

The second group was put through that same battery of tests and also given twenty dollars. The difference? They were told to go out and spend the money any way they wanted—as long as they spent it on others.

Any guesses on what happened next?

As expected, the undergrads who were given money to spend on themselves came back pretty happy.

But the undergrads who had been directed to spend money on others came back mega-boosted. They saw significant gains in mood, optimism, social connectivity, and other measures. And they couldn’t stop telling the researchers about how excited they were to go back to their dorms and start handing out gifts to their friends.

So generosity can seriously boost your mood. Good to know, right? If you’re feeling down, buy a little something for someone else. Recent studies have confirmed that the amount you spend doesn’t matter—it truly is the thought that counts.

Okay, now that we’ve established that generosity really is good for you (you’re convinced, right?), how do we get ourselves to actually do it? This is where meditation comes in. It’s not enough to just believe something is good. We need to train the mind. In a way, this is no different from training muscles in the body. This generosity meditation is like training the gift-giving muscles of the mind.

A Little Meditation

GENEROSITY

Let’s practice some generosity together. It’ll be fun. Obviously you can’t close your eyes while you’re reading. But you can let yourself drop into a meditative state by slowing down, pausing, maybe even shutting your eyes between sentences as you try this little exercise on for size.

Step One

Imagine a time when you gave something. Make it a time when you gave something genuine. Not just the obligatory bottle of wine when you went to somebody’s house or the birthday present that you secretly dug out of