Stories of Kindness from Around the World

Hey,

That's the way many of the email messages I receive begin.  It's a handy shorthand solution to the question of how to greet someone you know but don't know.

Others--many fewer--begin with the word "Dear."  It's a holdover from the time when we wrote actual personal letters. I still like that, and treasure the rare gift of a personal, handwritten note almost as much as an authentic conversation about something more than a transaction issue, like a grade, a missed assignment, an evaluation of some kind--criticism or praise included.

So my preference is to start with

Dear...

Would you read this aloud to everyone else who is here? Collect the attendance, give out the money any way you wish and return the rest to me whenever you want?  Someone has to volunteer.  It would be great if it was someone other than those who are generally the ones to take leadership.  Could be you.

Although this course is listed under the title of "Nonprofits and Consumers," I see it as more than that.

So this note, impersonal as it is, is about the key issue: trust.  But then, of course, life is rarely that simple.  Trust is only one of the foundations for giving.  Faith enters into it.

In this case, I have the faith (there’s a concept!) that you will think a good deal...and talk...and ask for advice from people you value, and maybe even do some research about the entire notion of giving.  Or, if I remember my own thoughts about such things at times of stress or overload, I'll sigh and imagine that you might be tempted to just get this "assignment" over with.

Keep the money?  Give it away a dollar at a time?  Get change in quarters and bury the quarters in sandboxes for kids to find?  Give it to panhandlers? Pay someone else’s toll at the toll booth? Those are all options. You could buy something and give it away, or try ten experiments in investment one dollar at time.  Set up some "if I did this, would you do this?" equations.  Make some explicit, some not.  

What I would hope is that you spend more time on this.  Think of it as an extended meditation or an exercise in creativity. Don't just take the money and leave because "there's no class today."

The only difference is that you are the teacher(s).  I am asking/requesting/suggesting/requiring/expecting/challenging you to fill the minutes between your arrival here and your leaving with open conversation about what giving is all about.

I would admire you as an individual if you did not go through this alone. I will admire you as a group (as I secretly admired you when I observed how many of you pitched in with the fundraising last week) if you help each other optimize the value of this exercise.

You could talk about such things as:

• Easy vs. more difficult ways to meaningfully use this opportunity.
• Fun vs. tedious (e.g. just fulfill the assignment and get it over with) The meaning of the act of giving each time you do it. The meaning to you, to the people you explore this with and to those you may give the money to.
• Magic, both deliberate and serendipitous. (Look up the word serendipity). As I have mentioned a few times, you can be alchemists and turn things into gold.   
  

Follow-Up in Jan 2008: What Can You Do With Ten Bucks?