Giving…the gifts we can give all year: love, purpose, empathy & generosity
Summary
Giving, yep that word. Do you think about giving only one time of year. I hope not. Giving should be all year round. Giving comes in so many forms and is to be done in so many ways. Giving is a gift, literally just what the word says. I heard once that a gift is to be given. It’s not a gift if isn’t given away. The gifts we have been given are to be given to others.
God has given each of us a gift and we have to use it for others so we can make a difference, have an impact in the world. Oftentimes we may wonder what our purpose is, why are we here. What is the purpose of life itself? Oprah has said that we are here to figure out our purpose and fulfill it. To quote her:
“There is no greater gift you can give or receive than to honor your calling. It’s why you were born. And how you become most truly alive.”
As I said before giving has a lot of meanings and I want to explore a few of them in this podcast. So, let’s talk about the giving of the gift of who you are and your purpose.
As I write this, I am thinking about several people, my mother, some everyday people and some well-known names. One of them is Chadwick Boseman. I saw a video clip of Chadwick talking about his purpose. He said “I feel like I’m living in my purpose. Purpose crosses disciplines, it is the reason you are on the planet right now. Whatever you choose for a career path, the struggles along the way are meant to shape you for your purpose. Further he said: “We know what it’s like to be told there’s not a screen for you to be featured on, a stage for you to be featured on. We know what it’s like to be the tail and not the head. We know what it’s like to be beneath and not above. That is what we went to work with every day because we knew… that we had something special that we wanted to give the world. That we could be full human beings in the roles that we were playing. That we could create a world that exemplified a world that we wanted to see.”
He said: “I feel that I’m living my purpose. But the thing about purpose is that it unfolds to you more and more every day.” “You could be living in what was revealed to you at a particular time, and then you might get stagnated because there’s more that you’re supposed to do. It doesn’t just stop as you do one thing. I think it’s [about] being open to what you’re supposed to do at this moment and not getting stuck in the past. Purpose is not related to career. It’s related to what God put inside you that you’re supposed to give to the world.”
Ahh, Chadwick Boseman gave much to the world in the years he walked on earth.
In the month of December, particularly this December 2022, I am thinking of my mother too. It has now been 10 years since her earthly death. Honestly, there are rare days when I think about her death because mostly, I think about her life. To me, she’s still very much alive in my life, in my heart.
I don’t mourn her passing because I believe it happened as she meant it to occur and when it happened, it all transpired so beautifully that it fills me with gratitude and peace. She had been diagnosed in late October of 2012 with pancreatic cancer. She didn’t feel fear about the diagnosis. She met with her doctors, and they felt she could withstand surgery in late November 2012 to remove the cancer although it was highly risky surgery, especially at her age of 83. She was willing to go through the surgery but had made it known that she didn’t want extraordinary measures taken to extend her life if things didn’t go as well as the doctors hoped. The moment she told me about her diagnosis, I knew within what would happen. Still, I kept my heart and mind focused on doing whatever she asked and being strong for our family.
My mother’s gift to us was her life, her way of life, her giving to others, and her generosity. Still 10 years later, I see my mother as the most generous person I personally knew. I of course read about and saw the deeds of Mother Teresa and people like her who were highly generous people, but I didn’t know Mother Teresa, so I can’t personally vouch for her. I can personally vouch for Vivian Reissland Rouson.
What I think my mother knew is that love, the gift of love is more important than anything else. Love comes in many forms but at its essence, it is a gift in every form. She helped everyone she could no matter what. In her last days, before she went into the hospital for the surgery, because we were unsure about how the surgery would result and we knew the high risk of it, we opened her home to friends and neighbors to come by and see her. Anyone whose life she had touched had the chance to come by and talk to her. It was an amazing testament to our mother’s life and the gifts of herself that she had given to others. Oh my, the stories that people told as they came by. A nearby neighborhood boy relayed how she picked him up in her van when she saw that him walking with a busted bicycle about two miles away from home. A formerly homeless woman who had met our mother when she was pregnant and my mother had arranged for her to be housed at a local home for women in need of care, even though they were already booked up. The local neighborhood watch group stopped by to talk about how our Mom had been outspoken to the substation police and Mayor’s office to fight crime and zoning issues. The front door was almost like a store revolving door with so many people came see Ms. Viv. The love they had for our Mom was heartwarming and uplifting. She was filled with all their gifts to take with her to the hospital, all because she had already gifted them.
Although the surgery seemed to be successful, the surgeons found that the cancer had ravaged other intestinal components and my mother decided that she didn’t want to have extraordinary measures taken. Her five adult daughters and sons honored her wish and with the assistance of hospice care, she would leave the hospital a week after the surgery on December 8, 2012. Two days later on December 10, 2012, she embraced her heavenly eternal life with our father. She was satisfied with the life she had lived and very much wanted to gift what could be utilized from her body upon her death to science. She requested the donation of her body to Howard University’s College of Medicine. So, even in death, she was still giving. See, like I said, a truly generous person all the way through. She died the way she lived, still giving.
I believe a beautiful accompaniment to the gift of love and generosity is empathy. In reading Michelle Obama’s “The Light We Carry,” empathy is mentioned towards the end of the book. She says: “All I can do is try to draw closer to your uniqueness, to feel linked by the small overlaps between us. This is how empathy works. It’s how differentness starts to weave itself into togetherness. Empathy fills the gap between us, but never closes them entirely. We get pulled into the lives of others by virtue of what they feel safe and able to show us, and the generosity with which we are able to meet them. Piece by piece, person by person, we begin to apprehend the world in more fullness.” I loved this.
I think the combination of purpose, love, generosity, and empathy make for the best gifts this time of year and all year. To paraphrase tidbits from Michelle Obama, it doesn’t necessarily mean everyone has to publish a book or go do something big and public, maybe we just listen, maybe we become a safe vessel for the stories of others with kindness, protecting their dignity. Maybe we become trustworthy, resist gossip. In others, we end up finding ourselves. She said: “I see a little of you. You see a little of me.”
So, this gifting season, no matter what you receive or don’t receive, think more about what you can give. Gift someone love. Figure out your purpose as Oprah and Chadwick Boseman talked about. Your purpose is the way to essentially pour out love to others, be your authentic self in what you do, how you show up. Be generous in all you are, all you do like my mother was. Let the light you carry be love. Let that be a gift to yourself and a gift to others. And may the gifting season be more than just one month a year. The gifts of love, generosity, empathy and purpose really can serve all of us throughout 12 months of the year.
Thank you for listening. Always own your own power and you will win in all ways. https://anchor.fm/ownyourownpower/message
