Despite the fact that my husband owns a store and we rely on consumers to make a small portion of our living, I am fairly Anti-Consumerist as a general rule. It’s my belief that many items with price tags actually do more harm than good. The packaging fills our landfills. The old parts from electronics cause heavy metal poisoning in certain parts of the world where they eventually get dumped and discarded. And material possessions trigger a scarcity mindset. They cause us to think of people as “haves” and “have nots.” This generates envy, lust, yearning, emptiness and depression.
Christmas and other holidays, in my opinion, have become overly gift focused. The holidays have become more about spending money and less about the true spirit of giving.
I’m not writing any of this as an attempt to make anyone feel badly about buying gifts. But I would like to suggest that we also think about giving the following more powerful gifts this season:
The gift of forgiveness.
The gift of an apology.
The gift of your time.
The gift of your skill or talent.
The gift of companionship.
The gift of affection.
The gift of lifting someone up and making that someone feel good.
The gift of listening.
The gift of your physical labor.
The gift of a phone call.
The gift of something you made by hand.
The gift of a good deed.
The gift of restraint.
The gift of love.
Updates
* Many of you have given me amazing gifts this season. You know who you are. Thank you!
* Laura Vanderkam interviewed me for this BNET article about how marriage advice can help your career.
* I wrote this post for Jonathan Fields about how to divorce proof your start up.
* There’s still one more day to enter the Miss Abigail giveaway, which just grew larger by two free Broadway tickets, thanks to the Hubby Diaries.
* There’s still time to enter the Great PHEA Giveaway, too.
* Tomorrow I will start the “Writing So Bad It Shouldn’t Be Published” series.
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
I’m looking forward to “the writing so bad”. I really want to know the 2 cuss words that you haven’t written in your book.
I’m not into Christmas, because the meaning of Christmas has so greatly changed over the years – it’s gotten far to commercial for me.
But I do send out Christmas cards every year. It’s my thing!
Thanks to you, Alisa, for your honesty, courage, and kindness.
This is awesome, truly! I try and give these gifts as often as I can, and especially this time of year. These are the best gifts of all, indeed, thanks for the reminder, Alisa! This is too cool!
Happy Holiday!
Many Blessings,
-Sarah Liz
Nice, Alisa. And words to live by — and not just during the gift-giving season.
What an excellent post Alisa & so very true. This year the wife & I weren’t going to buy each other anything for Christmas. Partially due to finances & partially due to the fact that we just didn’t really need anything. Seemed kind of silly to spend money we didn’t have on something we didn’t need..LOL
But we did decide to do something that would bring a little Christmas Joy to others. As most here know she does volenteer work teaching art for a local org that has programs for the mentally handicapped. They also run 4 group homes for their students. The students are all adults on differing levels of “functioning”. Sadly a few of these students have parents who just drop them at the homes & never come to see them or take them home for Christmas. It’s only a few that do that but is so very sad. Same is true with the elderly. Anyway probably 30 of them in the homes were going to be there for Christmas.
Now the wife & I can’t bring them home with us & didn’t have much money to buy gifts. So she came up with an idea that was really sweet. I made a run to walmart for the “makings” & she & I spent a couple of days baking Christmas cookies for the students left behind. Not only was it going to be something good for them, but it was an activity we could do & bond closer as a couple.
Well we delivered them on the night before Christmas eve after the ones who were going home for Christmas had left. Before going I was giving myself quite a few pats on the back & brimming with pride for all we had done. When we arrived as usual we were greeted with many hugs & hello’s. These students are so loving when they greet you anytime. Anyway we presented the cookies & the average reaction was “oh okay thanks”. Here I was all patting myself on the back for the “good thing” I had done & they barely reacted.
I thought about it on the way home & it dawned on me. The reason for the limited reaction is they were already happy. One thing I have learned on my limited dealings with this group of special people is they are ALWAYS happy in life. They give a love that is pure. They have no hidden agenda. They never give to get something in return. Mostly they are happy with whatever they have in life & most have little to nothing. So while I went to “give” to somebody else, they gave me a gift that is priceless. They gave me a lesson in pure love & true happiness. We could really learn a LOT from the mentally handicapped. I sure did.
Ron
Oh & I didn’t suceede in not buying anything for the wife as we promised. A local doctor who she does advocacy work with for the disabled with gave her this really nice gift basket of gormet coffee. When she opened it to try them the bags were full of whole coffee beans that weren’t ground up.
Guess what, we didn’t own a coffee grinder..LOL So Christmas eve morning I ran to Walmart at 6am (no big deal I wake up at 5 anyway) to buy her one. I also went so early because I thought they wouldn’t be busy at that hour. BOY WAS I WRONG…LOL The parking lot was full. As I walked in I saw long lines at every register & thought who are these people that go shopping at 6am? Don’t they have jobs to get ready for?..lol
Anyway found her a small one for $17. Then I had a brainstorm. I walked to the sporting good section one asle over, the cashier was there & there was NOBODY in line..YIPPIEEEE!!!!! Was probably in & out in 10 min. As I was walking out the door, seeing the long lines & thinking how I got out so fast, I had to resist the urge to say SUCKERS!!!!..LOL
Well she saw the gift wrapped & sitting on my bed on Christmas eve (she got up earlier than I expected & I hadn’t hid it yet. She had just seen the episode of All in the Family where Archie bought Edith a Lady Gillete for Christmas. She was kidding & said, “Honey you could get me that”. I think I actually had her convinced that that was what was in the box. I just played dumb (not to hard for me) & said “Honey you said that you would like that”. She actually bought it hook, line & sinker (I say with an evil grin..lol). Funnier still is she acted like “well that’s a nice gift” so as not to offend me..LOL
Well when she got up on Christmas (it was after 12 as she was pretty sick) I gave her the gift & she was THRILLED!!!!! Now every time she grinds a little coffee she stands there & does this funny little dance as it does it’s thing. It is a wonderful sight to see. It warms my heart to know she would even be so happy with such a small thing. Such a small gift that has meant the world to her. You would have thought I bought her diamonds the way I could before this awful illness hit & ruined our finances.
As for me I got a bag of rocks, a lump of coal & am happy with it
Actually my gift was the look on her face when she opened her $17 present.
Merry Christmas to all & to all a good night
Ron
Yes, I agree with Alisa – modern society is far too materialistic (which is hypocritical of me as I work in marketing!), and I think your list of gifts is far better.
In my family (there are 7 kids and my mother is still around!) we still get together on Christmas Day (so about 40 of us) and we don’t give presents to each other, and haven’t done for years. The ‘gift’ is spending a big chunk of the day together, not buying all sorts of stuff that none of us really need anyway!
WOW Bern 40 people? I think to do that many from my side of the family we would have ship in long lost relatives from Tazmania..LOL Now my wife’s family could easily round up 40. She has 6 brothers & sisters alone. In my family all my aunts & uncles, grandparents have passed & I only have about 6 cousins left. I do miss the days when Mom & dad were still with us & gathered the family (usually about 10-15) for holidays. Good memories though that will last a lifetime. Must have been a wonderful holiday
Ron
Appreciating the commitment you put into your blog and in depth information you provide. It’s great to come across a blog every once in a while that isn’t the same unwanted rehashed information. Wonderful read! I’ve saved your site and I’m including your RSS feeds to my Google account.