Seven Possible Explanations For The Giving Disparity
- Everyone, except me, is selfish. This is possible, I suppose. Likely? I think not.
- Maybe we’re all paying it forward. Maybe it’s like a big love triangle —where he likes her, but she likes the other guy. Maybe we all are over-giving to someone, and that person is over-giving to someone else, who is over-giving to someone else, which means we’re all giving, but it never feels reciprocated by the right people.
- Maybe it’s easier to see what we give than what she gives. In one case, I actually knew both of the women in a friendship, each of them thinking they gave more than the other. One said, “I’m always the one initiating our time together,” while the other said, “She does all the talking — I am always the one listening to her life.” They were both accurate, but it didn’t mean that the other wasn’t contributing; it was just in a different way. Some of us are better at scheduling, others at remembering birthdays and others at asking meaningful questions. Maybe we tend to only have eyes for how we give.
- Maybe we’re scared. Maybe we don’t over-give at all, but our insecurity heightens our fear of it. Perhaps we hold that memory of one person who walked all over our boundaries long ago; and now, to prevent getting hurt again, we are super-sensitive to anyone who doesn’t reciprocate immediately in big ways. Maybe we don’t remember that we’ve become better at setting boundaries since then and can trust more people than we do.
- Maybe we give more than anyone needs or asks. I once had a friend who kept buying me trinkets from different shopping expeditions. I sure didn’t need those little things and didn’t even like most of them. She was giving to me in a way that I wasn’t asking her to give, didn’t need her to give and certainly wasn’t reciprocating back to her. If she ever felt it was disproportionate, I’d rather her have cut back on what she bought me than to resent me for not matching her style. Maybe we need to look at where we give and see if we think it’s really meaningful to the receiver.
- Maybe we are leaking what we are given. Maybe other areas of our lives drain us so much that even if our friends are giving to us, we can’t hold it. Maybe she affirms all the time, but it just bounces off you. Maybe she initiates get-togethers frequently, but you’re too stressed to hear them.
- Maybe we’re not over-generous at all. Perhaps to prevent feeling rejected we only give an inch and retreat, calling it imbalanced when really it was just one email. Maybe the one clue you dropped that you’d be open to getting together again wasn’t really disproportionate. Maybe we’re only putting our toe in the water and calling it over-giving when it’s not. Maybe we can email her a second time, or follow up again, without it falling in the category of too much.
5 notes
Message me a letter and I’ll tell you my favorite thing that starts with that letter.
33,826 notes
sometimes when my phone goes almost a full day without ringing, i check to see if my service was suspended. then i realize, no one’s thought about me enough to call or text. :(
Notes
