{"id":1913,"date":"2011-05-13T13:48:07","date_gmt":"2011-05-13T13:48:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.faceofmalawi.com\/?p=1913"},"modified":"2011-05-13T13:48:07","modified_gmt":"2011-05-13T13:48:07","slug":"the-difference-between-givers-and-takers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/2011\/05\/13\/the-difference-between-givers-and-takers\/","title":{"rendered":"The Difference Between Givers And Takers"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<ul>\n<li><strong>What You Need To Know<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Be open to giving to others. You never know what you&#8217;ll get in return.<\/li>\n<li>It&#8217;s not just about giving, but about having a giving mindset.<\/li>\n<li>Choose to kill people with kindness rather than be rude to them.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;It&#8217;s clear they never figured out it&#8217;s  a lot less stressful to just be nice or accommodating for someone else  every now and then.  &#8220;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>I am fascinated by airports.  There are few, if any, other places you can visit where such a diverse  cross section of society comes together in the same place. Young and  old, yuppies, hippies, stoners, rednecks &#8212; they all roam the airport in  a sort of social Noah\u2019s Ark where at least two of everything is  represented.<\/p>\n<p>It is from this diverse pool of the general public  that our airline seatmates are plucked. When we&#8217;re travelling alone, we  don\u2019t have a say in choosing our seatmate. It\u2019s just a luck of the draw.  At times, that friend-for-the-flight lottery can be quite unnerving.  We\u2019ve all sat on the plane watching the menagerie of personalities  getting on board, hoping the one we like the look of will sit next to  us. Crestfallen as they pass us for a seat two rows behind, we pray that  the excessively obese, sweaty gentleman pushing his way down the aisle  will not be our five-hour companion, if for no other reason than because  we hope to use both armrests and be able to get up to go to the  bathroom at least once during the flight.<\/p>\n<h3>meeting a taker<\/h3>\n<p>Sometimes we may be the object of enticement or derision to the person  who got to our aisle before we did. This was the case of my seatmate  this week. A middle-aged woman with short salt-and-pepper hair and  tortoiseshell glasses sat in the aisle seat next to mine reading her  book pretending I didn\u2019t exist as I stood next to her lifting my case  into the overhead compartment. I think she was hoping I wouldn\u2019t be  sitting next to her because most people look up and politely ask \u201care  you sitting here?\u201d so they can move aside to let me in. She didn\u2019t even  look up, let alone speak to me. I actually had to say &#8220;excuse me&#8221; to her  so she could let me in. She was visibly unimpressed.<\/p>\n<p>I smiled  knowing that this one person would have a significant influence over my  flight experience. She didn\u2019t smile back. Instead, acting like someone  had just asked her she to prepare for a root canal, she begrudgingly  angled her legs to one side so I could squeeze past. I think people who  act like this are kind of funny, so it rarely if ever bothers me when I  interact with them in life. All that grimacing and sighing they do to  make sure I know how I much I am inconveniencing them must be quite  stressful (comedic for me, but stressful for them). With each snort and  groan, it\u2019s clear they never figured out it\u2019s a lot less stressful to  just be nice or accommodating for someone else every now and then.<\/p>\n<p>Given  the experience I just had getting to my seat, I knew what this flight  was going to be like. I\u2019d be putting on my headphones, and, for the  duration of the trip, we\u2019d ignore each other except when forced to  interact. In any other circumstance, there would be no reason to talk  about her, let alone write an entire column about her. But something  happened early on in the flight that I didn\u2019t expect. It wasn\u2019t so much  what she did but how I reacted to what she did that surprised me. This  taught me a simple but valuable little <a href=\"http:\/\/uk.askmen.com\/money\/mafioso_150\/156_mafia.html\">lesson<\/a>.<\/p>\n<h3>are you in the giving mindset?<\/h3>\n<p>Once we were at cruising altitude, the flight attendant came down the  aisle to ask us if we wanted an omelet or cereal for breakfast. I chose  the cereal and so did my seatmate. A few minutes later, the flight  attendant returned to say that there was only one cereal left and asked  if one of us would mind having the omelet instead. I was about to turn  to my seatmate and say, \u201cYou have the cereal, I don\u2019t mind having the  omelet,\u201d when, before the words even left my mouth she piped up, \u201cI\u2019ll  have the cereal.\u201d I actually felt myself getting angry. General  politeness dictates at least turning to the other person and offering or  asking.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;It&#8217;s not the act of giving that matters; it&#8217;s having a mindset of giving that matters.&#8221;<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/uk.askmen.com\/money\/career_400\/478_givers-and-takers.html\"><br \/>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<h3>the right mindset<\/h3>\n<p>We all know the proverb \u201cthe more you give, the more you get.\u201d And we all intellectually know that being a giver is a good thing. But in an instant, I understood what that idea means  more clearly than ever before. It\u2019s not the act of giving that matters;  it&#8217;s having a mindset of giving that matters. Is it nice to give to  others? Of course. But what engenders rapport with other human animals  is when they perceive us as having that giving mindset. This woman I was  sitting next to was a taker. She totally lacked the giving mindset,  and, as a result, I really dislike her. I was expecting to ignore her  and enjoy my flight, but now I can\u2019t help myself looking over at her and  giving her looks of pity. I\u2019m actually writing this piece with her  sitting next to me, and I\u2019ve made no attempt to angle the screen. I  actually hope she\u2019s reading over my shoulder.<\/p>\n<p>If others perceive  we have a giving mindset, they are more likely to get what they want in  the first place. The net result to this lady was the same. She got the  cereal had I offered it to her or if she had just taken it. The  difference is, in an instant, I don\u2019t like her, don\u2019t trust her and  don\u2019t want to help her. All she had to do was to turn to me and say,  \u201cWould you mind if I had the cereal,\u201d demonstrating a giving mindset  simply by showing concern for my wants or needs, and I\u2019d be lifting her  case out of the overhead when we land without her even asking. Now,  well, I may or may not. And if I do, it will be more for me, to  reinforce that I\u2019m still a giver or as a way to be snarky with her  (nothing is worse than when someone we don\u2019t like does something nice  for us. I\u2019d be that guy to her).<\/p>\n<p>In either circumstance, even  though the act of taking her case down would be one of giving, it  wouldn\u2019t be motivated by that giving mindset. The act would not be a  true act of generosity or kindness. And the reason it wouldn\u2019t be is not  because of me or her but because of how we interacted.<\/p>\n<h3>be the better man<\/h3>\n<p>At various times, we all forget that we\u2019re forced to share more than a  row on an airplane with a stranger. We\u2019re forced to share highways,  subway cars, sidewalks, offices, schools, neighborhoods, cities, and  countries with them, too. We all forget that our own happiness is not solely based on how we live our lives; it\u2019s very much influenced  by how others live theirs also. How we\u2019re treated impacts how we feel,  daily. Even if for selfish reasons we want to go about our business, do  our own thing and live our happy lives, then it matters that we do so  with a giving mindset. Next time we walk through a door, lets all commit  to holding open that extra three seconds longer so the person walking  behind doesn\u2019t have to catch the door we let go of. If we are the ones  who happily step to the side as we walk toward someone on the sidewalk,  instead of expecting them to move, we\u2019ll all get to where we\u2019re going a  little faster. None of us will miss our flights or our meetings or  whatever else we\u2019re rushing off to if we let that one person trying to  merge into our lane during rush hour just slip in. And the next time the  airline runs out of cereal, just turn to the person you\u2019re sitting next to and  say, \u201cYou have it.\u201d After all, we don\u2019t know who that person is and if  they can help us with something we want or need later. Who cares if we  get exactly what we want if we can take some comfort in that we helped  someone else get exactly what they wanted.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-1917\" title=\"giving-and-taking0001\" src=\"http:\/\/www.faceofmalawi.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/05\/giving-and-taking0001.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1011\" height=\"918\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What You Need To Know Be open to giving to others. You never know what you&#8217;ll get in return. It&#8217;s [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1917,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[216],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-malawi-culture"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1913"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1913\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}