What’s new?
“So many things, and yet absolutely nothing, I suppose.”
Go on.
“The residual effects of the Happiness Program continue along sweetly. New morning meditation routine. New reading recommendations. Numerous new thoughts about everything from responsibility to decentralization. New coaching workshops upcoming in Atlanta and Seattle. New thoughts about coaching. Many thoughts about self-acceptance.”
What would you like to talk about first?
“Self-acceptance, methinks.”
Go on.
“Or maybe generosity instead.”
What changed?
“Recently I am wondering if generosity doesn’t take care of most everything else. Certainly, it takes care of gratitude.”
In what way?
“Who that is ungrateful has a chance to be generous?”
Walk me through that.
“Ok, but remind me to talk about the power of gentle smiles, deal?”
Sure.
“Before you feel an inclination to give things away, money or possessions or time or even compliments, you must have a surplus of some sort and you must realize you have a surplus and you must realize that surplus was not inevitable.”
What does that say about rites like tithing?
“They fall under obligation, I’m thinking, more than generosity. The idea behind them is to encourage generosity, but that doesn’t mean that idea gets processed as more than obligation.”
What do you mean?
“There’s a certain irony that is glorious beneath it all, isn’t there? The obvious and cynical read on tithing is institutional fees-collection. And cultivating that habit of fees-paying in one’s followers from a wee age. But beneath that is a truth that being generous makes one’s life very much better.”
And do we need to attribute that truth to more than faith right now?
“You’re not supposed to ask questions that begin with ‘do’, pal.”
(Smiling) Fair point.
“If you cultivate the generosity habit, however much or little you have – and generosity is proportional in every sense – you get life handled on both ends, symmetrically.”
What do you mean?
“You have a habit of giving things away, which helps others, while this giving-away of things helps you recognize you don’t need them, which makes their acquisition less of a source for anxiety, which also makes giving them away easier – you didn’t lose sleep over them, after all – which makes you more generous, which makes you even happier.”
Tell me about the power of gentle smiles.
“I learned it in the Happiness Program. Every yoga exercise begins and ends with a gentle smile. It sets the tone. But it’s a habit I started taking with me everywhere. Coffeeshops, supermarkets, restaurants. When you greet the world this way, you sacrifice a good bit of seriousness, and you realize that’s a good thing to rid yourself of anyway. More importantly, everyone you encounter is already more open to you.”