Obligations attached to gifts: mastery and payment!

Here is what a friend wrote  me : "I have always (as long as I can remember, that is) steered away from gifts. There has always been, for me, an obligation attached to it, which I wanted no part of. That consideration is present now, and was activated by your note in a previous letter re “what gifts will we be bringing” or something close to that."

I think his point resonates. Although throughout the western world people have begun to complain of the loss of community, we started to lose community when we moved to the opportunity in anonymous cities. There was something great about unburdening oneself from nosy neighbors and interfering relatives! My great hero, Bernard Lietaer reports that studies show what most creates community is neither genetic relatedness nor proximity, but the giving of gifts. Apparently the Japanese alone among developed nations do not report loss of community, and theirs is a society still awash in the exchange of small gifts.

What I'm just beginning to appreciate is the existence of a whole other level of gift, a level where one gives ones gift for the sake of giving what one has to give, for the self-expression, for the mastery of an art. That giving is free of obligation.

By all accounts, Pable Picasso was an able businessman and negotiator, who did well for himself financially. However, I'll bet he played the money game on an entirely separate game board from the game board where he played master painter. This whole thing is beginning to look to me like one of those trick pictures: a rabbit from one perspective, a duck from the other.

A guest contribution

 Dr. Donna Kuck, DVM wrote this April 9, 2011, about the GAA WORKSHOP AND THE NEW ECONOMY

The Global Abundance Alliance is offering a 1-day Workshop near the San Francisco Airport on May 23, 2011 – the Monday following the Conference for Global Transformation. Our Workshop presenter is the founder of Karma Clinic – a “pay-it-forward” medical clinic in Berkeley, CA. This topic – of living life through gifts and service (side by side with the fiat currency economy) is especially timely in light of events in the US and abroad over the last few months.

The bitter, ideological facedowns in our State and Federal Government have caused many of us to take a long, hard look at how we - and the rest of the country - conduct our business. We’ve had to look into our own hearts and ask what ARE our values? What are we willing to sacrifice, what are we willing to give? Where have we been blind, where have we been numb? What are we accountable for and who do we hold to account? What can we do at the local level that makes a difference at the national or global level? What have creative, resourceful people done during other times of upheaval and change – or when money is scarce?

Many of us have read Lewis Hyde’s book The Gift, or are aware of Bernard Lietaer’s work (The Future of Money), or have even been following Frances Griffiths’ Blogs on money and alternate currency . You may have even been on the GAA call with Nipun Mehta, founder of CharityFocus.org – which operates on the pay-it-forward philosophy. His Karma Kitchen in Berkeley, CA is famous. There are no prices on the menu. You are a guest. And – you are welcome to pay for someone else’s meal in the form of money, through service, or some other form of gift. The food is not “free.” It is a “gift.”

Our Workshop presenter, Aumatma Shah, ND is one of Nipun’s protégées. She regards healing as a gift, but it is not “free.” There is a powerful distinction here – which is part of the focus of our Workshop. How DOES one participate in a Gift-based exchange? It calls for us to step into a state of Gratitude, Trust, Surrender and Generosity. Dare I say LOVE? What would YOUR world, your community, your Promise - look like if all your interactions came out of this state of being? This is what we will explore!

The cost of the Workshop is $35 USD – to cover the costs of the space and food. The organizers and presenter freely give their services as a gift to you. But we advertise the cost as $35 plus GIFT. Part of our exploration will be what we mean by GIFT, and then it is up to you to create what GIFT means - to you. It could be monetary; it could be an object; it could be a service; it could be actions or ideas you take back to your own community. The important thing is that there is a flow of human interaction.

We are going to be continuing our discussion of economy and alternative currency in Blogs and emails to GAA members and through the Impossible Promise Keepers. It is a rich and timely conversation!

Right now, to-day

What can I do about big problems in the world? The trouble for this human being is, that I rarely see the results of what I do. I have big dreams and what look like small actions available to take every day! When I was about to check out of the grocery store with my big cart load of stuff this morning, I managed to notice that the woman behind me had a single thing in her hand, and of course I told her to go ahead. It's something most of us would do, if we notice! That's to say, it's an obvious easy thing to do if I notice. Sometimes I'm so deep in my head I'm not noticing.
Here is a great essay by Charles Eisenstein. It's part of the reading list Aumatma Shah suggests for the workshop we are putting on in San Francisco on May 23. There is one passage I like for today:

"... greed is a red herring, itself a symptom and not a cause of a deeper problem. To blame greed and to fight it by intensifying the program of self-control is to intensify the war against the self, which is just another expression of the war against nature and the war against the other that lies at the base of our civilization.....Community is closely linked to gift-giving; when anthropologists seek to understand a culture, they trace the flow of gifts." Read the whole thing!

Imagine a world like my neighbor hood

I have been imagining a world where our usual way  was to look around for what was needed, and just take that on, on a world wide scale.  We often do just that with our families,and in fact my neighborhood operates this way more and more.

My sewing machine just died, and Peggy said, "Oh, I bought an extra sewing machine at a yard sale: you can have it, there's nothing wrong with it, but I don't need another sewing machine really." Gail down the road planted parsley which reseeds, so she has parsley everywhere. She offered me as much as I could carry away, and it is great!  She is a master gardener, and often has cuttings of this, and slips of that. Mary across the street didn't want to go to an appointment by herself, so I drove her. From next door, Carrie often comes by to drop off bread or homemade candy. When her family, with many children, first came, we gave them a great big piano that we really didn't want any more, and all the men in the neighborhood got together to move it. Peggy is teaching their eldest daughter to sew, while Tami is teaching their youngest daughters to quilt.

I lived here for years without having much to do with my neighbors. We were on good terms, and we knew people's name, but we only got together once a year because we had to do something about the road, which we hold in common and have to maintain ourselves. Ever since Peggy and Tami, then Mary and I started quilting together once a week, something wonderful has happened. We trade fabric and ideas and have a wonderful time talking about everything under the sun! The additional gifting just seemed to happen of its own accord, but it really nurtures us all, and gets greater with time.

Side effects of money story, and a story of other gifts

I am writing another blog, a year-long exercise translating Bernard Lietaer's " The Future of Money". The original version in English sells for $150 a copy, so this translation is a gift I am making for my friends, since I can't afford to buy them copies of the book at that price! At the moment I am translating chapter three, in which he asserts that there have been many different money systems in history, all of them having one or another "side effect" on the life of the communities that use them. (He adds that there exist a multitude of money systems  even now, although  they are  eclipsed by out national systems of interest bearing fiat currency based on bank debt, and very few people are aware of their possibilities )
Yesterday I had an experience demonstrating what he means by a side effect of the system. I met my neighbor on the road, and she told me the story of the house next door, which has just sold for a remarkably low price...a brick house on 3 acres 10 minutes drive from the state capitol for $150,000 ....The lady who lived there moved to a retirement village, and gifted it to her children, who, it turns out, were desperately in need of cash. Their cousin gave them this price. As my neighbor put it, "When people know you are desperate, they take advantage". But in fact, while it is not everywhere the case that when people know you are desperate, they take advantage, and while you can certainly make the case that this is reprehensible behavior, it also falls out of a financial system designed to create competition and scarcity, as our financial system does.
The work of Charles Eisenstein , which I have been reading for this blog, speaks of the end of an era, of a particular set of stories that we are separate and alone-that we need to compete with each other. Out of such a story unkindness falls more easily. I am so grateful for a family that took care of each other, and modelled that for me. Whatever stories we live are gifts, like the fable of the fairies who each had a gift for the newborn baby.  Most of the fairies' gifts were of cheer and happiness, but one fairy was not invited, and resentfully, she gave the baby a gift of bad fortune.

More from Charles Eisenstein...to whet your interest!

As we prepare for a workshop day of immersing ourselves in the gift economy, here is a little more from the first article Aumatma suggested reading (http://www.realitysandwich.com/rituals_lover_earth)

Our lives today are rife with little rituals that sustain the Story of the World in which we have been living. There is nothing unusual about this; it is as it has always been. However, we are entering one of those special moments in history when an old story is coming to an end, to be replaced by a new one. We are emerging from two stories... that are deeply interlocked. The first is the story of Self and World: we are discrete beings, fundamental separate from each other and from the objective universe that contains us. The second is the Story of the People: it is the Ascent of Humanity, in which science and technology lift us from a state of dependency on nature to become nature's master, separate and superior. The consummation of this story would be a destiny of space colonization and immortality, in which computers, nanotechnology, and genetic engineering complete our domination of nature and free us from natural limitations. These stories embed other, smaller stories, stories within stories within stories, that include everything in our world that depends on agreements, meanings, and symbols. So money... is a story. The government is a story. The American Medical Association is a story. The law is a story. Dates and times are a story. An educational degree is a story. Professional licensure, your credit rating, ownership of any property, the air traffic control system, all are stories.

The rituals that sustain these stories include such things as writing a check, signing a contract, affixing a stamp, waiting in line, voting, filling out a form, writing a report, issuing a grade, affixing a label, signing off on a proposal, asking permission, showing a passport at immigration, friending someone on Facebook, registering a vehicle, making a schedule, using a theater ticket, filing a lawsuit, or issuing a receipt. I think it is quite easy to see how these actions maintain the web of stories that underlies our society. ...... The laws of physics, that we think are so objective, reflect on a deep level our sense-of-self and the story of What Is that defines self and world......

As the overarching stories of our civilization draw to their conclusion, the rituals that draw from them and sustain them begin to grow stale. They lose their seamless integration into the logic of our lives, and begin to look, well, like "rituals." Their meaning drains away from them.... This is obvious to me every time I download some software or make a purchase on line, and have to click an "I agree" button located underneath a voluminous scrolling window filled with legal text entitled "Terms and Conditions." When I do this, I am supposedly entering into a contract, a concept that draws on ancient sacred ceremonies that involved the swearing of oaths, the letting of blood, and so on. In political and legal philosophy, one often comes across the term "the sanctity of contract." But today we recognize the numerous on-line contracts that we enter into as meaningless formalities, and we do not really feel like we are lying when we affirm, "I have read and agree to all these terms and conditions." 

Today when I set a plate before my husband at lunch, he said "You don't have to wait on me", and I replied "but I intend this as a little gift to you, and I do it for pleasure" That has been true for years, but I never said so, exactly, before now.  Do read Charles Eisenstein's article. He talks about things done in love for the other who/which is not some separate entity, but an expression of the New Story of interconnectedness.

 

Is this a freely given gift? or are there are “strings attached”

In the Global Abundance Alliance we are presenting a day-long workshop on May 23rd, designed for shifting our personal stories from separateness to interconnectedness. Since whatever we may theoretically believe, this shift is highly foreign to most of us, I will be working on myself every day and blogging about it here in preparation for having that day be as effective as possible. A lot of things are supposed to be gifts, but I don't want them, or even, I am suspicious of the offering.


When I tried to read the first of the preparatory readings suggested for us by Dr. Aumatma Shah, I struggled with it.What is he talking about, "rituals for lover earth"? Who is this person? (Charles Eisenstein) This is way too weird. It is suspicious, even. What good is it if "ordinary people" can't get it? This is for a special subsegment of the population....the woo woo crowd. As I write, my houseful of engineering men is discussing motors. I can deal with motors.

And yet, today I am rereading it: finding it easy, interesting, intriguing....He says, "Wanting to believe something based on sentiments about respecting traditions or restoring connection to earth or spirit is not the same as actually believing something. Beliefs are not mere vapors in the head, but reveal themselves as actions."Hmm, pretty straight.

So one freely given gift I can see already is to speak freely, truly, lovingly. That often seems to me like "the forbidden path"! I entertain my voluptuous love of the world in private, in case somebody will disapprove! 
I hesitate to talk to my neighbor at all, because I "know" her religious posture, and I disapprove of it....so I am at work on seeking out my own "disapprovals "....There must be a way to be in the world with one's opinions, yet not quite so suppressed by them? I doubt I will ever entirely without opinions- they spring up like wild onions. But maybe I can take them less seriously.

When less is more

I'm doing the HCG diet, 500 calories a day for 23 days. I watched a couple of my friends get rid of weight they'd worked on for years. I'm at the 6th day, and have lost 3 pounds. I 'd like to look the way I did forty years ago, but I doubt that will happen. I'd like to be able to go without blood pressure medicine, and I expect that will happen. Several unexpected gifts have come my way with this exercise.

First of all, my friend Pat loaded me up with info about the plan, and demonstrated it in action. One gift  was that she shared this with me, and another (from me to me) that I didn't dismiss it out of hand. Not only that, I did the historically  unthinkable, and talked to other people (such as my daughter the doctor) about it ahead of time.

The gift of the moment is that in eating so little every day, I have rediscovered the flavors of food, and begun to explore the joy of spices! Food is a great gift, and around here we have so much that we, at least I, really have not been enjoying every mouthful. Today I say YUM.

Large And small Gifts

Yesterday I was looking out to sea from the Getty in LA. It is a shining white temple on the hill, a summons to beauty and creativity- gloriously inspiring. Last night I watched Shai Aggasi's TED talk on his project for electric vehicles. Getty's gift and Agassi's gift are both unmistakable: they are so large!

My friend Leah has an orange tree in her garden. It was given to her twenty five years ago by her co-workers when she bought this house. It is an exotic treat for me to pick the brilliant globes and eat them two yards from where they grew. She has planted white flowering vines on the corners of her house. They perfume the whole neighborhood and are full of birds,singing.

We talked about people whose lives seem painfully constrained, and others who just keep moving cheerfully along. The ones who keep going are gifts like Getty's magnificent buildings and art, and Agassi's inspiring ideas. I guess they seem like small gifts when they fit right into every day...maybe that was what the Dalai Lama meant when he said that "all expressions of love are maximal"

Birthday Season

It's birthday season at my house: last week mine, this week my daughter's. I had so much fun choosing a pile of small token gifts for her, and a series of whimsical greeting cards, as part of a campaign to counteract the loneliness of living far apart. I remember reading that people have as much pleasure from an experience of service as they have from food or sex, and I can believe that. It was pure fun to look around with her sister for little things that might please our Elizabeth.

The ladies of my quilting group had a party for me, with food, wine, cards and gifts. Then my other friends and family had a second party for me, with food, wine, cards, flowers, and gifts. The gifts were ALL things I liked, the flowers were beautiful (red roses from my husband, red gladioli) the affection and kindness were true.....and I realized I was slightly uncomfortable to be the recipient of so much straightforward affection!

I wonder if the prospect of a gift economy stirs up similar cultural self-doubts among those of us who have spent so much of our lives in the current dominant economic paradigm? Can we learn to trust each other to be about so much more than "the commercial grab"? We were mesmerized and joyful at the rescue of Chilean miners, and at the peaceful Tunisian and Egyptian revolutions. This year I am studying "trusting" as a possibility in life!

Gratitude: It's a Pleasure!

Nippun Mehta's explanation of his experiment in living the gift economy addresses the inner journey. In the essay behind that link he describes the origins of "Charity Focus", the organization he founded. It's a wonderful read, and not too long.

I don't remember where I heard the idea of lying in bed before falling asleep and thinking of three things you were grateful for. I do remember that at first, I wondered what am I grateful for? Just that simple thought experiment, as a practice, has multiplied how much I see to be grateful for. I  consider it a technique for enjoying life ever more fully. When I lie in bed at night now, fifteen things pop into mind  for gratitude. For example, to-day I realized I am glad to be 65. Sometimes I have regretted the signs of aging, but it seems that I'm living long enough to learn about things that were a complete mystery to me in the past. That's a pleasure that outweighs wrinkles! I am grateful to whoever shared that idea.

Not every gift is welcome!

Lewis Hyde's book "The Gift '  was my introduction to the idea of the "gift economy" : an exchange running parallel to what we usually call "the economy"- buying and selling with money. The book was reading for a course, and I couldn't get into it at all. Several years went by until I picked up the book again and read it in one gulp.

What is is about a gift economy that was so difficult for me? Hyde mentions in passing that there is a downside to the gift economy, although his book mainly conjures us the sustaining of community that arises from it.  I have started to think about  the gifts I would rather not receive. Nice things, sometimes, but just not my taste. These days, I'm getting rid of stuff. I don't want more stuff! Take it away! There are things sitting on my shelf that I never did like, and felt guilty for not liking.

And then there is giving: what will they like? I like it, but will he? It is so much easier to go and buy what you want and pay cash, and if you decide to return it there are not hard feelings. It's a transaction not loaded with  relationship issues.