Christmas is just around the corner.
In fact, this article is probably just for men, because if you’re a woman you probably did all your Christmas shopping back in April, right?
If you’re a guy like me, then it’s not the night before, the night before Christmas yet, so it still feels like there is a LOT of time.
This year, my wife tbV [the beautiful Val] and myself came up with a great idea for Christmas presents: Don’t have any!
(Waits for you to stop hyperventilating and pick yourself up off the floor before continuing)
THE PERSON WHO HAS EVERYTHING
Each year there’s always that big question.
“What do you give the person who has everything?”
And while none of us really have everything, I don’t know about you, but we definitely have way more than we need.
Is there stuff we want? Absolutely! Latest board game, Chris Pratt Starlord Funko Pop toy, a big bag of raiSIN-free chocolate… I could go on… But there really isn’t anything that we need.
Same goes for the people we buy presents for, who are typically family. We stress ourselves trying to find “the perfect gift” and we waste money on stuff that people want but don’t need and hope that we get it right.
THE PERSON WHO HAS NOTHING
But there are people in and around our lives who have real needs. People that we know and also people we drive past, or who maybe look after our homes or our children or our cars when we park them out at night. The idea of spending more money (that we don’t at the moment have in excess) on people who are not in need in those ways bothers me.
I was reminded of that Haley Joel Osment movie, ‘Pay it Forward’ which encouraged people to act like a human version of karma. The premise of the movie was a school project where you had to pay forward a favour someone did for you by doing three favours for three other people. The idea was that exponential favour-doing would spread across the country and even the world.
Now imagine if we embraced Christmas with that kind of thinking. Instead of spending money on the people we know have enough, we buy things or give experiences to those who don’t:
# Instead of a once-off gift perhaps there is a child you know whose monthly school fees you could pay for the next 12-months.
# Perhaps there are some people you know are likely to be alone for Christmas who you could invite to spend Christmas dinner with you.
# A year’s worth of once a week after school lessons to someone who is struggling with school in a subject you are good at.
Those are just three examples, but with a bit of creativity I’m sure you can think of 100 more.
Christmas can really provide the opportunity (what with 13th cheques where those happen and the general spirit and vibe of the season) to walk alongside a person or family who don’t have it as good as you and make sure that there is enough for everyone. Your overflow might just be someone else’s enough.
Let’s hear it from you. What are some of the ways that you can think of that you can implement this year to pay it forward to those around you? Write some ideas in the comments and then go and do them.