Give Money Away: Make Regular Charitable Donations

Research using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) showed that charitable giving was linked with feelings of happiness. Other research supports the idea that altruistic financial behaviors such as gift giving or providing charitable donations are linked to happiness. Research has found that happiness is related to successful outcomes. Thus, engaging in behaviors that make you feel happy is obviously worthwhile. Although happiness is all well and good, giving money away can and does have a tangible and powerful impact on your subconscious. It sends a powerful signal to yourself that you are the type of person who gives to others. Giving money away is a subconscious-enhancing behavior. You can and should use it as a tool for expanding your identity. For instance, although a religious example, the story of George Cannon highlights how making charitable donations can transform your identity and capacity for love. George Cannon was a Christian. As part of his faith, he was encouraged to tithe 10 percent of his income, a notion that is repeated throughout the Bible. However, despite being a young and impoverished man, George approached tithing in a very nontraditional, and far more transformative, way. Rather than paying retroactively, wherein he paid 10 percent of what he earned, he decided to pay 10 percent of what he intended to earn in his future. Discussing this story in a talk, mental health scholar and therapist Dr. Wendy Watson Nelson explained, “When his bishop commented on the large amount of tithing poor young George was paying, George said something like, ‘Oh bishop, I’m not paying tithing on what I make. I’m paying tithing on what I want to make.’ And the very next year George earned exactly the amount of money he had paid tithing on the year before!” George was not transactional in his approach to tithing. He was transformational. He didn’t see tithing as a cost, but an investment in his future self and his relationship with God. George’s behavior was subconscious-enhancing. He was seeing, and acting as, his future self, not his present or former self. He was operating from his future circumstances — as though they were already real — rather than operating from his current circumstances. His financial investment became a forcing function. He put himself, financially and psychologically — even spiritually — in a position where he felt not only inspired but compelled to act in faith. He paid 10 percent of what he wanted to make. When he made that investment, he prayed and acted from the vantage point of someone earning ten times what he had invested. As a result, George quickly became that person. I first heard this story in January of 2017. Since then, I’ve applied charitable giving in a more proactive way. My income has increased dramatically. But more than just an increase in income, my identity and confidence has changed. I believe I have a greater capacity to learn and grow. I’m far more flexible. I have greater trust and faith that things will work out my way. I’m more willing to take courageous leaps. I also take opportunities to help people in need, when it makes sense. Recently, I was in an Uber and my driver was a single mom of four in her early fifties. She was working sixty-plus hours per week trying to get her kids through college. She wanted to finish her own degree, but was chipping away at various bills that were keeping her stuck. I decided to pay one of the bills, which was a few hundred bucks. To her, this meant she could get back to her schooling a year before she anticipated. Tears came to her eyes. She was in disbelief. The impact my gift had on her was surprising to me. It humbled me and made me want to increase my financial situation so I could help more people. Thus, this experience expanded my subconscious and my future self. You too should apply the concept of charitable giving as a technique for enhancing your subconscious. The more you give, the greater will become your capacity to give. As Mark Victor Hansen and Robert Allen explain: “Giving taps into the spiritual dimension that multiplies us, our thinking, and our results. . . . There is an ocean of abundance and one can tap into it with a teaspoon, a bucket, or a tractor trailer. The ocean doesn’t care.”