GIVING PRESENTS

Giving a present is a way to express a positive attitude towards the recipient. It signals values such as friendship, love thanks and recognition. A carefully selected present say a great deal about how the present-giver evaluates us. Seen in this way, the gift is a mirror held up to the person to whom it is given.

The act of giving does not try to attain anything; it is not calculated to produce a certain response. To think of ‘paying back’ the giver immediately shows a lack of respect for the generosity with which the present was given us. It is as if we were to give the present straight back to the giver.

If we do not know how to receive a gift in the same spirit as it was given, we go against the intrinsic affirmation of the act of giving. Real giving is thus only fulfilled through the proper acceptance of the gift.

Proper acceptance entails in the first place an attitude of thanks, of pleasure, of liberality. We want to receive with the same breadth of spirit with which the gift was given.