When Did You Experience the Unexpected Rightness of Giving Your Gifts Away?
Ripples from Giving and Receiving
This week we explored the poem, “Cargo” by Greg Kimura. The opening lines say it all:
“You enter life a ship laden with meaning, purpose and gifts
sent to be delivered to a hungry world.
And as much as the world needs your cargo,
you need to give it away.
Everything depends on this.”
We are born into aloneness and although we’ll always hold that with one hand, the other must give and receive to be fully human. It must hold and hold onto others because ultimately, we are because they are. Connection, care, and giving what is ours to give (which surprises us sometimes) are the catalysts of hope, love, purpose, and meaning.
The prompt we created was: When did you experience the unexpected rightness of giving away your gifts? We wrote for 15 minutes.
The gift of architect, Antoni Gaudi - Basílica de la Sagrada Família, Barcelona, Spain
Here is what we wrote:
Penny: “Sometimes, following my heart and instinct is the needed gift. Here is a memory that brought that home to me. It was in the fall of 9/11. I was, once again, asked to lead an all-day annual retreat for a new cohort of resident physicians in the first months of their three-year training. It was always a day when the recently formed group of 22 interns got to know each other better through various reflective activities and lightly structured experiences.
As before, this cohort was made up largely of international medical graduates. They came from many countries and ethnic traditions. I had heard, a few days in advance of the retreat, that there had been more than a few incidents of racial slurs, accusations and outright refusals from patients unwilling or afraid to be treated by “foreign doctors”.
As I looked around the group, I saw two dozen young men and women, masked behind polite gazes. I could only vaguely imagine the stories of their lives and what brought them to this hospital training program at this time. What were their hopes, their fears? How might this day help?
In that moment I had an instinct and went with it. I ditched my carefully planned schedule. I said that the horror of 9/11 had thrown our country into fear and suspicion. I told them I had heard about some challenges they’d already faced. “You are strangers to each other and yet you will need to count on each other; never more so than now. I want to shift from what I had originally planned to do. If you’re willing, I’d like to invite us to spend time this morning with each of you telling each other whatever you’d like to share of your life story, of what you have experienced to get to this place, starting this residency. I have a feeling you each have a story to tell. And it is only when we know each other’s stories that we can best be there for each other in this challenging time.”
It felt like a risk - no structure, no warm up, just an invitation to let each other be known by their colleagues. There were many seconds of silence, and then the stories started. Each person took a turn. They told brave, heart-breaking, determined stories of escaping wars and prejudice in their home countries, of parents who had suffered or died in harm’s way, of being misunderstood for their beliefs but prevailing, making their way against great odds to this country. Of hopes to go back home to help. There was a young man from Viet Nam who at six had escaped with his 4 year old sister on a boat crowded with refugees and found his way across the ocean to be taken in by relatives.
My heart broke a little as I listened to them. Broke open to hope. I really hadn’t known what I was opening up - I’d simply followed my gut to “get out of the way”. They wanted to be known for who they were. And their fellow residents wanted to know them. They listened to each other, really listened. At the end of that long beautiful morning one of the last residents to speak summed it up for all of us. She was one of the few Caucasian, American residents, from the Midwest. She said “if people could talk like this to each other, there wouldn’t be war.”
I still carry that morning with me in my heart’s eye. It changed me. I am grateful I stepped into that moment with something I may not have even named as a gift—to offer a heartfelt invitation and get out of the way.”
Darcy: “The doorbell rang and when I opened the door a large bouquet of roses was thrust into my hands by the delivery person. I slowly said, “uh… thank you,” which was more of a question than an expression of gratitude. The accompanying note said, “Maggie just turned 10-years-old and I wanted to thank you for the care you gave her as a kitten.”
I sank down on a bench nearby, my mind flung back 10 years to another city over 2500 miles away. I didn’t remember the kitten or its owner. For the life of me I didn’t know what I did to merit such a gift marking an event that seemed so distant and especially one that I couldn’t recall.
After some phone calls back to the hospital where I did my internal medicine residency, the details of the case emerged. It wasn’t a brilliant diagnosis or above-and-beyond life saving care. It was an 8-week-old kitten who had been bitten around the head and neck by a large dog. It was brought in while I was on emergency duty and other than being shaken and scared, the actual trauma and wounds were minor. I cleaned the kitten up, gave it some anti-inflammatory and pain medications and hospitalized it overnight for observation. It recovered speedily and I discharged it the next day.
So what did I give that evening as a gift? It was certainly not any breathtaking medical expertise. Maybe it was because I was there, at night, listened, cared, and was kind, calm, and reassuring. I never found out why. Being fully seen, heard and understood are what most of us need when we are worried, suffering, or in pain. The deeply touching gift of roses reminded me that often, it’s the simple offerings that matter most, and that sometimes, we need someone else to show us the gifts we can give.”
WRITING PROMPT
When did you experience the unexpected rightness of giving away your gifts?
We invite you to write for 10 or 15 minutes on the same prompt and if you’re writing with a friend, read what you wrote to each other.
We’d love to hear your comments about how it’s going, what you’ve liked so far, and what you’d like going forward. Do share snippets of your writing if you’re so moved.
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I loved this one. Both of your stories were so heartfelt. What a great prompt. Thank you.