Giving or Trading?

Where is the line between “giving” and “service”?

On one level, they are the same. We “give” our service to others. But then, when I am paid to do a job, then I am providing service as well. But is it still “giving”, or is it just “providing”?

The difference is in what comes back it seems to me. Whenever I “give” something with some hope or expectation of something in return, then it is no longer giving, is it? Now it is just bartering or trading for services.

And what is in our nature I wonder? Are we put together to be able to truly give?

Evidence would suggest that we are not put together this way – that we are generally inclined to be looking for every opportunity to get more in return than we have to give. Yet, my experience is that the greatest grace that a person can experience comes as part of a true and selfless giving process.

Nothing can fill a heart like the simple and pure harmony that rings from within the soul when pure service is given as a gift to another person.

I know this to be true, and I suspect that most people know this to be true, yet we do it so rarely. This doesn’t make sense, and makes me wonder about the way we are put together. Why do we continue to pursue the bartering and the trading, when they render so little to our soul, yet we rarely allow ourselves the luxury of the things that render so much to our soul?

Author: Neil Hanson

Neil administers this site and manages content.