Serve, Learn & Lead with Raymond Tay

Giving Matters!!

This Christmas season I attended my friend’s church and watched their awesome performance about love story & the birth of Jesus. In the recent years, I’ve been spending my X’mas days in church as the origin of this festival is created by Him and I feel really peaceful & happy to join their celebration. I’m still a free-thinker and respect all religions. Just enjoy some of the Christianity’s preachings and their followers’ personal stories. At that church, they were issuing their magazines and after the service, I began to read a few articles in it.

There is an article talked about Arthur Brooks, a researcher and professor, and his book, “Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth About Compasionate Conservatism Who Gives, Who Doesn’t, and Why It Matters“. It has struck me about the benefits of GIVING.

“In terms of physical health and happiness, Brooks notes that people who give more charitably are 43 percent more likely to say they are “very happy” than non-givers, while non-givers are three and a half times more likely than givers to report they are “not happy at all.”

In addition, several large studies have also found that senior citizens who volunteer have a 40 percent lower probability of dying in a given year than people of the same age and health level.

Giving also increases personal and well as national prosperity. Pointing to a survey conducted in 2000 that controlled for education, age, race and all the other outside explanations for giving and income increases, Brooks reports that a dollar donated to charity was associated with $4.35 in extra income.

Of this additional income, $3.75 was due to the dollar given to charity. At the national level, a 1 percent increase in national giving appeared to increase real GDP by about $36 billion.”

(Adapted from The Heritage Foundation)

After reading this, we should strive to give whenever we can (esp. when somebody’s doing fundraising). It makes us feel good and let us know that we have more than enough.

Christmas Gifts for You

As Christmas is approaching, I believe everyone’s looking forward to it, so am I! I think it is a day of giving gifts and showing appreciation to people whom we care about (can even include strangers). Only when we experiencing giving, then we can feel grateful & fulfilled as a human being. Let me share with you the following gifts that I enjoy:

Christmas Canon Lyric (by Trans-Siberian Orchestra):

This night
We pray
Our lives
Will show

This dream
He had
Each child
Still knows

We are waiting
We have not forgotten

On this night
On this night
On this very Christmas night