Other studies have demonstrated that such positive feelings can actually strengthen and enhance the immune system. Positive emotions increase the body's number of T-cells, cells in the immune system that help the body resist disease and recover quickly from illness. Positive emotions also release endorphins into the bloodstream. Endorphins are the body's natural tranquilizers and painkillers; they stimulate dilation of the blood vessels, which leads to a relaxed heart.
While we don't quite understand all the reasons why giving creates good health, many studies have documented generosity's positive effects. Michigan researchers who studied 2,700 people for almost ten years found that men who regularly did volunteer work had death rates two-and-one half times lower than men who didn't. In a separate study, volunteers who worked directly with those who benefited from their services had a greater immune system boost than those whose volunteer work was restricted to pushing papers.
Harvard researchers also conducted a study that showed how giving is such a powerful immune booster that it can be experienced just by watching someone else in the act of giving! In this well-known experiment, students looking at a film of Mother Teresa as she tended the sick in Calcutta—even those who purported to dislike Mother Teresa—got an increase in immune function.
Psychologist Robert Ornstein and physician David Sobel are well known for their examinations of the health effects of altruism. In their book Healthy Pleasures, they describe what they call the “helper's high,” a kind of euphoria volunteers get when helping others—a warm glow in the chest and a sense of vitality that comes from being simultaneously energized and calm. They compare it to a runner's high and claim it is caused by the body's release of endorphins. Because of all these health benefits, as Stella Reznick says in The Pleasure Zone, “the one who ends up getting the most from a good deed may, ultimately, be the good Samaritan.”
Generosity Alleviates Fear
It is expressly at those times when we feel needythat we will benefit the most from giving.
—RUTH ROSS
I've never had the privilege of meeting writer Anne Lamott, but I have loved her books, particularly Operating Instructions. Her emotional honesty leaps off every page—here is a woman who is not afraid to show herself, warts and all. In admitting her vulnerabilities, she makes it okay for us to be just who we are too.
In an interview, she was asked about her relationship to money. As a single mother living off her writing, her financial security has been precarious at best. She spoke of having survived, at times, off the generosity of friends, and then said something that leaped out at me. “I know that if I feel any deprivation or fear [about money], the solution is to give. The solution is to go find some mothers on the streets of San Raphael and give them tens and twenties and mail off another $50 to Doctors Without Borders to use for the refugees in KOSOVO. Because I know that giving is the way we can feel abundant. Giving is the way that we fill ourselves up…. For me the way to fill up is through service and sharing and getting myself to give more than I feel comfortable giving.”
To me, a person who has a great deal of fear when it comes to money, the thought of giving money away precisely when I felt like clinging to it seemed terrifying. Sick of constantly being fearful about money, I decided to give it a try. Amazingly, it really works. I feel less afraid the more I give.
It's a paradox. If we are afraid of not having enough, we think we need to hold on tightly to what we have and work hard to get more. As Anne Lamott and I found out, that perspective only makes us more afraid, because we get caught in a cycle of clinging and hoarding. When is enough enough? Is $5,000 enough? $50,000? $100,000? $1 million? A recent study found that no matter how much money people made, they thought they would be happier if only they had more. Whether they made $20,000 a year or $200,000, everyone thought they needed a bit more.
If we turn around and give instead of hoarding everything, we suddenly experience the abundance we do have. Most of us, particularly those of us living in Western societies, have a great deal, and when we share what we have, we feel our abundance. It becomes real to us, and that diminishes our fears. I read about a woman who was suffering from depression and contemplating suicide because of back pain and poverty. She found a kid foraging in the Dumpster and thought to herself, “I don't have a lot, but at least I can fix this kid a peanut butter sandwich.” Giving away that peanut butter sandwich reminded her of the abundance she still had, even in the projects. If she could still give, her life wasn't so bleak after all. She now runs a volunteer program in Dallas that feeds hundreds of kids a day. It started from that one day when she gave away the sandwich.
Giving Helps Us Experience Our Connection with Others
Just as the wave cannot exist for itself but is evera part of the heaving surface of the ocean, so must I neverlive my life for itself, but always in the experiencewhich is going on all around me.
—ALBERT SCHWEITZER
My friend Tom recently went to his high school reunion and had a surprising experience. “I always thought reunions were stupid,” he said, “and so I never went. But an old friend called and guilt-tripped me into it, so I went. It was strange, but not in the way I had imagined.
“I'm a very successful financial analyst, a bit on the driven side, but it got me all the things I thought I wanted—a great condo in the city, a country house, fancy car. So I showed up with a bit of a self-satisfied attitude. There were plenty of surprises, both in appearances—people change a lot in twenty years—and in what individuals had done with their lives. The biggest surprise was that the people who seemed the most happy were not those who had ‘made it’ in the sense that I would have understood. There were a number of people in my income bracket—lawyers, computer guys—but for the most part they were the most unhappy and lonely.”
“The interaction that really affected me was with an old girlfriend who was a nursery school teacher. When she talked about ‘her kids,’ her eyes would light up with a kind of excitement and energy I hadn't seen for years.
“It came to me that she had a very deep connection to the people in her work life—kids, parents, and other teachers—that came out of her giving them her time, energy, and enthusiasm, whereas I had all the trimmings of a great life but wasn't connected to anything at all except my wallet. That was the beginning of my midlife crisis, and it hasn't been easy. I decided to take a small step and become a Big Brother to a twelve-year-old kid from the projects. I've been really enjoying myself, taking him to ball games and helping with homework.”
The wonderful thing about giving is that you can't help but experience a good feeling when you do it. Humans are social creatures. We're made to live within the company of others, and initiating that connection—making it concrete—just feels good in and of itself. When we get narrowly focused on just ourselves, we lose track of the sense of connection to others that helping gives us and instead experience isolation and loneliness. Far too many of us are stuck in that state today. Cut off from enough meaningful contact, we drift alone in the universe. No matter our circumstances, we can always experience human connection simply by reaching out to help someone else. When it comes to connecting, what you give is what you'll get.
Giving Allows Us to Look Deeply at Ourselves
Just as we are, we are giving and receiving life.But we miss this because we are caught up with all of theefforts to be right, to be the best, to be the winner, to be first. Allthe evaluations and judgments we make about ourselvesand others separate us from this simple being.
—ROBERT JOSHIN ALTHOUSE SENSEI
for three years, I delivered dinner once a week to people with AIDS. I would go
