An Open Letter to the Givers
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Hi Community,
Last week I received some sad news. While the world has lots of sadness, sometimes I can miss that people closest to me are struggling in ways I cannot always know or see. A dear teacher of my 3 yr old is struggling with cancer treatment and is unable to afford proper care, resulting in a worsening condition. He’s 27 years old.
In my true entrepreneurial spirit, I got to organizing. When I was able to offer Charlie the first of raised donations, I realized two things:
1- He was really struggling to receive the gift
2- I was really struggling to say “you’re welcome” without dismissiveness
See, we’re both nurturers and it can be hard to receive - gifts, kind words, appreciation, and positive attention. While I am happy to get a public shout-out indirectly, being told directly something kind, warm, or appreciative is really uncomfortable! Why is this?
So today, I want to talk to the Givers of the World. I see you and I stand with you.
TOOLS
Each of our team members at Reset, upon hire, is asked to complete the Enneagram Assessment. This is a way for us to all better understand each other, and pull out our strengths while also encouraging growth edges. What I’ve always loved about this tool is how validating it feels to read a description that is really accurate. While not all personality assessments are valid, in my experience, the Enneagram has a holistic perspective that offers well-rounded feedback and opportunities to get more curious in your self-development journey.
Perhaps not surprisingly, about 85% of the team at Reset identifies as a Type 2 - the Helper. Generous, demonstrative, friendly, warm-hearted, and tender are words to describe this type. But helpers, in general, also tend to lose themselves in the care of others. This may be why healthcare, education, and childcare professionals have the highest rates of burnout.
Contributing to burnout, helpers also have a tendency to feel the weight of all the world’s problems. Not just focusing on the things they can control, they see the enormity of pain and hurt in the world, oftentimes feeling the responsibility to fix it all, help everyone, and spend a lot of time in despair and worry. Weirdly enough, there’s also a link between “nice people” and diseases like ALS and cancer.
Because being nice all the time may mean self-abandonment. Being nice may be in compensation for a wound we’re trying to heal. Perhaps childhood trauma led The Helper to seek out worthiness, love, and acceptance from others. Perhaps attachment wounds, early traumas, societal bullying, and systemic oppression left someone chronically feeling unloved, unworthy, and unwanted.
GRATITUDE
So to you, dear nurturer, I want to share some things. You love deeply, fiercely, and loyally. You give your heart your blood in sweat and tears and your soul to help others. But who takes care of you? Are you open to receiving? Do you allow yourself to be taken care of by others? Do you allow yourself to take care of yourself?
I wonder what would happen if you were receptive to the gifts that the world and others want to give you. For you, you heal the world. It is your life and your energy that make this world a better place. But you can’t keep giving if you don’t know how to receive.
I wonder what would happen if you let yourself feel deserving of the same tenderness, and care if you come to others.
Not every human works tirelessly for the sake of other people. Not every human has a mission to help others or is as generous and caring as you. You are special. And your specialness cannot be dimmed by burning out.
In order for you to continue to be a helper and a giver, you have to be able to receive.
First, try and recieve the gratitude of others. When they say thank you do you feel it in your bones? Do you dismiss it and think of it as nothing because for you, giving is second nature?
It may seem little, what you give in comparison to all those that need help, but it matters. For the person on the other end, it’s their whole world. Do you see that? Can you appreciate and acknowledge your impact?
INNOVATION
I know you don’t want credit. That’s not why you do it. I know you don’t want public acknowledgment, let alone even a thank you card could make you uncomfortable.
But it’s important for you to see your impact. Because if you don’t recognize how special and generous your heart is, you might never think that you’re worthy enough of being taken care of too. You may always feel you’re not worthy or deserving of feeling what it feels like to receive. And in that unworthiness, you self-abandon.
Perhaps you deny your own needs over and over again. And I’m not talking about treating yourself with a cupcake or an Amazon impulse buy or a full cart from Target. You know that those are superfluous things. I’m talking about asking yourself, “what do I really want? and “what do I need?”
When you start looking at yourself as someone worthy of all that you give to others, what could you give to yourself?
Could you give the gift and boundaries of self-care and rest?
Could you give the gift of freedom and flexibility empowerment?
Could you give the gift of love and acceptance and confidence?
What about the gift of grace? Forgiveness?
You don’t have to give to receive love. You don’t have to do anything or be anyone to anyone in order to be loved, and in order to be lovable.
You are enough exactly as you are even if you stop giving right this moment. If you never give again, you are still enough.
FEELS
And yet, you might tell me that you have so much love to give. You have such a big heart and you love, loving! I get it. It feels good to spread your love to the world.
But you don’t have to give love away.
You simply have to be love. You can be in lovingness.
You see, the more that you stand and operate from a place of lovingness, the more you naturally spread love.
Picture yourself as a mountain. That mountain is strong and sturdy. It can grow, but it’s unmovable and oftentimes impenetrable in a good way. Rain, snow sleet, rockslides, and wind certainly impact it, but it still is sturdy and strong.
Are you the same way? Or do you falter when there’s a strong wind that tries to take too much from you? Do you crumble when the love you give is not received back in the same way that you would expect or hope or desire?
Being love is being like a mountain. The higher you vibrate, the stronger your love, and the bigger and taller you will be. The more you are love, the more that you will stand out across a busy noisy landscape as a beacon of hope and beauty, and optimism.
Being in your lovingness is not giving anything away it’s simply modeling and showing what love feels like and looks like. Being love is contagious towards others. Being love inspires, motivates and allows others to feel love just by being in your energy.
So raise your vibration, without giving yourself away:
Be in nature and feel wonder, awe, and curiosity
Laugh and play like a child, letting go of inhibitions
Get quiet, rejoicing in stillness and rest
Crack your heart open with movement and breath, relaxing in your body
See the good, trust the good, and allow good to flow to you
Believe that you are the luckiest and available to receive all love
Allow yourself to be taken care of
Trust you are always supported
Let go, in the knowing that when you are love, anything is possible
Click here to learn more about therapy for stress.
Warm, tender hugs.
