Quotes about Giving

You can't give away what you don't have...

Withhold no good impulse.  You may fear that you will run to excess and squander too much, but those feelings are born of fear.  In God's reality, the more you give of yourself--in feeling, generosity, self-expression, goodness, creativity, and love--the more you will be given.

I see when men love women. They give them but a little of their lives. But women when they love give everything.

Love is, above all, the gift of oneself.

No psychological message is so open to question as that which tells us that we have nothing left to do or to give.

Perhaps a great love is never returned. Had it been given warmth and shelter by its counterpart in the Other, perhaps it would have been hindered from ever growing to maturity.
It "gives" us nothing.
But in its world of loneliness it leads us up to the summits with wide vistas - of great insights.

Love means to commit oneself without guarantee, to give oneself completely in the hope that our love will produce love in the loved person. Love is an act of faith, and whoever is of little faith is also of little love.

Relationship works best when you think of it as a vehicle of giving and contributing and as a secular spiritual practice, keeping your own interests present but not predominant in your choice processes.

For this I bless you most.  You give much and know not that you give at all.

A hundred times every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life depend on the labors of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving.

Is devotion to others a cover for the hungers and the needs of the self, of which one is ashamed? I was always ashamed to take. So I gave. It was not a virtue. It was a disguise.

If you need something from somebody, always give that person a way to hand it to you.

"Love doesn't die a natural death. Love has to be killed, either by neglect or narcissism. Those guilty of these two crimes of the heart always hide behind excuses convenient; too ashamed, lacking in integrity and courage to face the truth. To them, it is always something other than their own actions, desires and self-importance that dictate circumstances. For these people, so blind to truth, true love can never be fully experienced for they have never really given of themselves all that they are."

"Correcting oneself is correcting the whole world. The Sun is simply bright. It does not correct anyone. Because it shines, the whole world is full of light. Transforming yourself is a means of giving light to the whole world."

Seeking is good, but Giving is better!

Giving is living. If you stop wanting to give, theres nothing more to live for.

Tithe in kind where your spirit is fed.

Once beyond the self, however, holiness is no longer possible, because now, there is nothing left to give and no-one left to do the giving.

If someone hates you, they won't ask you for things.

~~Ashanti proverby, quoted by Kwame Anthony Appiah in "Cosmopolitanism."

Yes, you can get a man to do just about anything, and you know it. So, what are you going to attract him into doing? Buying you a nice house? Giving you the space to guide your own life? Or, offering his deepest gifts to you and all beings while opening his heart to God?
  Are you a selfish witch, a self-sufficient witch, or a witch for the sake of drawing your man and all beings open as a gift for all?

There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their reward.

Love has nothing to do with what you are expecting to get -- only what you are expecting to give -- which is everything. What you will receive n return varies. But it really has no connection with what you give. You give because you love and cannot help giving.

Blessed are those who give without remembering and Take without forgetting.

I've learned that you shouldn't go through life
with a catcher's mitt on both hands;
you need to be able to throw something back.

I postpone death by living, by suffering, by error, by risking, by giving, by losing.

We are not primarily put on this earth to see through one another, but to see one another through.

If you believe that every life has equal value, it’s revolting to learn that some lives are seen as worth saving and others are not. We said to ourselves: “This can’t be true. But if it is true, it deserves to be the priority of our giving.”

So we began our work in the same way anyone here would begin it. We asked: “How could the world let these children die?”

The answer is simple, and harsh. The market did not reward saving the lives of these children, and governments did not subsidize it. So the children died because their mothers and their fathers had no power in the market and no voice in the system.

But you and I have both.

We can make market forces work better for the poor if we can develop a more creative capitalism – if we can stretch the reach of market forces so that more people can make a profit, or at least make a living, serving people who are suffering from the worst inequities. We also can press governments around the world to spend taxpayer money in ways that better reflect the values of the people who pay the taxes.

If we can find approaches that meet the needs of the poor in ways that generate profits for business and votes for politicians, we will have found a sustainable way to reduce inequity in the world. This task is open-ended. It can never be finished. But a conscious effort to answer this challenge will change the world.

A giving which gives only its gift, but in the giving holds itself back and withdraws, such a giving we call sending.

If something is important enough to you that you feel the urge to donate your money or time to it, I think it’s best to try to express that form of giving through your career, not just as something you do on the side.  If you enjoy your volunteering and charitable activities more than your career, it means your career is in serious need of an upgrade.  In my opinion your career should be your best outlet for giving.

There are those who give little of the much which they have - and they give it for recognition and their hidden desire makes their gifts unwholesome.

And there are those who have little and give it all.
These are the believers in life and the bounty of life, and their coffer is never empty.
There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their reward.
And there are those who give with pain, and that pain is their baptism.
And there are those who give and know not pain in giving, nor do they seek joy, nor give with mindfulness of virtue;
They give as in yonder valley the myrtle breathes its fragrance into space.