Awakin Readings

Giving and Receiving

Jaggi Vasudev
  2 min read ·   7 reflections
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Giving and receiving is the basis of all transactions. No interaction can take place without these two. Nowadays, we are constantly trying to elevate one to a place of sanctity and the other to subordination. One is considered superior and the other inferior. Today, we feel we must emphasize the importance of giving only because taking happens in large volumes and giving has become scarce.

In reality, however, there is no giving or taking. With a little deeper perception of life, one can see that there is no such thing as giving and taking. It is just life rearranging itself constantly. Modern science agrees with this today. There is no giving and taking, no adding or subtracting, just a rearrangement of the same energy. If you see everything as yours, you just rearrange as necessary.

When you realize that the essential process of life is a constant transaction, you will realize that for an iota of offering that you make, there are a trillion things to receive all the time. Think of the forces of existence and the zillions of creatures working, knowingly or unknowingly, within your body and outside of it, to make life possible. Everything in the existence is somehow collaborating to keep you alive and well. Only a fool thinks of himself as a giver. Just to be alive is to receive in great abundance.

--Jaggi Vasudev, in Is Philanthropy Outdated

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7 Past Reflections
AS
asasdasdasd
Jan 5, 2012

so romantic :)

SE
sekaran
Aug 18, 2011

EXCELLENT THIS SENTENCE: Only a fool thinks of himself as a giver ; as per BHAGAVAT GITA

While born our hands having nothing ; the same during the period death nothing in hand; so giving and receiving is basis for all transactions including married life also

GA
ganoba
Feb 17, 2011

 For a transaction to take place there have to be two entities.

Accepting this duality is the first error.

If we don't notice this error then all that follows is a futile excercise. It is like beating around a bush.

We are all one. At least accept that we are all related.  Within the family do we talk about giving and receiving? When the hand scratches a part of the body is it giving or receiving?

The writer is completely off the mark.

VV
Vaibhav Vinayaka
Feb 16, 2011

Taking seems to be easy, but actually it is harder to be a taker. The one who is at the receving end is always indebted to the one who gives. The world seems to be lighter for those who open their heart and give every thing.

The one who has nothing, does not have anything to loose. So the more you give the less troubled you are.

AD
amo dartey
Feb 16, 2011

VERY INSPIRATIONAL

RI
Rishi
Feb 15, 2011
Today I was thinking about taking and serving. Taking is often associated with pleasure while serving with pain. Is that so? Really? Taking is the Star that holds it's energy within itself imploding into a black-hole and sucks all the life around it into nothingness. Serving is the Sun that shines it's abundant, god-given energy onto the planet and is rewarded with the beauty we call Earth. Is it really more pleasing to be the black-hole that takes or the bright-light that serves? I especially like the way the character Eliseo in the movie "Life is Beautiful" expresses the wonder of serving to Guido: "Think of a sunflower, they bow to the sun. But if you see some that are bowed too far down, it means they're dead. You're here serving, you're not a servant. Serving is the supreme art. God is the first of servants. God serves men, but he's not a servant to men."  As I conclude my thoughts, I realize that if I cannot serve, I cannot be. ... View full comment
SN
suzi nance
Feb 15, 2011
Givers and Takers   ACCEPT the LOVE, SEIZE the GOOD…why is that harder for some than… giving the Love…sharing the good? There are givers and takers, at first blush one might assume that the more challenging task would be in the giving rather than the receiving. However for many of us taking requires a much greater sacrifice... taking requires a drink of humility and trust that for some is just too bitter. So we quietly attempt to position ourselves in the seat of benefactor …hoping our acts of generosity will mask our inability to receive, but what we fail to see is that we are denying someone else of that very role. What appears altruistic and selfless is in fact our most selfish act...the giving has become the taking and such the taking the giving. Is this simply another symptom of a hungry ego, a need to feel grand and powerful? Yes and no, ego feed, no doubt, but for many, much more than the need to feel grand is fear…the f... View full comment