Going Gift Free...and not hating it

When my husband first suggested going (largely) gift free last December*, I was horrified. I adore presents; choosing them, wrapping them, giving them, getting them, unwrapping them... the whole shebang.

But after a long year, the thought of trying to pick out non-bankrupting presents that weren't largely meaningless additions to clutter and/or consumerism was overwhelming.

I agreed to try it.

We persuaded most of our immediate family to do the same.

Somewhat to my surprise, I didn't hate it.

Now WHY would you cut these delightful things out of your life?
Photo credit: JD Hancock (CC-BY 2.0)

Why Replace Gifts?

Why do we give gifts? Sometimes we do it in order to satisfy social convention, but in the best case scenario we genuinely desire to show love and appreciation for another person by giving them something that they will enjoy, and something which they wouldn't necessarily have gotten for themselves.

Now ask yourself: does my gift giving always actually end up doing this? And if so, is it the best way to do it?

Often, it seems to me, we spend a huge amount of time and a scary amount of money trying (sometimes unsuccessfully) to express our love. The stress of malls and shopping centres in the run up to Christmas can consume our attention for weeks ahead of "the big day", and being in that environment often increases our dissatisfaction with the gifts we've chosen and the lifestyle we live: being exposed to all that consumerism and advertising definitely has an impact. It's all very well to be strong willed, but companies spend millions of rand trying to make their product irresistible to people just like you and me.

And then, too often, the gift you settle on isn't quite right. You end up buying something for the sake of having something to give, but it isn't quite what the person needs or wants, and you end up feeling even more dissatisfied. 

(This isn't to say that when you find that perfect gift you shouldn't buy it. But don't buy it because you have to. Buy it "just because". We did that once. Three years on, the gift in question is still being used daily. This is a win.)

But when you are buying bulk gifts for everyone, it's unlikely that you'll hit the giver's jackpot for everyone. You'll probably have to settle in some cases, and end up back where we started. Dissatisfied.

Or they'll get you a bigger/better gift, and you feel guilty.

Or they'll get you a smaller/worse gift and you feel grumpy. And guilty for being grumpy.

Either way, you lose. Money. Time. Peace of mind. Even relationship value.

Wouldn't it be better to take that time, and a small portion of that money, and spend it with the person you love?

The gift of time?
Photo credit: Moyan Brenn (CC-BY 2.0)

Time and Effort

I am a firm believer in this principle: if you want to cut something out of your life, replace it with something better. Otherwise the gap will either hurt like the blazes, or get filled by something worse.

We replaced Christmas presents with two things: time and effort. Or, as we phrased it amongst ourselves, acts of service and family activities.

Basically, we got together and made two lists. One was of things that we would like to have done for us, or that we needed help with. My requested act of service was making a headboard for our bed. My dad wanted help painting his puppet theatre. My mom needed help with organising her digital music collection, and so on. Then we made (and diarised!) times  to do these acts of service for - and more importantly, with - each other.

Mostly, the acts of service weren't necessities - of course we would help each other with urgent and essential things at any time during the year. They were just those little niggly things that you want done. In that way, they mimicked an important quality of gifts: no-one wants nothing but socks and toothpaste for Christmas! You want things that you just want.

The second list was of family activities. Climbing Table Mountain, going to the Planetarium, having a mini carol service and baking gingerbread were some of our chosen activities. Some activities involved a smaller subset of the gifting community, others were much wider. We made a conscious effort to spend large chunks of time doing things that we wanted to do, rather than letting the whole "festive season" take over and leave us exhausted but without having actually spent quality time together.

Family outings aren't limited to the human race!
Photo credit: Boris Kasimov (CC-BY 2.0)

Saving Money vs Financial Freedom

You will notice that I haven't spoken much about saving money. That's because although that was a side-effect of our Gift Free campaign, it wasn't the main purpose. In fact, some of our acts of service and family outings actually cost some money. Gasp!

But although it wasn't about saving money as such, it was definitely about financial freedom.

Because financial freedom isn't only about being free to quit work if we want to. It is also about having our happiness independent from money. It's about satisfaction getting disconnected from consumerism and reconnected to relationship.

From this point of view, and in fact from many points of view, I am more than happy to repeat the Gift Free strategy this year, without feeling the least bit sad about those glittery packages.

What would you do to replace gifts in  your life? If you're not ready to replace them altogether, how could you reduce the impact of stress and consumerism on your gifting decisions?

To freedom!
jjdaydream




*If you're wondering why I'm talking about December/Christmas in September it is because we have had to start planning travel arrangements and family events already... so it is at the forefront of my mind. 2015 is almost over, people!

The Grace of Giving: Now or Later?

John Wesley famously said, “Earn all you can, give all you can, save all you can”. Most of us will admit that generous giving is an admirable quality. How does this fit in with the quest for financial independence?

Now or Later?

As always, there are several sides to the argument...
Photo credit: Kristofher Muñoz (CC-BY 2.0)

At the moment, as an example, we live on roughly 22% of our joint salaries (post tax). Surely that leaves 78% to donate to charities and organisations that desperately need financial support? John Wesley also said “Do you not know that God entrusted you with that money (all above what buys necessities for your families) to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to help the stranger, the widow, the fatherless; and, indeed, as far as it will go, to relieve the wants of all mankind?" Whether or not you believe in God, the needs in this country are so enormous that it is difficult to sanction holding on to resources which could serve others. 

On the other hand, if we are particularly good stewards of our wealth, then surely it is better for us to take good care of it, ensuring optimal growth, and allowing much greater generosity in the future - putting compound interest to work for charity, as it were. The hope is that after reaching financial independence, our ability to be lavish with our giving will be much larger. Besides, if we don't save at all, we ourselves will be a burden on society at some point in the future when we are no longer able to work. 

And if we can imagine a third, less altruistic hand in this argument, what about the whole point of this blog? Aren't we supposed to be saving everything we possibly can so that we can reach financial independence as quickly as possible? That couple of thousand rand that you give away each month could be powering the financial independence engine and shaving months if not years off your working life. 

Since this one is probably a bit easier to answer, let's put it to rest now:

Reasons to Give Now:

1. Gratitude. Giving really is a grace. It gives me a chance to reflect on everything we've been given. How wonderful that we are in a position to have so much more than we need that we can give money away! How wonderful that we are able to touch the lives of others, even in a small way. How wonderful that we are able to encourage and support causes that we believe in.
2. There are an awful lot of needs right now. Telling the NGO to let the children in the orphanage hang on a few years for their supper because we're just letting their donation grow by compound interest... you can imagine how well that wouldn't go down. The church roof might actually fall in by the time we are good and ready to start giving. 
3. Good habits die hard. Even if you are giving less than you plan to give in the long run, it means it won't come as such a shock when you finally reach the point where you want to start giving a significantly. The danger of course is that we get so attached to our money that by the time we were going to start, it's just too much... or we haven't taken account of it in our FI calculations, or, or, or... Far better to put the habits into place from the beginning, even if it burns a little bit.
4. Tax. You won't ever make money by giving but if you're giving to the right types of organisations (section 18A) then the government will give you a tax rebate on some of your donations. Up to 10% of your taxable income can be deducted from your taxable income via donations. So you pay a bit less tax. (Mr Cent(ri)frugal will do a more detailed post on this later - this is called delegation.) What is comes down to as far as I'm concerned is you're forcing the government to donate money to the charity of your choice. I like. 
5. Giving in other ways. This doesn't really belong on this list, but it is still something to consider. Sometimes, we can (and should) be giving acts of service, not only money. This costs nothing but time, but can be hugely valuable. Does the organisation you're supporting need volunteers? Maybe this is a way that you can maximise both giving and saving. (I still don't think financial giving should be off the table, though...)

How much then?

Not whether there should be a gift, but what size the gift should be.
Photo credit: FutUndBeidl (CC-BY 2.0)

Okay, so assuming that you agree with me that a certain amount of giving should happen now, the question really comes down to this: where is the balance between the "give all you can" and the "save all you can" clauses of the Wesleyan advice with which I started this post?

I think this is really something each individual or family needs to figure out for themselves. I'll share our thinking, not because I think we've necessarily got this sorted, or because we feel grandly self-righteous about how much we give (as you'll see, we haven't reached our giving goal yet), but because it can be helpful to have a benchmark; somewhere to start your own thinking.

I mentioned that we live on approximately 22% of our post tax income. We donate about 8% of that income to two organisations - one religious, one education NGO. The remaining 70% goes to savings. 

Our end goal is to be giving the same amount that we live on. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could each support another family to the same standard of living that we enjoy? Of course this money wouldn't go to one other family, but would be spread out across the organizations that we support. It simply gives us an image of how we would like the world to be: every person fully supporting one other person.

We haven't reached this giving goal yet. At the moment, it would just put our financial independence goal too far away. We are (theoretically) only supporting just over one third (8/22) of another couple, living at the same level as we do. But we're working on it. And after financial independence we are confident that this will be possible, if not exactly easy. It forms part of our plan: we are saving more now, aiming for a bigger goal, so that we can make it happen in the future.

In closing, I really do believe that giving, both now and later, is an incredible opportunity. It puts you at the forefront of a different way of seeing the world; a way of seeing the world that isn't about "us" and "them" but only about all of us, together, doing the best we can. Even if we don't get it right straight away, it is a dream that we can all work towards, starting with the smallest donation and building up from there.

To gracious giving, and generosity of heart!
jjdaydream