Does Generosity Make You Happier?

Let's find out!

When I started to write What Gives? I wasn’t expecting anyone to pledge money to support my work. But so far you all have promised almost $300 in pledges.

Here’s the plan: On October 1st I’m going to ‘turn on’ the payment button for What Gives? and at that point, all existing pledges will turn into paid subscriptions, which I will then donate to a worthy cause.

By donating 100% of all payments received for my work on this newsletter, our exploration of generosity can also be a vehicle for it.

If you are an existing pledge holder and do not want your pledge donated, please go to your account and ‘unpledge’ before October 1st.

But consider this: “One of the quickest and easiest ways to get happier is to be generous,” Dan Harris said in a recent episode of his podcast, “Ten Percent Happier with Dan Harris.”

According to the Cleveland Clinic, helping people and giving things to others can increase your ‘feel good’ chemicals like dopamine, serotonin and oxytocin.

Chris Anderson, author of “Infectious Generosity,” writes that “we are wired to be generous…We feel each other’s pain. When we see another human suffering, we want to do something about it.”

How’s this for scientific validation? In a study that surveyed data from 136 countries, people who had reported giving to charity in the past year reported greater happiness, even after controlling for things like household income, age, gender, marital status, education and food inadequacy. In fact, happiness derived from donating to charity was on par with the level of happiness associated with a doubling of one’s household income.

So, I’d love it if some of you would be willing to pledge to support What Gives? and increase the amount that we, collectively, can give. For this first donation, I will donate to World Central Kitchen. They provide emergency food relief for devastated communities around the world.

Going forward, I hope to be able to offer a poll in our chat, so that people can vote for where future donations can go.

I’m looking forward to seeing how we can work together to explore generosity by doing it together.

Take care,

Liza