Merry Christmas

This Christmas is special because my little daughter realizes it’s Christmas for the first time today. I’ve woken up early, turned on the Christmas lights and put the present under the Christmas tree. This feels better than receiving a gift ever did and so from my experience it’s definitely true that “giving is more blessed than receiving”.

Jonathan Haidt writes about this in The Happiness Hypothesis (which is one of the best books I’ve read this year):

Those who reported giving more help and support to spouses, friends, and relatives went on to live longer than those who gave less (even after controlling for factors such as health at the beginning of the study period), whereas the amount of help that people reported receiving showed no relationship to longevity. Brown’s finding shows directly that, at least for older people, it really is more blessed to give than to receive.

So giving is the right to do even if you do it for purely selfish reasons. May this day be very unproductive and full of kindness and giving. Merry Christmas.