“Do charity in such way that your left hand doesn’t know when your right hand is giving alms.” I am sure we all have heard this saying. But when it comes to helping someone, do we all genuinely adhere to this. Don’t we all in the heart of our hearts want to feel that our good deeds be acknowledged?
Somewhere somehow, we have expectations to be rewarded for helping a person in any situation. If you are donating money to an orphanage, many times I hear people say they want to do it as it will help absolve their sins and help gain brownie points from the Universe.
When we help our colleague with a sale at work, we expect him to praise us in front of their bosses and also next time help you out in your sale. I see mega companies say they will donate a dollar from each sale to a good cause, which is indirectly helping them make better sales.
You would say there is nothing wrong in that as long as it is benefitting someone less privileged. I say it mars the whole essence of helping someone. It feels more like an exchange system. Though you don’t say it aloud, you do expect things in return, even if it is just a dose of good luck from the Universe for helping that poor beggar out.
These expectations in a way negate the whole good karma of helping people around us. Because when these expectations are not met, it makes you second guess as to why you did the good deed in the first place.
So, let us for a second detach ourselves from these expectations and see within us as to why we really want to help someone. The most genuine answer you will get from within is that you feel good, it gives you a sense of peace and happiness in the fact that you could help someone.
Maybe at one point in life you were in their shoes and you know what it felt liked and you don’t want that person to go through the same thing you did. You want to offer them the help that you wished you had received long back. May be things would have been easier for you, maybe life would have turned out to be different.
The key here is not to help someone expecting something tangible in return, but to help someone because you are an empath. You are able to put yourself in their place and feel what they are feeling. And when you do that, you will help someone without expecting anything in return, because you see a reflection of your own self in them.
We are not just bodies who has a soul, we are souls with a body and this life here on earth is a journey we take. Our true lessons are not how successful we can become in this life, our true lessons are how kind, compassionate and selfless you can become, that is the only way to get in touch with your core self, that is what will you the peace and joy you seek in life. And when you do that, you will realize that your expectations were just roadblocks in your journey.
How you overcome them and how willing you are to overcome them is what will be your true measuring stick of you as a person, as a soul and as a diving being on this earth.