Just a thank you

We like people to do good stuff. We like people to do good stuff for us. Most people appreciate philanthropy, but that is more than money or tangible things. It might be just a good deed, like helping an elderly woman across the street.

I expect most people have been a recipient of someone doing good for them. I know I have, and probably more times than I can count. It is just a good thing to be touched in that way by another human being, who sees our need or even responds positively to our call for help.

People are classified as philanthropists when then make a habit of giving whatever. We like philanthropists, don't we? Lots of people get past mere existence because someone cared. Of course the big time givers make news, too. We read it in the newspapers and see it on our televisions. That is good too. But that is not all of it. Little things count too.

Here is the thing: thank yous are really important too. Oftentimes we fail to render that thank you to people who have done us a good deed, whatever that might be. We might even think we were owed it. It was their job to do it, so why do I need to say thank you? Well, this is to cause us to rid out minds of that thinking.

Saying thank you is just a part of doing good. It may be that we can never provide help that others need. It may be that we are only, and always, recipients. But we can say thank you, and that counts as philanthropy too in my book.

Of course when we find the opportunity to do for someone else, more than just saying thank you, we need to be ready to do that. Meantime, we ought to say, "Thank you. I appreciate what you did for me (or anyone else you might have seen it done for)."

We do need to practice the philanthropy of saying "Thank you." It will make us feel better, and it might be just the push that the provider needed to keep doing the good.

I think this is more that just a chuckothoughts. It ought to be an everybodythoughts, come to think about it.