the art of gifting

A few weeks ago, there was an article on NY Times about Chinese living in Beijing and Shanghai have started to move away from polluted cities in pursuit of clean air and blue sky. This article prompted me to think about how we in the U.S. have benefited from cheap "Made in China" goods. The Chinese have been producing all kinds of goods to satisfy Western appetite and have as a result increased its own wealth. However, this wealth came as a steep and irreversible price of polluting its land, air, and water.

After reading that article, I have made a resolution to consume less to minimize our impact to the environment. Basically, we will buy just what we need (not what we want). This may be quite difficult to carry out especially with these e-mail blasts of promotions and beautiful window displays but we will just need to constantly remind ourselves whether we really need something.

Christmas is a season to celebrate the birth of Jesus. But people often forget about the real reason of celebration and focus more on buying gifts. For some people, they buy things that they cannot afford which create additional stress. On the receiving end, people may not always be pleased with what they have received. Over the years, we have been given a lot of stuff and to this day we still don't know what to do with them. There are clothes that are perfectly functional but just not my style. There are vitamins that we don't really eat. They now take up space at home and I get annoyed every time when I see them. To donate them or throwing them out, it inflicted a deep guilt as I know that others spend money in acquiring these items. So the best solution to this dilemma is to advising family members not to give them in the future. Instead of giving gifts, the best thing that we can give is our heart and our time.

So instead of buying your loved ones gifts, how about spending quality time with them? Cook something wonderful for them? Take a walk with them? These invisible gifts will last for many years in their memories!