When You Gave Too Much

When You Gave Too Much

Balance, Exploring the Mindset Between Giving and Receiving

By: Stephanie S. Franklin, Esq., “Mecca”

Everything must be in balance. Balance creates order. Like positive and negative, masculine and feminine, day and night, sun and moon, opposites create a harmonious balance. These are examples of polarities, polarities equal completion. Without polar opposites, there is a disruption in the equation. Too much of one thing or another will create an imbalance. Imbalance creates a disruption in social order, physical bodies and mental and emotional stability.

Giving and receiving are a natural part of living. But what is unnatural is giving too much or taking too much. There are people who are very generous and always give, it is their nature. But, people who often give all the time, give too much and barely receive. This creates a huge imbalance. Now, some people may argue that one could never give too much, but this is not true. People who give too much disrupt the natural order of things and become resentful of giving too much and rarely receiving.

On the other hand, there are those who receive all the time. Not only do they constantly receive, but hardly ever give or don’t give at all. These are the people who are the takers. You know who you are because you clearly exist. These are the people who are very comfortable taking a great deal from you consistently without giving back, or if they do give back, it is rare and incomparable to what they have received. They take emotionally, they take physically, they take mentally, they take spiritually and financially. They also create an imbalance. Because remember, the Divine Law of Balance is about giving and receiving. It does not favor one pole over the other. Balance is balance. There must be a divine flow between each in order to maintain order. So, let’s explore the mindset of both givers and takers to unravel why each of them acts the way they do.

Givers Versus Takers

Givers are generous by nature; however, people who overly give have an insatiable need to control and please. Their need to control is that they want to guide the outcome to what they desire. And although masked as generosity, those who overly give like to control the process out of fear that what they desire will not happen. There is also this need to please. Driven by the need for affirmation of something for them, regardless of what it is. Pleasing is their way of getting what they need to affirm something inside of them that you will never know.

Takers are different. Takers are the ones who feel entitled. Generally, they do not want to take responsibility for things. They are those who blame everyone else for their predicament but themselves. They feel that everybody owes them, not because they feel that they are deserving, but because they feel guilty about their current predicament that they have created and are unable to digest this emotionally. Therefore, they feel that everyone else should assist them. This entitlement belief continues as they receive more and more. They continue to receive so consistently because they are in expectation of receiving. Because we live under capitalism, in a land of material consumption, some people may see this as the way to go and seek to copy this behavior. But you should be strongly cautioned in engaging in the “taking” behavior because again, looking back at the Divine Law of Balance, taking too much creates an imbalance which is very unhealthy. It creates a karmic dynamic that is what you put out, you get back. So, if you are comfortable taking all the time, what you will receive will be minimal compared to what you could receive if you were more giving.

Givers and takers, you know in which camp you belong. Take the time to study why you are a giver and why you are a taker and how you will shift the scale in order to create a harmonious balance within yourself and your relationships!