In our last show, we told you about the benefits of being thankful. Today, we'll tell you about the "helper's high".
The BIGG Successs Show
Putting The Giving In Thanksgiving
Welcome to our tenth big success show today. We'll discuss how to put the giving in Thanksgiving the big success show with George and Mary Lynn Last show we talked about the first half of Thanksgiving the thanks We've got a link to that show on our blog today at big success calm And we reference a really good study in that show about how being thankful George not only can improve your health But it can also help you achieve your goals. That makes me thankful. Well, I achieved my goals Things like you've never seen well and today of course we want to talk about the giving part of Thanksgiving and towards that end There's a lot of research out there Mary Lynn about the benefits just like with giving thanks the benefits of giving And I think most of us also already feel the benefits of giving well sure and it's interesting you say that because there's a study done by a Guy named Alan Luxe and Alan Luxe is the executive director at Big Brother's Big Sisters of New York City And he wrote a book called the healing power of doing good and in this book He describes something coined a phrase called the helpers high The helpers high and it turns out that you can get high by helping Isn't that a deal? It's a lot like that the endorphins that are released when you work out the workout high Exactly right. You feel more alert mentally. You've got more energy So you get the same benefit from helping others you sure do and interestingly enough When you work out you get that high, but if you try to recall working out it doesn't it doesn't change your body chemistry at all Thinking about working out doesn't help you lose weight Even if you've done it even if you've done it But the thing is when you help people when you give and then you recall the event the research shows that you actually get not as good a benefit But there's still benefit even in just recalling helping now I can completely identify with that because my mom suffered from complications of diabetes and every year I help out with the American Diabetes Association's walk our local chapters walk and You know, I I donate money. I donate my time. I'm a volunteer And whenever I'm there I always feel like I'm doing it in memory of mom And I'm doing it to help people who were in her situation by raising money to help with research And maybe people wouldn't have to suffer from the same complications and then also by being there at the event Helping to make it a success interacting with the other volunteers sharing stories all of that Just gives me that warm fuzzy feeling and and I just think of her all day long And I'm just thinking about it right now is giving me that feel I've got the I've got the tingles Mm-hmm, but it makes me feel good and warm in my heart and so see you're recalling it and you're experiencing that helper helper's eyes You know, so it's that's really something how this works And of course, you know, we're highlighting. There's two ways you can give right you can give your time or you can give your money That's right, and you know, maybe giving money isn't necessarily in the budget We all suffer from having tight budgets from time to time, but you don't have to just give money I mean obviously you can donate some food to the local food pantry If you've got a coat that's sitting in the closet that you don't use you could donate that for a family that is in need So there's plenty of options out there other than just cash and actually Mary Lynn I can I can relate to that I can give you a story that that that kind of demonstrates that and my mom passed a lot last Thanksgiving was her last and She didn't quite make it to Christmas, but at her funeral This young lady told a story about how she couldn't eat bread She suddenly had an allergy to flour, right? So she had to stop eating bread and I mean picture yourself, you know, some people can do that But for some people bread is a very in fact Doctors even tell us right bread should be a very stable part of your diet and here She is you know going day after day after day with no bread and she said she reached a point where she just she was just craving a slice of bread so badly and at that moment practically there was a knock on the door and It's my mom with some flourless bread And so, you know, here is my mom Giving something that you know, she wouldn't have bought this for herself She wouldn't have gone to a gourmet Shop to find a particular type of loaf of bread no way in the world because my mom would stretch a dollar into a dollar 50 You know, so there's no way she would have bought this for herself But but she knew that this woman was really in need. Yeah, I remember her telling that story and everybody in the church Their eyes watered because she told that story was such a motion I mean your mom made such an impact by reaching out to her and see that's another thing that we can give our Attention our attention to the people that we run into every day and what your mom did by paying attention she found a need that she could meet and Sometimes we can make the biggest difference in the lives of those closest to us, you know So so that's something to keep in mind and here's a little promise If you focus on giving you never have to worry about getting and I will attest to that because the people that I'm closest to I've met through volunteering in most cases and Marilyn you're one of those people you gave and you got a lot more than you have Argan for right and I like what I got all right, so let's wrap up what we talked about today Today we discussed the helpers high and the benefits of being benevolent and we do have a summary of today's show on our blog at B I G G success calm big success calm And we've also got a link to the book that we talked about the healing power of doing good And we've got to get our big quote for the day our quote is from the writer G Donald Gail a pessimist they say Sees a glass of water as being half empty an optimist sees the same glass half full but a giving person sees a glass of water and starts looking for someone who might be thirsty so quench someone's need today and Next show will practice not being perfect the perfectionist in me already doesn't like this one bit until then here's to your big success The big success show at B I G G success calm You (gentle music) [BLANK_AUDIO]