Growing the Skill of Giving

In 2008, Malcolm Gladwell’s book, Outliers, hit the shelves and quickly rose to the top of several prominent best seller lists. In this book, Gladwell attempts to answer the question of what makes high-achievers different? Among other factors, Gladwell identifies what he calls “the 10,000-hour rule.” He argues that natural talent is a myth and for people to become experts in a profession or craft, they need at least 10,000 hours of practice to master that skill. While some nuances to this rule have been added over the past 15 years, the main idea persists: if you want to be good at something, you need to practice. And you need to practice a lot.

Are there any spaces in life where this rule doesn’t apply? What about generosity? There’s no reason to think this rule doesn’t fit generosity, or more specifically the skill for giving. That’s right, it would serve us well to view giving as a skill to be developed as opposed to a quality that someone either possesses or not. When we view giving in this way, akin to learning to play the piano or compete in a sport, we can see that giving also takes practice to master as well. And as with practicing any other skill, we don’t become experts overnight. Instead, it requires hours and hours of persistent, intentional practice.

There are many ways we can practice the skill of giving in our own lives. Many churches, nonprofits and community organizations have one-time serve onramps for volunteers. This is an excellent opportunity to practice serving for different causes and in different capacities. Through these low commitment opportunities, we may find that there are certain causes we are more passionate about than others. We may also discover that we find more joy serving in one particular way over another. Through this “practice” we can gain better clarity in how to best serve and where we can have the greatest impact with our generosity.

Likewise, as we seek to grow our financial giving we can start with simple steps. Small monetary donations to specific causes can build the habit of giving and soften our hearts toward being more generous down the road. Similarly, for someone that’s been a consistent giver for quite a while, stretching themselves in faith to move to an above-and-beyond giver can be practiced. It just starts with making that first commitment to give that extra gift that makes them a little uncomfortable. Another development is the person who has practiced giving for so long that they’re ready for more holistic giving, like giving asset-based gifts and non-cash gifts in sophisticated ways.

The more we practice our giving, the more impact we will have in the world! Whatever your skill level for generosity right now, be encouraged, and also challenged, that you can keep getting better at it. If you were your own Generosity Coach for a day, where would you challenge yourself to hone your skill of giving through old-fashioned practice? It may not take 10,000 hours to get really good at giving, but the more we practice it, the more impactful it will be!