Image: Escalera (Museo Botero) by David Yazo

In Dan Millman’s book Everyday Enlightenment, the last chapter discusses the topic of Serving Others. Halfway through that chapter , Dan includes a wonderful quote from Lynne Twist, one of the founders of The Hunger Project:

People think that service is a kind of charity – strong people giving to weak people, healthy people giving to sick people, rich people giving to poor people, together people giving to people who aren’t so together.

To me, true service is an experience of wholeness, fulfillment, fullness, self-reliance, and self-sufficiency for all parties – an experience of the magnificence and infinite capacity of human beings. When I’m really in service, I disappear. My identity is no longer present. I am one with he or she or that which I am serving. It is actually an experience of God, of unity and wholeness. There is nobody giving and nobody receiving. None of that is happening. There is only an experience of unity. We begin to see that we are the expression of one soul.

An act of service is an act of love and trust. It’s also an act of responsibility and of courage… a stand for the integrity of human life.

In this profound quote, Lynne hints to the true benefits of generosity. Passing your kindness forward is a transcendental action, one which provides the giver and the receiver with a greater sense of being, of connection to all that is. Lynne describes it a as ‘experience of God‘, something you will experience regardless of your religious inclination.

Giving & Receiving is a part of life; we do it every day. Embrace it with a whole and open heart, and become more aware of all that you give and receive from life every day, and you may find a deeper meaning in what appear to be very ordinary moments. Yet by becoming more aware of the connectedness that links you to the rest of the human race, you will find that there are, in fact, very little ordinary moments.

Pass It forward; not only will it soon come back with interest, but you will also find the experience uplifting for your soul and spirit.