A Penny Spent

How many of you like holiday shopping? Not me. I don’t like lines, I don’t like crowds and I don’t like competitive or whining shoppers. Yet I have to admit one of the most positive, defining moments of my life occurred the very first time I went holiday shopping on my own.

That first time came the next December after I graduated from high school. I went Christmas shopping with a jaded eye because of a vocabulary word I learned in my junior year. The word was misanthrope, defined for me then as a belief that all human behavior is self-motivated. That definition led me to think that even when we do something good for someone else we are really doing it for ourselves.

So as I walked through the crowded mall that’s the lens through which I saw everything. Selfish kids were tugging at their parent’s shirt, pestering them about what they wanted for Christmas. Selfish adults were complaining about what presents they could buy other adults that would satisfy some self-interested social contract. I could see the dollar signs in each shopkeeper’s eyes as they indulged their customers. My beliefs as a misanthrope painted an unflattering sight.

After an hour of shopping I came across the food court, with smells of pizza and fried foods filling the air. I decided a strawberry ice cream cone would hit the spot, with the cool, creamy texture and taste of strawberry melting in my mouth. I got in line at a Baskins and Robbins counter right behind an elderly, disheveled woman. The line moved well; ice cream in December was not in big demand. The elderly woman in front of me paid for her order by placing fifteen cents on the counter, but the clerk informed her there was a penny tax. She looked distressed as she went to rummage in her purse. I responded to her distress by grabbing a penny my pocket that I plunked down on the counter.

That gave me a revelation. Why did I detect a look of concern on this stranger’s face? The simple answer is because I could. We all read emotions pretty well, that is part of being human. Why did I bother with the penny for a stranger? The misanthrope would say the cause was to boost my own self-esteem, or to get the line moving, or because I’ve learned that general reciprocity makes a better world for me to live in. Though I was a misanthrope up until that moment I did not accept any of those motivations for my altruistic behavior.

Instead, I felt compassion for a total stranger who seemed to be down on her luck and I behaved out of pure humanitarian instinct without any thinking or “self-motivation” involved. As much as my mind wanted me to believe that my behavior was self-motivated my heart would not allow it. My new conclusion, based on my own experiential evidence, was that not all human behavior is self-motivated.  I came to learn the value of empathy.

Until that moment I had not realized my spiritual impoverishment since high school. I had been on a path towards becoming a Scrooge. I skipped down the crowded mall with a buoyant spirit. I went up the down escalator and down the up escalator. I became a child at heart once more; similar to what might be called born again.

I indeed was saved from a life of cynicism. I now saw things differently in that crowded mall. I saw kids snuggling up to their parents on benches as they took a break from shopping. I saw young lovers walking hand-in-hand as they strolled and looked at displays. I saw shopkeepers with an obvious talent and love for waiting on people. Not everybody was like this, of course, but enough for me to think to myself, as I have thought ever since: “Humanity is good!”

The impact on my life of that penny spent is one of the most profound experiences anyone can have. Nothing is going to affect your outlook and the paths you take in life as much as what you believe about humanity. When I later went to college I did not automatically accept popular but unproven assumptions such as “the selfish gene” or “the invisible hand of self-interest.” Instead, I’ve always delighted in those moments of pure altruism that, rare as they may be in a civilized society, continually frame the goodness of humanity.

How about you? Is everything you see and feel self-motivated? Or are there many experiences in your life that are other-motivated? You must look into your own heart for that answer, but make sure you consult your heart first before believing what a cynical society tells you.