[rottenapple]

I donate a decent amount every year to causes I support. This past year I've donated a couple a hundred to earthquake victims here in Ecuador. I also put in time and work to get a 2 ton shipment to an isolated community living close to the epicenter. Besides this some money for biodiversity conservation. But the most money in charity I spend on families of girls I'm dating. I've dated a few like that with very poor backgrounds and families that are really at the bottom, can't even buy medicine for their kids etc. In those cases its a no brainer to help out and it gives more satisfaction as you can directly see the impact.

I don't believe in all charities, but solidarity is important guys, you never know when you will be on the wrong side of a natural disaster or a medical problem for instance. And yes it makes me feel good about myself as well, nothing wrong with that.

[Rawmeo]

I donate to charity on a weekly basis - but I take great care to choose which ones to avoid. I always research the organism to ensure that they are not affiliated with equality, LGBT, feminism, globalism, or any other shit. If the organism comes clean, then I'll be happy to donate.

[GlobalMan]

I don't think I've ever donated to any general cause or group in my life.

It's not a decision I've made, more like this kind of vaguery doesn't find space in my interests and doesn't compel me in the least.

On the other hand, I will freely and without thought treat friends and family to excellent nights out and an excellent time; and I will help people I know in the various ways I can. This is a far more important and impactful cause- and a far better use of my time and spare cash.

To address something about the title itself- I don't think there's a more empty reason to give something than to "feel good about yourself". If that is one's motivation then it's not about making a difference at all, it's about assuaging one's fears and guilt.

Give because you know it will make a real and direct difference- even better if it's someone you know, a person standing in front of you, or something like buying a Gold Membership to help keep your favorite forum going.

Lizard expanded on this topic in the following quotes. Even though he's speaking about wealthy men particularly, it also applies generally:

thread-54878.html

(04-03-2016 10:16 PM)The Lizard of Oz Wrote:  

...The only reason that seriously wealthy men ruin their lives and don't have the greatest lives imaginable is because they ruin their minds and their bodies with drugs, booze, bad habits, and laziness. I'm talking weak-minded inheritors of wealth who waste it in a blaze of vice and dissipation; I'm talking prole powerball winners who burn it all in two years full of meth, aging strippers, poor investments, and lawsuits (well, I can respect that, but only within reason -- within reason); and I'm talking Xer and boomer dullards who get lucky with some app and then give their minds and their lives over to the terrible VICE of CHARITY -- not realizing that charity, for a rich man, is one of the worst and most worthless of all vices, a banality so profound that it can turn your mind and your character to mush faster than you can say "Gates foundation"...

...help people you know -- not "targeted charities" but actual people you meet in your life for whom you can make a gross and disproportionate difference -- with gifts and advice that transform their lives radically for the better...

(04-06-2016 10:14 PM)The Lizard of Oz Wrote:  

There is nothing wrong with charity as such -- it's fine to share some of your wealth to improve other people's lives, and there is no problem as far as that goes.

The problem happens when people who become quite wealthy use an excessive concentration on charity as an excuse to keep their lives and minds dull. To have great wealth is to have great possibility -- an entrance to a thousand worlds, worlds of pleasure, interest, variety and entertainment not available to almost any human being -- whether it be any who lives now, or any that has ever lived.

A man should have the brain -- and the balls -- to embrace these possibilities. Just as a king should relish wearing his crown and letting all its jewels sparkle in turn, a wealthy man -- who, if he has his health and is not damaged by vices is like a king in the world -- should relish taking what he is so privileged to have; he should let his mind and his body eat the world. Again, this does not imply dissolution or idiotic excesses of gluttony, but a wealthy man should take a heaping measure, both of the physical goods and pleasures that are his for the taking, and of the incomparable riches of experience and apprehension and curiosity that go beyond the physical. And it can be added that work -- work done to accomplish one's most coveted ends and ambitions -- is another one of those goods that a wealthy man is free to abandon himself to in heaping measure; it is one of the strong pleasures that differs from the burden of work done for mere sustenance.

To do otherwise is to betray life. The wealthy who devote their entire time to the rote pursuits of charity are widely admired but in fact they do so because they fear life and fear the world. Because of this fear, rather than take what is rightfully theirs -- rather than drink from the thick cup of life -- they confine their best years to these thin transactions; as if the utter banality of such generic "good works" could replace the variety and interest of a great life. In doing so, they diminish their lives and their minds and, at worst, turn them to mush. A mind that occupies itself too long with the contemplation of banalities and commonplaces when the entire world is at its feet is a mind that fears and rejects life, that will not consume its real juices; and life will in turn, soon enough, have no use for it.

For a man of wealth and means, the best giving is the giving that comes not from a dull devotion to charity but from the desire to turn his happy energies outward, to distribute the life that it's been his privilege to drink of so deeply and to bring others into it; to share not just of his wealth but of himself and of what he's become. When a great and happy king walks among his people, the gifts he bestows upon them are more than mere donations, they are dazzling and they have within them the warmth of what is given from the overflowing of great energy. They can change a whole life and they can uplift the spirit of those who may be less fortunate; because they see that a deeper, fuller, richer life is not a mere fiction, it can be a reality; they receive a sense of fullness and possibilities that no alms can provide. That is what can be given by a man who has used great wealth to live a great life full of energies and in league with the world; and it can be given by no one else. To that, no charity comes close.

[Hypno]

I don't want to hijack this thread, but OP mentioned that he was interested in the psychic benefits of giving, so I think one should really look at donating one's time, not one's money. There is nothing wrong with donating money - it can be more effective for the recipient, but donating your time will have a more profound effect on you.

I gave a brief speech to some boy scouts about the benefits of community service. When you do this, you put yourself in the shoes of the recipient. You understand their values and challenges. It humbles you. It give you new perspectives. It connects you to a broader community.

Now, this doesn't have to be a soup kitchen. Volunteer to referee or help a youth sports league. There is someone who opens and closes the field. There is usually a team that needs an extra assistant coach. Tucker Max in his book Mate volunteered at an animal shelter as a strategy to get laid because its mostly women there. My father, when he became a widower, visited other from his church who were also mourning and it helped my father get over HIS loss.

Just donating money is a shortcut and you miss most of these benefits.