How Not To Give A Gift
Giving a gift is hard. It’s difficult to know what someone else might like. You want the gift to be well-received and enjoyed, but you want to give more than a generic gift card. I get it!
I’ve seen people go about gift giving in many ways and I’m here to tell you what to avoid and what to do instead. By avoiding the common mistakes, you can be an amazing gift giver, no matter the situation.
1. Give What You Love
Giving something you love to use sounds like a solid plan to give a gift, right? I mean, if you love it, other people will too.
Wrong.
A friend of mine was having trouble thinking of a Christmas gift for his brother. My friend loved to lift weights and found these weights that allowed you to choose the weight you lifted by the spin of a dial. Pretty cool, right? It is…for someone who loves to lift weights. My friend’s brother was not one of those people. He never used the weights and they collected dust for years before he ended up giving them back.
While the gift of the weights was very thoughtful, it wasn’t well thought out. Rather than looking outward to see what his brother would like, my friend looked inward to see what he would like.
When you choose a gift simply because you love it, the gift is no longer for that person. Instead, it’s for you.
Sometimes You Can!
It’s not always a bad idea to gift something you love. If a friend admires something you have or use, it MIGHT be okay to gift them a similar item. But there’s a catch. They have to mention they like it more than once. We all say we like something for the sake of conversation or to save someone’s feelings. It might be true, but we might also be full of it.
So if you do want to give this type of gift, make sure you’ve hinted at something similar so they have a chance to tell you how they really feel about it.
What to do instead…
Rather than thinking of what you would like to receive, look at what the other person loves. What do they with their free time? Friends don’t always share common interests, so really pay attention to what they might want or need.
When I was still dating my husband, I asked him for a Craftsman tool chest for my garage as a Christmas gift. We hadn’t been dating all that long and he wasn’t so sure about my request. His coworkers did their best to convince him it was a terrible gift and I was clearly setting him up for failure. They even tried to get him to buy me chocolate instead(I actually hate chocolate).
He bought me the tool chest and I could not have been happier. We still have that tool chest, 20 years later. Because my husband listened to me and paid attention to what I wanted, I got a gift that I loved. I was thoroughly impressed.
2. Give A Gift Card
Okay, I know this one seems a bit extreme, but hear me out. It’s completely fine to give a gift card as long as there’s a thoughtful gift that accompanies it.
A gift card by itself shows that you simply couldn’t think of a personalized gift. I’m guilty of doing this and if I’m honest about it, I know that I couldn’t think of another gift.
Something as simple as a bag of high-end coffee beans (or ground coffee) can go great with that gift card to the coffee shop. Or add a candle to a Target gift card.
Adding a simple gift to the gift card can make all the difference and easily turns a generic gift into something thoughtful and memorable.
3. Give A Gift With Conditions
This is a big one for me. Conditional gifts are not gifts at all. Adding conditions to your gift does nothing but feed your ego while making the other person feel like they don’t matter at all.
A gift is only truly a gift if it’s given freely. God gave his son for us. Can you imagine if he said, “Yes, my son will die for you…but only if you never sin again.”? No, His gifts are unconditional. Ours should be as well.
When you give a gift to your child, you can see how happy they are. It can be a physical representation of your love. If you then tell them that they better get good grades because you gave them that gift, the gift is no longer for the child. The gift becomes about the grades, not the person. That’s not a good feeling.
Keep gifts unconditional and they become more personal and meaningful.
How to Choose the Perfect Gift
Choosing the perfect gift comes down to one thing…observation. Pay attention to what the other person does with their free time. What colors to you see them wear a lot? Where do they like to go to relax or refuel? Strike up a conversation and get some information. If you want to know what the other person needs, start talking about some things you need.
If all else fails and you still can’t think of a gift idea, just ask. It can be as simple as “Hey, what do you want for Christmas?” Kids love adventure. If you’re looking for something unique for kids, set up a treasure hunt to find the gift. Half of the gift will be the treasure hunt itself!