Tool 59 · Develop your mission
This exercise has no view about how much you should give. It looks at what you actually give and what happens as a result.
A guided 18 to 22 minute conversation using ChatGPT. Free, no account, nothing to sign up to.
01
Copy
Take the TAIU prompt.
02
Paste
Open ChatGPT.
03
Talk
One question at a time.
Copies the TAIU prompt. Paste it into ChatGPT.
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And what happens in you when you consider it? That answer usually explains the giving better than any account of your values.
Well meant help sometimes maintains a situation rather than changing it.
What you'll explore
A note from Mark
I would take money out of it first. Most people give far more in access, introductions, attention and unpaid work than they ever give in cash, and none of it appears in their own accounting.
Then I would ask what happened afterwards. Not what it felt like. What changed. Generosity is not judged by the intention behind it, and a great deal of well meant help maintains a situation rather than moving it, which is worth knowing without anybody being blamed for it.
The refusals tell you more than the gifts. Who do you never say no to, and what happens in you when you try? That is where the motive lives, and it is far more reliable than asking somebody directly why they give.
And I would allow no to be a legitimate answer. Saying no is sometimes the most useful thing you can do for somebody, and almost everybody who gives a lot has one relationship where it is overdue.
What you'll get
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What is really given
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The observable effect
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The real cost
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Whether no is available
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Your TAIU handover — a portable summary of everything the conversation established.
What now?
01 · Save it
What you actually give, in all its forms.
02 · Test it
Say no once, to somebody you always say yes to, and see what actually happens.
What I would do
List the forms, not just the amounts. Access and attention are given more often than money.
Look at what actually happened afterwards.
Notice who you never refuse, and ask yourself why.
Count the cost honestly, including the resentment.
Be willing to conclude that giving less is the responsible answer.
Test it
What do you give that is not money?
Who have you never refused?
What happened after the last time?
The alternative
The expected reading is either that you should give more or that you are being taken advantage of. Two alternatives usually produce more. Saying no may be the more responsible act, particularly where the giving is maintaining a situation rather than changing it, and that is a finding rather than a criticism. Or the reverse: you may have considerably more capacity to contribute than you recognise, and a habit of modesty about it that has quietly become a reason not to.
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If the question underneath is obligation rather than giving
Further thinking
Spending money on others promotes happiness
Elizabeth Dunn, Lara Aknin and Michael Norton
Give and Take
Adam Grant
The Generative Society
Dan McAdams and Ed de St Aubin
Article
Elizabeth Dunn, Lara Aknin and Michael Norton
The effect depends far less on the amount than on whether the giving was chosen and whether you can see what it did. That is a useful design constraint. A small, specific, visible commitment does more for the person giving than a larger anonymous one, which is worth knowing before you set up something you will never think about again.
Book
Adam Grant
Grant's finding that givers occupy both the top and the bottom of most performance distributions is the practical heart of this. What separates them is not generosity but whether the giving is bounded. If you have ever concluded that you should do more while quietly running out of road, read this before you add anything.
Book
Dan McAdams and Ed de St Aubin
McAdams has spent a career on generativity, the concern for establishing and guiding the next generation. His work shows it is not confined to parents and not confined to later life, and that people who have it tend to tell a particular kind of story about themselves. Useful for locating contribution you already make and have never counted.
Article
C. Daniel Batson and colleagues
Batson's experiments put people in situations where acting fairly cost them something and nobody would know. Most preferred to appear moral to themselves rather than to be moral, and were remarkably good at not noticing. It is a useful piece of evidence to hold when you are describing the distance between what you say you value and what you did last month.