The Heart Takes the Reins: A Christmas Reflection
Yesterday, Christmas Eve, I ran a few early errands to avoid the holiday crowds. My last stop was Trader Joe’s. As I pushed my cart toward the car in the pouring rain, I looked up and saw a family—mom, dad, and two children in raincoats, huddled under an umbrella. They were standing at the exit, holding a sign: “Merry Christmas. Please help.”
I raised my eyes from the cardboard sign to the father’s face and smiled. He smiled back—actually, he might have smiled first. In that instant, a thought surfaced, unbidden: I am going to put my groceries away and give them twenty dollars.
The thing is, I never give money to people on the street. It’s just not my thing. I usually believe in other ways of helping; I’ve never quite agreed with simply handing out cash. The thought took me by surprise.
I reached my car, loaded the groceries, and checked my wallet. I thought I had a twenty, but I only had a ten. Then I remembered—I had tucked forty dollars into my pocket earlier.
I returned the cart and turned back toward the family. I smiled again; the father smiled back. I walked up and handed him the two twenty-dollar bills. "Merry Christmas," I said.
The father looked at the bills, and his smile simply overflowed. In an accent that sounded Middle Eastern, he thanked me, wished me a Merry Christmas, and made a slight bowing gesture with his hands together. "God bless you," he said. I returned the gesture.
My heart overflowed. It felt, quite literally, as though my heart was so open that it was connecting with this family, all of us standing there together in the rain. As I drove out of the lot, the father’s eyes followed me. He looked as though his heart was overflowing, too. He smiled again and made that same bowing gesture of gratitude. I made it back to him.
I don’t share this to say, “Look at how generous I am.” Remember, I don’t even usually agree with doing this! And I certainly don't agree with people who boast about their charity publicly. Also, in my world, $40 is a lot!
The "amazing thing" for me was that I actually did it. The ten dollars I had in my wallet would have been a more than sufficient gift. But I didn’t even give the calculating mind a chance to bargain down my heart. The moment I remembered the $40, I knew that I would give it all.
It wasn’t a calculated, intellectual decision. It was an outpouring of love coming directly from my heart. My heart didn’t bother to ask my head for permission; it simply acted on an impulse of love.
Seeing that family standing there in the rain while all of the rest of us rushed to do our last-minute holiday shopping, I had this sudden, deep sense of wanting them to know that they belong. I wanted them to know they are loved, and that there is a warm heart turned toward them.
I have no idea what their story is. I don't know if they "needed" the money, though one might assume you’d have to be in desperate straits to stand in the pouring rain on Christmas Eve with your children. But the "need" wasn't the point.
The point was that my heart opened, and I let it. Not only did I let it, I acted on it. It felt as though my heart took back the reins from the calculating mind. It didn’t hem and haw; it didn't ask for permission or ponder the "correctness" of the situation. It connected, and it acted.
I realized then that this was an assertion of my own agency in the world. We often associate "taking the reins" with being overly assertive or even aggressive. But this wasn't aggressive. This was expansive. It was the power of an open heart moving outward into the world. It felt like coming home.
Merry Christmas.
