My Answer...

I hope am not unique when I say that my mood can change very quickly (maybe it's a woman thing). One  moment I am inspired and energised and the next I am despondent and exhausted. Yes, I am going through quite a big change right now - from teacher to writer - and this, I know, is not an easy task but change is what I asked for so change is what I will welcome.

I read a quote the other day that started like this: "Don’t get bogged down looking for a way to persist. Just make sure you’re absolutely clear on why you have chosen to persist". I read this at the exact moment that I was feeling rather overwhelmed and rather 'bleh' about my chosen career path. Even though I KNOW I am doing what I am supposed to do and even though I KNOW that this might take some time, I forget to look at the WHY.

What I love about this quote (and I wish I knew who wrote it) is that it inspired me immediately. I even made it into my desktop background so that as soon as I start writing in the morning it will be there as a reminder. So right now I am going to answer that question and if you are also on the path of change I suggest you answer it as well.

Why have I chosen to persist?
I have chosen to persist because writing is like breathing to me. When I write I feel more alive, more conscious and more connected to who I am.
I have chosen to persist because I believe in myself (even though this is probably the first time I have admitted that).
I have chosen to persist because I want to be heard - I want my thoughts to be heard.
I have chosen to persist because I know that if I don't I will be letting a part of myself die and I might never get that part back again.
I have chosen to persist because I want to - it is so important to remember that it is in fact a choice - no one has forced me to do this and no one is forcing me to persist.

I have chosen to persist because I am who I am and I want the world to know me too.

"It is precisely the possibility of realising a dream that makes life interesting" - Paulo Coelho

Gift Certificates

According to Wikipedia, a gift certificate was first called a “scrip”. Scrip is an “American term for any substitute for currency which is not legal tender and is often a form of credit. Scrips were created as company payment of employees and also as a means of payment in times where regular money is unavailable, such as remote coal towns, military bases, ships on long voyages, or occupied countries in war time”.

You could receive a gift certificate like the one above and discover it was sent to you from the past by a welder named Klaus. Or the more likely scenario is that you have a voucher to go on the party pirate ship that sails around the Cape Peninsula. It seems like a lot of fun can be had with the making of gift vouchers. I have often thought that in some situations the best thing you can do is make a gift certificate for someone. For example, if a friend has just had a baby I could give her a voucher for one babysit or a home cooked meal – a voucher almost makes that offer more tangible and then they might remember to take you up on your offer.

Gift cards are of course another form of gift certificates. There would be a certain amount of money on the card already and you would have to spend it at the specified store or shopping centre. I think that these are really great, I know that I love getting them (especially if it’s a Woolworths one because then I have to shop there).

And then there are the gift vouchers that no one ever wants to get. Personally, I would not want this one. I wonder if there is gift certificate etiquette...can you pass it on to someone who can use it and just lie to you friend and say that you got the hammer you always wanted? I guess this falls under friend etiquette and then I guess the lying part would be inappropriate. I guess I could always buy a plant at the hardware store.

There are so many different types of gift certificates out there and in this day and age almost every shop has them. I think it is a great way to let someone choose what they want. And if you do get a gift voucher to some random shop like Dumbbells-R-Us then just make the best of it and be grateful for the gift of toned upper arms.

Presents

I was curious to know how many presents I would have bought for my immediate family if I lived to be 90 years old. I am guessing that I, personally, started buying gifts when I was 19 years old (before that my parents would have done it on my behalf). So, I am taking 5 family members (my parents, my sister, my husband and my daughter) with each of them receiving 2 presents a year (birthdays and Christmas) over a 71 year period. That is a total of 710 presents. I was hoping for a far more dramatic number like 3254 to be exact, so now I have no idea what the point of this blog is.

Let’s look at how much this would have cost me. Let’s say on average I have spent R200 per present (for my daughter this amount will be more) so that, in total, comes to R142 000...Aha! There’s the dramatic number I was looking for. So in other words, if I want to have a comfortable retirement I need to stop spending so much money on presents.

Unfortunately, I find it very difficult not to spend a lot of money on gifts. I love to spoil the people I love and the things I want to buy them always seem to cost a lot of money. This, however, is not my fault. I had come up with what I thought to be an ingenious plan the other day and shared it with my husband. “What if all over the world there was an immediate decrease in the cost of everything, for example, what if everything was cut down by 50%, all our problems would be solved.” My husband then replied (shattering my clever plan), “But what about salaries?” So there went the master plan – salaries would also be cut down by 50% and then we would all still be struggling but with far less money. Anyway, it was worth a try – I won’t bore you further with my brilliant idea of how to bring bartering back.

The point of my delightful story is that presents cost money – even if you make something it will cost you money, yes, it won’t be nearly as much (unless you make jewelry) but then you have to factor in the time to make all these gifts. The ideal situation would be if you then discover that you are great at making gifts and you start selling them and then make lots of money.

My goodness! I am really not staying on topic at all. It always amazes me that while I write something with a certain topic in mind I sometimes find myself writing something completely different. What I really wanted to say was that gift giving to me is something I enjoy and if the total was 3254 I would be thrilled because it meant that I had had people to love in my life and people who love me. What I also just realised is that the amount of presents you give is probably the same amount that you get (not that this is the point at all). This blog has not turned out the way I wanted it to but anyway, I guess I am a least delivering on my promise to share with you my thoughts as they are “write now”. If you have continued to read this far, I greatly appreciate you sticking through this very random blog on presents.

Wedding Gift Registry and General Gift Registry

A wedding gift registry is the only way that a soon to be married couple can actually get what they want and what they need. Very few people are going to be honest about they want if you ask them but if you have a registry it tells the guests for you.

I can imagine, however, that now a days, with couples already living together before they get married, that some people already have the most obvious wedding gifts such as kitchen appliances, crockery and picture frames. So maybe the wedding registry is going out of fashion. My husband and I stated on our wedding invite that “your presence is present enough but money for our honeymoon would be much appreciated”. We had all the homely items that we needed and frankly, we didn’t have the space for any homely items that we wanted, so if anything, money would be most welcome. And because of this we were able to buy a bed and a braai – in my opinion these are two vital items needed for any marriage.

A wedding registry can only be extremely useful if the couple has not lived together and they are both coming from home (where they lived with their parents) and do literally not own a single thing of their own. In this situation it is, I’m sure, a wonderful way to get all the things you need to get your home all homely.

General gift registry is a foreign concept to me. It would make me feel uncomfortable to have a registry for my birthday. In fact, I have never heard of anyone having a registry for anything but a wedding. I can imagine that it could work for a baby shower or possibly an engagement party (but then surely you couldn’t do one for your wedding as well)...mmm...I’m not sure about this. Maybe it is more for upper upper class individuals who splurge on any occasion and it is just common practice to have a gift registry when you son turns 2 years old.

I am wracking my brain to think on what other occasion you could have a general gift registry. Maybe a 20^th wedding anniversary (still I feel this is something for the elite part of society). I guess, however, that the registry doesn’t have to be somewhere expensive. You could have one at Mr. Price Home or Pep or even Builders Warehouse. Then even Mr. Joe Smith could have a registry for his 50^th birthday and everyone can choose between garden hose nozzles and braai tools. It could work I guess.

Maybe people would be really relieved to no longer guess what someone wants for their birthday and maybe I am just to shy to tell people, “this where I have a gift registry, go and buy me what I want”. I have never thought so much about gifts registries before and I have never changed my mind about a concept while writing a blog. So, if anything, random gift registries have served their purpose already.

Adventure Gift Voucher and Adventure Bookings

I think that there are very few people who look back at their life and say, “I wish I didn’t have so many adventures”. If anything, people say that they were not adventurous enough. I think that most people also need a little push when it comes to trying out any extreme sport experience. A gift of an adventure gift voucher is a great idea when you have a friend who doesn’t have the guts to take the first step.

An adventure experience I am assuming involves doing an extreme sport of some sort. You get board sports which involve activities such as sand boarding, kite surfing and flow boarding. With motorsports you could do things such as motocross, drifting and motorcycle rallying. Then there are water sports which involve activities such as kayaking and scuba diving. Mountaineering includes ice climbing, rock climbing and bouldering. And finally there is freefall which is wing-suit flying, BASE jumping and parachuting. All the above activities would make great gifts in the form of an adventure gift voucher.

With an adventure gift voucher you can give someone the opportunity to do anything from rally racing to windsurfing and free-diving to bungee jumping – the possibilities are endless when the gift is an adventure gift voucher – and the best thing is that you can choose something that you know the person has wanted to do. Just an idea, but it would probably be best if you join them as well (you can’t tell someone that they will have a great time jumping out of an airplane if you wouldn’t do it yourself).

As well as adventure gift vouchers you can also do adventure bookings for groups. Adventure bookings would be done for corporate teambuilding and tourists or even just a group of friends or family members. I am sure there are few activities that could bring a team (or a family) together like the fear of dying. I can just picture everyone speaking their mind as they plummet towards the ground...on second thought this might do the opposite and tear your team apart. Well, I still think that adventure bookings seem like a swell idea.

I asked my husband what he thought of if I mentioned the words ‘adventure bookings’ and he first laughed, then said, “4 x 4’s, camping, roughing it”. At least now I know to never give him a wing-suit flying voucher. I believe that the aim of these ‘adventures’ is to thrill and excite and to release the following hormones into our blood stream – dopamine, endorphins, serotonin and most importantly adrenalin. Maybe that’s why a corporation would make an adventure booking for its staff – because it will make them all temporarily happy with adrenaline induced happy hormones.

An adventure booking is also a bit risky because you have to take into account that some people are just really attached to being alive and they might not take part as freely as others. Maybe it is best to check with everyone before hand and maybe split into a few different groups. For example, you could have the ‘live long’ group, the ‘when it’s my time it’s my time’ group and lastly the ‘I don’t give a f#%k’ group...yip, that should do the trick.