The Power of Gratitude: Building Stronger Communities Through Generosity
What if the key to personal happiness and community strength isn't in what we accumulate but in what we give away? This November, as we gather around Thanksgiving tables, we have an opportunity to recognize a truth that experience, science, and faith traditions have long known. Gratitude and generosity don't drain us. They enrich us, creating ripples that strengthen the very fabric of our democracy.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu once joked that "God doesn't know very much math, because when you give to others, it should be that you are subtracting from yourself. But in this incredible kind of way, you give, and it then seems like in fact you are making space for more to be given to you." This paradox reveals itself in our daily lives. When we act generously, practice charity, and bring joy to others, we discover that our own well-being grows rather than diminishes.
Science confirms what many of us instinctively know. Evolutionary biologists and social scientists now see cooperation, empathy, compassion, and generosity as essential for human survival. Research indicates that generosity links to better health and longer life. Even more impressively, kindness is infectious—when we act compassionately, our friends, their friends, and even their friends' friends become more likely to show compassion themselves. This creates synergy, where our combined efforts produce outcomes much greater than what any of us could achieve alone.
Gratitude forms the basis of this interconnectedness. When we take a moment to appreciate a meal, we recognize the farmers who grew our food, the harvesters who gathered it, the truckers who transported it, the grocers who stocked it, and the hands that prepared it. This simple gesture uncovers the invisible threads that link us in mutual dependence. As Brother David Steindl-Rast wisely said, "It is not happiness that makes us grateful. It is gratefulness that makes us happy."
Practicing gratitude doesn't require us to ignore life's struggles or deny pain. Rather, grateful people choose to appreciate what remains positive while acknowledging what challenges them. This shift moves us from a narrow focus on fault and lack toward a wider perspective of benefit and abundance—exactly the mindset healthy democracies need to thrive.
This understanding shaped the League of Women Voters when it was founded over a century ago. Our founders knew that informed, engaged citizens who see themselves as part of something bigger build stronger communities. That spirit still guides us today as we work to inspire everyone to participate in civic life, vote, and lend their voices to our shared future.
One powerful way to practice gratitude is to recognize those who strengthen our community. Each March, the League of Women Voters of South Central Texas celebrates Women's History Month by honoring area women whose inspiring stories remind us that women's voices and contributions are vital to our collective history. Our Women Making History event invites our community to join this joyful work by nominating women for special recognition. We will honor these remarkable women on March 8, 2026, at La Grange's Historic Casino Hall. Community nominations are open now.
As we enter this season of thanksgiving, we invite you to embrace gratitude not as a cure-all, but as a practice—a way of doing, trying, failing, and trying again that enriches our lives in meaningful ways. In doing so, we strengthen the connections, compassion, and civic participation that support not just our own well-being, but also the well-being of our communities and our democracy itself.
For information on nominating a woman for Women Making History recognition, visit the Women Making History page on our website or email the League of Women Voters of South Central Texas at contactus@lwvsouthcentraltx.org.