There is much controversy about gift giving at this time of the year. Whether it’s over a holiday or simply a non-holiday end-of-the-year gift, there are many ways people have tried to make this easy and have quite honestly confused the tradition for many people.

My opinion on gift giving is simple. Ask yourself one question. Do you want to give this person a gift? Don’t worry about if they are giving you a gift; don’t worry about who else is giving this person a gift; don’t worry about a price range. The essential reason you give a person a gift must originate with the feeling that you want to give this person a gift.

The holiday season has confused this feeling for many people. Because there is this season of giving, there is now a “right time” for giving. However, each individual may feel the need to give a gift at any point during the year, or not. Gift giving is a personal thing based on a personal relationship between you and the one you are buying a gift for. This is why the whole idea of buying a gift for everyone or no one at all is ridiculous! There is no way you are expected to have personal relationships with everyone in your office or class or whatever group you are associated with. If that is the expectation, I would reevaluate the reason you associate with that group.

The whole season of giving started with celebrating being thankful during Thanksgiving. That should honestly be the holiday we give gifts. A gift should be given to say something along the lines of, “I appreciate you as a friend or colleague or family member,” or “I appreciate you being in my life,” or “I feel as if you have positively affected my life, and I am thankful for that”.

When you have decided to give this meaningful person a gift the gift itself should be as meaningful as the decision to give the gift. Let’s reflect on what we just did. We ignored social pressure to buy pointless gifts, we singled out who was meaningful in our life, and we consciously decided to put effort towards buying these people gifts. This may seem like no big deal to some people. But on the other hand to those who do not give this much thought during their busy life this may be a significant step this year. So why spend all that effort narrowing down the significant people in your life to merely hand them a gift card to Target?

There are millions of ways to pick out gifts. It could be based on the type of relationship you have with the person. It could be based on what you think that person is interested in. It could be based on what you think that person really wants. It could be based on what you think that person needs. I am not here to tell you how to pick out a gift. But whatever you do give that person it is a small representation of not only what you think of that person but possibly what you think about the relationship between you two, however casual or friendly it is.

This shouldn’t give you reason to worry about picking out the “perfect gift.” Honestly whatever you put thought into will be perfect enough. The more thought you put into the gift will show. The more thought you put into the gift the more that person will see the effort you took to give them a nice gift.

Not to put life into an old phrase, but it’s the thought that counts. Granted the thought has to have been acted upon. You can’t just think of buying your significant other a nice gift and then do nothing about it. That simply shows that you are lazy. I suppose that the thought still counts in this situation as well it just counts negatively instead of in your favor.

So make your thoughts of the people you find most significant in your life count in your favor this year whenever you choose to give them a gift.