Expressing Gratitude

[muqawwee123]

Re: Expressing Gratitude

@Muzna

You’ve touched upon the thing that I want to understand.
There are different rules it seems.

I’ve recently had an experience where gifts, mainly of cash, were given to a couple where the husband is a recent arrival in Canada. Typically the couple was invited over for dinner and as they were leaving they were handed a card/envelope containing the gift. The couple did the standard, “Thank you. We had a lovely evening” formalities and left. They did nothing to follow up after the dinner or to thank the hosts for the monetary gift that they were given. This happened not only to me but to other family members as well.

Within a few months an occasion arose where I gave another such monetary gift. Again…same thing…no acknowledgement and no thank you.

What gives?

I get it that you don’t have to thank your parents or your spouse (though I don’t agree with that either cuz that’s not how I was raised) but anyone other than that deserves a thank you, no?

And for those that may say the culture in Pakistan is different, I have other cousins that were born and brought up there and they do not behave this way…so I’m left a bit perplexed.

I personally observed that when people start taking care of us, we start taking them for granted. It may not be a cultural thing, but a psychological impact that is becoming a trend in most of the societies. May be its human nature.

Sometimes, people consider favors given to them as a norm (acceptable custom) and they think that just saying ‘thank you’ is all what is required. There are people who always want to be on receiving side and if you deny them a favour (even due to some good reason), they take it very negatively. But this should not be surprising as the Creator Himself called human-beings thankless (na-shukre).

On other side, there are filmi phrases like “There is nothing like ‘sorry’ and ‘thanks’ in friendship, etc”. Some people are not expressive to show their gratitude, even they are burdened with the favour they receive.

To cut it short, its probably not something related to culture. Its individual psyche and upbringing that determine how a particular person will show gratitude. Almost all cultures and religions emphasize to show gratitude and be thankful like there is a hadees (if I’m not mistaken) which goes like ‘He has not thanked Allah who has not thanked people’.