Why do people become stingy when they don’t feel appreciated?
By Rabbi Shalom Landau.
Rabbi Landau teaches that “stinginess is not a personality, it’s a recipe.” The stingiest person in your life can become the most generous one.
He explains with a common situation. If you don’t feel appreciated by your wife or children, you will still provide and still pay the bills, but something shifts. “You start to become measured and stingy. Something inside you closes when you don’t feel wanted.”
That, he says, is the difference between a dictator and a king whom people accept willingly. A dictator also gives, because he has no choice, but he gives stingily. That is why Achashverosh made a feast for 180 days: to show what a king is about, as the Megillah says, בְּהַרְאֹתוֹ אֶת עֹשֶׁר כְּבוֹד מַלְכוּתוֹ, displaying the riches of his kingdom. Giving at the scale of a king happens “because kingship is only activated when you feel wanted.”
The same is true of Hashem, which is why He wants us to choose Him as King again every year. “He definitely doesn’t want to give stingily.” His lesson applies everywhere: “Make someone feel like a king, and they will give you like a king.”
Related concepts: Generosity that cannot be taken back · Relationships
In A Soul at Peace: Giving Like a King
Also answered in this teaching
Why does Hashem want us to crown Him King every year?
Rabbi Landau teaches that kingship is activated when the king feels wanted. Hashem wants us to choose Him again each year because He does not want to give stingily.
Going deeper: Rabbi Landau's teaching, level by level
Surface claim
Rabbi Landau teaches that stinginess is not a fixed trait but a reaction to not feeling wanted.
Fear, vulnerability, or tension
A man who doesn’t feel appreciated at home keeps providing, but something inside him closes and his giving becomes measured.
Underlying need or longing
Every giver wants to feel wanted. A king accepted willingly gives with abundance; a dictator gives because he has to.
Deepest human truth
Make someone feel like a king and they will give like a king. In A Soul at Peace, Rabbi Landau adds: before you ask someone else to give, let him feel that he is a king.
More questions from this teaching
More answers: The Cycle of Renewal: Elul, Holidays, and Light · All questions · Questions about Rabbi Landau and Rivnitz