Giving as Identity
Thanksgiving often exposes who we really are. Some people treat it like a polite ritual, a yearly checklist of safe gratitude. But anyone who has been shaped by pressure knows that real gratitude has nothing to do with comfort. It comes from clarity from seeing what hardened you, what grew you, and who stood with you when life was honest.
In my culture, there is a phrase that carries more weight than any holiday toast. “May we always be the ones who give and not the ones who take.” This is not about charity. It is about identity. You choose who you are in a world that never stops testing you. The giver builds. The taker waits. The giver strengthens others. The taker drains others. The giver stands up when things get hard. The taker hides and hopes someone else will deal with the problem. Self-defense teaches you quickly that strength dies when you keep it to yourself. When you give it, it multiplies.
Most people see giving as loss. Less time. Less energy. Less attention. That is small thinking. Real giving is the strongest form of hoarding there is. Not hoarding objects or comfort. That kind of hoarding is fear pretending to be safety. I am talking about hoarding trust. Hoarding confidence. Hoarding good faith in people. Every time you give, you are raising the value of the people around you. You are building human capital that pays you back when life decides to test your foundation.
The strongest people you know are not the ones who cling to things. They are the ones who are not afraid to pour into others. Giving is not a weakness. Giving is evidence that you are not afraid of running out. In our training environment, this shows up every day. The partner who pushes you instead of letting you coast is giving something real. The instructor who demands more is investing in you. The student who shows up tired is giving to the entire room. Shared strength is strength that lasts.
But there is a side of gratitude that most people avoid because it is uncomfortable. Gratitude is not only for the people who supported you. It also belongs to the people who made your life difficult. The ones who forced you to confront your weakness. The ones who disappointed you. The ones who embarrassed you. The ones who showed you exactly where you were unprepared. These people were not obstacles. They were teachers. They made you sharper. They made you honest. They made you grow up. Without them, your current strength would not exist.
This is why gratitude is not softness. Gratitude is truth. It means looking at your past without lying to yourself. You survived things you once thought you could not handle. You adapted. You hardened. You learned. And now you are in a position to give others the strength you fought to earn.
Krav Maga reinforces this every day. You do not come here to learn choreography. You come here to handle pressure. To stay present when your body wants to check out. To manage fear instead of letting fear manage you. To push someone away with purpose. To move when hesitation wants to freeze you in place. The mat exposes you. Some days you show up strong. Some days you struggle. Some days you get hit harder than you planned for. Every one of those moments either mirrors you or grows you. Either way, you walk out better.
Thanksgiving is not about comfort. It is about presence. It is about recognizing the people who shaped your strength. The ones who trained with you. The ones who pushed you. The ones who did not let you stay small. The ones who showed you your blind spots. The ones who stood next to you even when life outside felt unstable. These people sharpen your instincts. They strengthen your mind. They help you become someone you can rely on.
We spend so much time trying to avoid difficulty that we forget that difficulty is the thing that forges resilience. A life without resistance produces fragile people. A life with honest resistance produces clarity and courage. If you have grown this year, it is because something or someone pushed you past the edge of your comfort. Be grateful for that. Growth never comes from what is easy. It comes from what demands a better version of you.
And this is the part people forget. Gratitude is not a feeling. It is a responsibility. If you want to honor what others have given you, you pass it forward. You become the giver. You invest in others. You show up when someone else struggles. You steady them when they freeze. You teach them what someone taught you. This is how real communities are built. Through presence. Through strength. Through choosing to give more than you take.
May we always be the ones who give and not the ones who take. Not because it sounds noble, but because it builds the kind of world we want to live in. A world where capable people stand together. A world where resilience spreads instead of thins out. A world where courage becomes normal.
This Thanksgiving, be grateful for the easy moments, but do not ignore the hard ones. Be grateful for the people who stood with you, but do not forget the ones who forced you to grow. Be grateful for the strength you have, and pass it forward. That is how we build fighters. That is how we build protectors. That is how we build a community worth belonging to.
If you trained here this year, if you sweat on these mats, if you pushed or were pushed, if you learned or taught or both, you already know the truth.
Happy Thanksgiving to those who give and to those learning to give more.
Do something amazing,
Tsahi Shemesh
Founder & CEO
Krav Maga Experts
Relevant articles:
1. Deficit Based Giving vs Abundance Based Giving
If you give from fear, you shrink. If you give from strength, you change people.
2. The Influence of a Good Teacher Can Never Be Erased
The people who push you hardest leave the strongest parts of you behind.
3. Life Lessons We Should Learn From Kids
Kids give without calculation. They remind us what giving looks like before fear interrupts it.
One Response
Thank you, Tsahi, for everything you do every day to enhance and strengthen the KME experience and community. Wishing you and all of my KME partners a Happy Thanksgiving! Rick T.