Four Ways of Giving - mauriceling/mauriceling.github.io GitHub Wiki
I began by giving through labour
Hands and mind bound to the turning world
Deadlines were my seasons
My name signed off the harvest
Contribution meant motion
To build to publish to prove to provide
Then came the middle hush
Semi-retirement though the word feels soft
Like silk over a still-beating heart
I learned to give by craft
To shape to design to refine
Not for pay but for clarity
Not for pace but for precision
This was contribution by choice
Not the push of duty but the pull of purpose
When work became play again
I called it recreational employment
To wander through new questions
To teach a while
To mend an old code
To build not for others’ need
But for the joy of still learning
This was contribution by curiosity
And then at last
To rest without retreat
To wake and see the morning
To sit beside those who seek the way
To be still enough
That others hear themselves better
This is contribution by presence
The gift of simply being
After all the giving is done
There were no gates only gradients
Each season dissolving into the next
As dawn yields to day
And day to the quiet of evening
There were no gates only gradients
I am still fading still forming
Each phase a quieter echo
Of the same intention
To give in whatever way I can
— 05/10/25
Commentary: Four Ways of Giving traces the evolution of a life devoted to purpose, revealing how the act of contribution transforms as one moves through the seasons of work, mastery, curiosity, and presence. The poem begins in the realm of labour, where contribution is tied to motion — to building, publishing, proving, and providing. Here, identity is forged through effort, and time is measured in deadlines rather than days. Yet as the speaker progresses, the tone softens; semi-retirement arrives not as withdrawal but as refinement. The focus shifts from productivity to craftsmanship, from duty to choice. The work continues, but now it is done “not for pay but for clarity,” signalling a newfound agency in shaping one’s own rhythm and meaning.
In the next phase, “recreational employment” emerges as an inspired oxymoron that captures the freedom of curiosity after obligation. The act of giving becomes playful again: to teach, to mend, to tinker not for necessity but for joy. This stage recovers the wonder of learning for its own sake, where contribution arises from exploration rather than expectation. Finally, the arc culminates in stillness — the giving by presence. Here, the act of doing dissolves into the act of being. The poem’s quietest lines carry its deepest wisdom: to sit beside others, to listen, to be still enough that others hear themselves better. This final form of giving, stripped of all external markers of success, becomes a kind of spiritual practice — the culmination of a lifetime of motion distilled into quiet radiance.
The repeated line, “There were no gates only gradients,” anchors the poem’s philosophy. It rejects the rigid milestones of modern life; career, retirement, legacy; and instead envisions them as subtle transitions, each dissolving naturally into the next like dawn into day, day into evening. The speaker’s voice, calm and assured, mirrors this idea; the verbs shift from the muscular “build” and “prove” to the meditative “rest” and “be.” The rhythm itself slows across the stanzas, embodying the poem’s central movement from striving to serenity.
Ultimately, Four Ways of Giving redefines retirement not as an end but as an evolution. Each stage of life continues the same underlying intention, “to give in whatever way I can”, even as the forms of that giving change. Full-time work becomes contribution by labour, semi-retirement by craft, recreational employment by curiosity, and full retirement by presence. Seen together, these are not discrete phases but deepening expressions of the same impulse to serve, learn, and be. The poem offers a gentle revelation: that the truest form of generosity may not be in what we produce, but in the quiet grace of our continued presence after all the giving is done.
This marks my 4 stages from (a) full time employment / work (from 15 July 2004, the day I start my PhD, to 06 January 2023, the day I cleared my mortgage), to (b) semi-retirement (from mortgage clearance to possibly mid-2026), to © casual employment / recreational employment (from possibly mid-2026 to 2032), and (d) full retirement (from possibly 2033 and beyond).