I have not been a good caretaker for sick people for much of my life. This bothered me, because I felt ungrateful and selfish. But over time, I found that I am better. When my wife was sick, I did all her work and visited her in the hospital, and while it was hard, I never resented it. Well, maybe a little, but that’s no different from when I’m reading and someone interrupts me.
Later on, my wife took care of me when I was sick. Lately I have more and more friends who are sick, some of them deathly sick. We do what we can. Visiting, mostly. Sometimes bringing food. Others give them massages or make music tapes or just hang out. It doesn’t really matter.
I think most of us tend to do it because we love our family and friends. Maybe we feel an obligation, but that’s ok, too. We are all tied together, whether from duty or love or obligation. It doesn’t really matter. If you help someone so that someone will help you if you need it, that’s just good karma. You may need help in the future, and you might not. Meanwhile, you have helped someone, and people usually feel good about that whether or not they expect any return.
Helping people is like doing any kind of work from the goodness of your heart. Whether it’s volunteering at the homeless shelter or the dog shelter or the orchestra, matters not. What matters is that you do it. It also doesn’t matter why you do it. What matters is that you do do it.