I give a fair amount every year -- not to the point where it hurts, but let's face it, at our level of income in this country it's pretty hard to really hurt. But people in developing and / or war-torn nations? Now those people know the meaning of the word "hurt."
I want to retire very badly, and have visions of myself going out and doing good works / saving the world, yada yada, once I'm free to do so. It's been frustrating to wait to reach my savings goal and tempting to sock away every single penny.
But in an odd way, "giving back" and NOT keeping everything myself has helped me to be less impatient. If I'm not yet contributing my labor and effort to good causes, then at least I'm contributing to those others who are laboring.
And I can go to work thinking that I'm achieving some good beyond the basic paycheck. When I get tremendously angry with my company for making stupid mistakes, laying good people off, and wasting my effort with cancelled projects and busy-work, I can think instead: "This week's salary fed starving people" and that makes it much, much better.
Caroline