If You’re Always the Giver, You’ll Eventually Go Empty: Krishna Warned Us
Riya Kumari | Jul 11, 2025, 15:15 IST
You know that friend? The one who’s basically the group’s unpaid therapist, Uber driver, emotional sponge, and emergency contact? Yeah, that friend is you. And if you're already nodding like, “Oh god, I am that person,” welcome to the party. There’s no cake, just emotional burnout and maybe a mild resentment towards everyone who texts “u up?” only when their life is a flaming mess.
There’s a kind of exhaustion no sleep can fix. It’s not physical. It’s deeper than that. It’s what happens when you give so much of yourself—time, love, presence, silence, forgiveness, understanding, that you slowly start disappearing in the process. Not in some poetic, noble way. In a very real, soul-draining, “who am I even anymore?” kind of way. People like you are taught to feel proud of this giving nature. To wear it like a badge. You’re “the dependable one.” “The strong one.” “The one who’s always there.” But here’s the uncomfortable truth: Being the one who's always there... means you're the one who's never really seen.
Krishna never told you to be selfless at the cost of your self
Somewhere along the path of “doing the right thing,” we twisted spirituality into self-erasure. We turned kindness into compliance. Love into obligation. And silence into surrender. But if you actually read what Krishna told Arjuna on that battlefield, not through the lens of blind devotion, but with clarity, you’d find something different. Not a call to abandon yourself in service of others, but a reminder to act with detachment, not from depletion.
He said: “Do your duty, but don’t attach yourself to the outcome.” What does that mean today? It means: Love, but don’t lose yourself. Help, but don’t become the help. Be kind, but not at the expense of your own voice, energy, or dignity. Because giving without balance isn’t spiritual. It’s self-neglect dressed as virtue.
Everyone praises the giver, but no one stays to refill them
The world is full of takers who believe your availability is eternal. Your support is expected. Your softness is default. And because you give without asking, without reminding, without demanding, no one notices when you’re quietly running on empty. But Krishna would have.
He never told Arjuna to fight endlessly. He told him to act from alignment. From clarity. From inner stillness, not guilt, not pressure, not compulsion. Not the kind of emotional exhaustion that builds silently inside the nicest people. Krishna didn’t want you to be empty. He wanted you to be free.
Giving is sacred. But boundaries are too
Some people won’t like the version of you who stops overextending. Who says no. Who doesn’t offer themselves up so easily anymore. Let them be uncomfortable. Because choosing yourself is not betrayal. It is return. To your center. To your wholeness. To the part of you that doesn’t want to be endlessly good, just to be enough.
Krishna didn't ask Arjuna to be the strongest or most self-sacrificing. He asked him to be aware. To see clearly. To act rightly. And most of all, to stop living in fear of how others would perceive his choices. You’re not here to keep everyone else afloat while you quietly sink.
A quiet revolution: Choose to stay full
Start giving from a place of fullness, not fear. Not guilt. Not need for validation. Not that silent, aching hope that one day, someone will see how much you do, and finally love you right. Because here’s the real truth: You don’t need to be emptied to be worthy.
You don’t owe your peace to anyone who can’t protect it. You don’t owe your energy to every situation that demands it. You don’t owe your softness to people who haven’t earned it. You owe yourself awareness. Stillness. And the strength to walk away from any version of love that leaves you half-alive.
So next time you give, ask yourself:
Am I doing this from love, or from fear of losing it? Am I helping because it aligns with me or because I don’t know how to say no without guilt? Am I offering… or overcompensating? Because Krishna didn’t say: be the giver who forgets themselves.
He said: Be the one who acts from truth. And sometimes, truth sounds like a very loving, very necessary no.
Krishna never told you to be selfless at the cost of your self
Donate
( Image credit : Pexels )
Somewhere along the path of “doing the right thing,” we twisted spirituality into self-erasure. We turned kindness into compliance. Love into obligation. And silence into surrender. But if you actually read what Krishna told Arjuna on that battlefield, not through the lens of blind devotion, but with clarity, you’d find something different. Not a call to abandon yourself in service of others, but a reminder to act with detachment, not from depletion.
He said: “Do your duty, but don’t attach yourself to the outcome.” What does that mean today? It means: Love, but don’t lose yourself. Help, but don’t become the help. Be kind, but not at the expense of your own voice, energy, or dignity. Because giving without balance isn’t spiritual. It’s self-neglect dressed as virtue.
Everyone praises the giver, but no one stays to refill them
Meditate
( Image credit : Pexels )
The world is full of takers who believe your availability is eternal. Your support is expected. Your softness is default. And because you give without asking, without reminding, without demanding, no one notices when you’re quietly running on empty. But Krishna would have.
He never told Arjuna to fight endlessly. He told him to act from alignment. From clarity. From inner stillness, not guilt, not pressure, not compulsion. Not the kind of emotional exhaustion that builds silently inside the nicest people. Krishna didn’t want you to be empty. He wanted you to be free.
Giving is sacred. But boundaries are too
Empty
( Image credit : Pexels )
Some people won’t like the version of you who stops overextending. Who says no. Who doesn’t offer themselves up so easily anymore. Let them be uncomfortable. Because choosing yourself is not betrayal. It is return. To your center. To your wholeness. To the part of you that doesn’t want to be endlessly good, just to be enough.
Krishna didn't ask Arjuna to be the strongest or most self-sacrificing. He asked him to be aware. To see clearly. To act rightly. And most of all, to stop living in fear of how others would perceive his choices. You’re not here to keep everyone else afloat while you quietly sink.
A quiet revolution: Choose to stay full
Fear
( Image credit : Pexels )
Start giving from a place of fullness, not fear. Not guilt. Not need for validation. Not that silent, aching hope that one day, someone will see how much you do, and finally love you right. Because here’s the real truth: You don’t need to be emptied to be worthy.
You don’t owe your peace to anyone who can’t protect it. You don’t owe your energy to every situation that demands it. You don’t owe your softness to people who haven’t earned it. You owe yourself awareness. Stillness. And the strength to walk away from any version of love that leaves you half-alive.
So next time you give, ask yourself:
He said: Be the one who acts from truth. And sometimes, truth sounds like a very loving, very necessary no.