"If earning a tie is like kissing your sister, losing is
like kissing your grandmother with her teeth out."
George Brett
Poor old George. He was a great baseball player and an occasionally funny guy, but he just didn't get it. Life really isn't just about winning or losing. Lots of other famous folks whose name begins with 'B' have figured that out - Bono, Warren Buffet, Brangelina and Bill (as in Gates). What do they have in common? They all had tons of dough and they all gave tons of it away.

If you hope to croak with a smile on your face, it's the second part of the last sentence that really matters. There is no real joy in Getting Stuff - and that grim truth applies equally to billionaires and bag ladies. Whether you're piling up coffers of Krugerrands or shopping carts full of plastic bags, a simple truth applies: a human being can only use so much crap in a lifetime.

The real happiness comes from giving it away - there's even scientific proof of that. Researchers at the University of British Columbia targeted a group of youths and 'gifted' them with cash. Half the group got to keep the money; the other half was directed to pass it along to others. The second group reported significantly higher feelings of satisfaction and happiness than the first.

A follow-up survey of 600 adults showed that rates of happiness increased proportionally with the amount of money people gave away, not the amount they had earned or spent on themselves. There is however, another 'B' word that effectively cuts a lot of us potential players out of the philanthropy game. That word is 'broke'. Most of us can't indulge in the Generosity Sweepstakes because we're, ahem, lacking in financial fluidity. Skint. Busted.

Well there's good news for us, too. Turns out you don't need to hand out cash to feel good. Paying compliments is just as rewarding as doling out dollars. Japanese researchers at the National Institute for Physiological Sciences in Okazaki employed a brain scanning technique known as functional magnetic resonance imaging to track a group of 19 healthy people through a series of experiments. It was a complicated setup, but basically it confirmed that the human brain does not discriminate between material and immaterial rewards. "We found that different kinds of rewards - a good reputation versus money - are biologically coded by the same neural structure, the striatum," said Dr. Norihiro Sadato, chief researcher. Simply put, as far as your brain is concerned, praise is just as good as cash.

So is simple kindness. And kindness comes from a well that never goes dry — providing you prime it.

There was a baseball game at Western Oregon University recently that would have made George Brett smile, if not laugh out loud. The Western Women's softball team was playing a crew from Central Washington and Sara Tucholsky was in the batter's box. She took a couple of strikes and then caught a sweet pitch that came right over the plate, belt-high. She swung. She connected. The ball sailed up, up and over the centerfield fence. Sara was ecstatic. It was her first home run ever. She started to run the bases, but in her excitement she failed to touch first. Her team-mates shouted, she lurched to a stop on the baseline so harshly that her legs buckled and she fell to the ground. She tore a ligament. She couldn't walk at all.

Baseball rules are very straightforward. If Sara Tucholsky couldn't make it around the bases then the home run was cancelled. Under the rules her teammates were forbidden to help her. Tough. But rules are rules.

Unless.... Mallory Holtman, the pitcher for Central Washington, approached the umpire. What if the injured batter was carried around the bases by members of the opposing team?

Nothing in the rule book about that.

The pitcher and the shortstop from the other side picked Sara up and carried her around all the bases. The action cost the Central Washington team the game. When they touched home plate Sara was crying, but not from a sore knee. "They didn't even know it was my first home run," she said. "It just says a lot about them."

Indeed it does. George Brett, please copy.