How to Receive a Gift You Hate

It happens to all of us, and it happens all too often. We receive a gift that we not only will never use, but chances are we are inherently against it in all shapes and forms. However, many times we get these horrible gifts from people we respect or people who hand them to us, expect us to open them right in front of them and then ask us what we think. It is human nature to lie to escape awkwardness. Follow these steps to enhance your humanitarian abilities.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Things You’ll Need:

• A gift from somebody
• A heart

1. There are some people in your life who always give you bad gifts, and for me I've been able to do a better job faking my appreciation with those people then with others. What I realized was that it was all in the preparation. When you receive a gift, you will usually smile before you even open it. This is fine as long as half way through the unwrapping you lose the smile and just put on a blank face until the gift is revealed.
2. Once the gift is unwrapped and discovered to be an evil gift, the initial reaction is key. If you had started with a smile, it would be easy for the person to see the smile fade once the gift is revealed, despite how much you might fight it. What usually happens is that we react first to the present and then remember the feelings of the giver, so our smile often fades without us even thinking about it. With a blank stare canvas, you can continue the blank stare through the discovery of the gift to the remembering of the other's feelings and then go right to a big smile.
3. Work hard to identify the object immediately. For example, "Oh, a garlic press!". The recognition of the gift is sometimes half the battle; it usually provokes a smile in the giver when you recognize it, and it also gives you material to use to bring this acting job home.
4. Start to get specific about why you "love" this gift. If you get a black t-shirt with sparkled mountain lions roaring at a sparkling full moon (An actual gift I received), then comment about how you love that both the mountain lions and the full moon are sparkling. Also say that you've been on a big mountain-lion kick lately, and this will be a great addition to the collection. You get the idea.
5. To really bring down the house, describe how you are going to use the gift in the future. For example, "There's this barista downtown that loves mountain lions. I can't wait to wear this the next time I buy coffee from her."
6. Finally, the way you set aside the gift is important. Obviously, you don't want to throw the thing to the side and move on to the next one. And you don't need to put on the shirt right away (unless they ask you), but simply take care in setting the gift aside. Then, take a long look at it, smile again at the gift, smile at the giver, and respectfully move on to the gift that has the most promising shape.

Tips & Warnings

• If you can't identify the gift right away, try to look intrigued by it and hope that they offer the description for you. If that doesn't happen or they ask you if you know what it is, say that you don't but you are really intrigued by it.
• Hold your jokes about the gift until the person has completely left, because they will inevitably be standing behind you.