Giving gifts and receiving gifts has never been quite the easiest thing for me to do, on the one hand I have no idea what to give people and on the other side of things I have no idea what to tell people I want to receive as a gift.
A common gift people give when they don't know what to give is gift cards which for me is a complete no no because there can be so many things you either can or cannot do with gift cards. Amazon cards are a safe choice but in reality cash would be better because then if there's something at a store I wanted I can use it for that, but most of the time the gift cards are just around $20 which might make people feel bad giving "just" $20 cash and feel better giving a $20 gift card, I'm sure there some phycology behind that. With that being said when I'm giving gifts I don't like giving things I would dislike receiving, so no to giving gift cards. Most of the time I hope I know the person well enough to give them something they like however I find it's much easier to just ask them what they want as a gift instead of wondering for hours what to get them, removes the stress of it all to be honest and avoids the awkwardness of them having to pretend the like something I gave them if they really don't.
On the other side of things it's extremely hard for me to receive presents because there really isn't anything I want that I haven't bough for myself already unless it's $1k or more, and most people don't have that in their budget (especially in this economy) so most of the time I would just ask for cash that I'll stuff into my wallet for a month then run into something at the store that I like and use the money then. I'm also not big on waiting for "special events" to get free things, like lets say there's a new mouse on sale that I liked in my mind I'm not thinking to wait for my birthday and have someone get me it as my present, instead I see it and think if it fits in my monthly budget and if it does I buy it, if not I revisit next month until it fits into my budgeting to buy it. This does end up leading to some really awkward situations that someone gives me something that years later I'm still trying to figure out what to do with it.
I guess in the end there is also a reason to keep gifts a secret and not open ask what someone wants or share what you want because ultimately when it comes time to open your present at least for me it's hard to act thankful or happy/surprised when you already knew what you were getting, but I also don't want to be monotone because everyone's waiting for your reaction, camera's out, everyone excited, so sometimes you just gotta fake it to see them smile, but in the end it's all about what works for YOU.
