Generosity presents a paradox. It is obvious that generosity imposes a net cost on the giver since it involves a loss of things that are valuable to him, such as money, possessions, time, attention, aid, encouragement, emotional availability, and more. At the same time, the more generously people give, the more they receive in return, as generosity can increase happiness and health; the elements which are representative of a good life. Hence, people willingly incur the costs of helping for the sake of the good life, which in Iran has specific meanings in the context of both its pre-Islamic Iranian and Muslim heritages. For the study, we selected a charitable “group” on the popular messaging service Telegram, whose members are mostly young and middle-class people. We participated in this group for two years, starting from the time of its establishment. We also interviewed eighteen people, including administrators and donors. Our results show that participants have conceptions of the good life that mostly refer to happiness, personal identity as a Muslim, the sense of blessing in one’s life, a close relationship with God, and moral development. At the same time, these generous people are not interested in participating in any real-world meetings or being a member of a team to help the needy in the field. In fact, they prefer to donate money but not energy or time. Telegram is very useful in this regard, since it provides the means for fast, efficient virtual interaction. Further, according to the philosophy of the group, donations are not substantial. Rather, collecting small sums can make great changes in the lives of few people. However, due to the expertise and skills of the channel administrators donations are efficiently used. Although there are many formal charity organizations in the country, many people often trust informal groups like the Telegram group studied in this case. Due to legal deficiencies, unclear licensing authorities, and lack of monitoring mechanisms over official charities, some of them have been misused, and the reputations of otherwise credible charities have also suffered. On the other hand, the informal charities are managed by a few administrator-trustees who are at the center of the network of donors. Members vouch personally for their honesty. Moreover, reports on previous donations are accessible to everyone, which creates a high degree of transparency as to their use and efficacy. By this meaning, these people have employed Telegram as a ResourceCulture for achieving the good life according to their own preferred style of cooperation. People ascribe to the importance of generosity for good life, but they are not ready for intense engagement with poor people.

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