Have you heard that expression “The more you give, the more you get”? I think it is a phrase that just doesn’t get said enough or practiced enough in our society. Collectively we are becoming more selfish, more entitled, less considerate, and generally disrespectful of each other’s needs.
When we take an hour (or more!) each week to give back to the community, we take back the power to be good to each other. Some of us may have to put in a few additional hours to offset the negative impact of the selfish in society.
Fortunately volunteering has recently been seen as a good thing, which provides a huge relief in this age or people seizing opportunities.
With the increasing rate of hungry and homeless people, there are that many more opportunities to serve locally. But you don’t just have to work at the homeless shelter. You can connect with troubled youth, homebound elderly folk, non-English speakers, provide service cleaning up nature, hosting exchange students, serving in schools, donating blood, or building houses.
Giving money is one wonderful option people choose to help their community, but I believe that by getting your hands dirty and sacrificing your even more valuable time is a way to truly give. Here are three sites that will help you find a place to start volunteering:
Just Serve is an online service organization that helps link up volunteers with like minded organizations. While this site is organized by Church of Latter-day Saints, it works with all types of organizations, from food pantries to senior centers to libraries.
Volunteer Match allows you to search for just the right fit via location. You can search your hometown for opportunities to serve, or you can look at your next vacation destination to see if there are chances to help for an hour or two. Non profit organizations list their needs and you can find just the right match.
Habitat for Humanity allows you to learn while you give. Habitat for Humanity works with volunteers to build homes for families in all 50 United States and in 70 countries around the world. Habitat homeowners work alongside volunteers to build their homes and pay an affordable mortgage.
You can also find apps to log and track your volunteer hours. These are useful for youth who are building up service hours, for non profit organizations to track how much work individuals are doing for them and reward them as such, and for those who find a reward system makes them inclined to do more good.
Reward Volunteers provides a great tracking system, as do Track it Forward and Volunteer Mark.
Collectively we can do so much good in the world, we can overpower the negativity. Finding the goodness in volunteering, in helping others, seeing the positive change we can make in the world makes the good stronger.
With just one it is 10 hours. With hundreds doing the same, it becomes thousands, and then millions. Let us join hands to help one another as best we can in order to make our society collectively stronger, better, and more full of love.
If you already serve, please share your experiences below.
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