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Home | News & Society | Social Issues In response to that question, not once did I say “I want to be a supervisor.” or “I want to manage a retail store.” I never said that I wanted to go to a job that I hated so I could pay the bills. I never said I wanted to be unemployed due to office politics. Yet somehow that is exactly where I find myself at the moment, unemployed and faced with the prospect of being unable to pay my bills in a few short weeks, looking for a job that will continue to pay the bills. Fear, loathing, dread, depression, frustration, and the desire to have someone wake me when it’s all over wash over me at the prospect of filling out job applications, agreeing to have my life thus far researched and judged, waiting for the phone to ring for interviews, and spending hours fruitlessly looking for that job that doesn’t suck, but still pays the rent. So what happened? Did my dreams die? On the contrary! My dreams have changed since I was a child, but they’ve grown bigger with time, rather than shriveling and dying. My desire to help others has been what puts a sparkle in my eye and a smile on my lips for years now. I become very passionate when I talk about helping adults learn to read, getting homeless people off the street, sheltering battered women, providing food and housing for the people less fortunate of the world, and almost anything that helps to make someone’s life even the smallest bit better. Simply put, I want to do volunteer work. Oddly, this caused me agony. Some part of me also wanted to be rich. How could I get rich doing volunteer work? It doesn’t pay very well. I had always dreamed of a day when I wouldn’t have to worry about having enough money anymore. I had grown up already, but what I wanted to be seemed to elude me. First, there was rent. If I didn’t want to be one of the homeless I wanted to help, then I needed a job to pay the rent. Besides rent, there were always other expenses to pay for as well. I didn’t have much, and I needed to work full-time to keep it. College was far beyond my means at that point, and I didn’t think there was a degree that would allow me to become rich doing volunteer work. I taught myself everything I needed to know from that point on. I went home everyday too tired to do much of anything. I was good at what I did, but it wasn’t making a difference in the world. I continued on this road to nowhere for a long time, always wanting to make a difference, but being too burned out from work to spend my free time volunteering. I struggled to make ends meet, not always succeeding. I fought with bipolar disorder which had plagued me since I was twelve. I coped poorly when I was diagnosed with chronic illnesses at the age of 21. Everything else seemed to fade into the background. All of those things required money. I was too tired and in too much pain to do much outside of working, but I had to work so I could pay the bills. It was a vicious cycle that I couldn’t seem to break. Debt grew little by little. I excelled at every job I took, but my health prevented me from moving up very far. I got to the position of supervision or middle management, but there was almost nowhere to go from there. I thought about going back to school many times, but it always came back to money. Money, money, money. I made too much to qualify for a whole lot in free assistance, but I made too little to be able to afford the loans. I knew people who spent their whole lives trying to pay back student loans and never even worked in the field they went to school for in the first place. I couldn’t bring myself to do that. I was reminded of my dream again when I spent six months unemployed and unsuccessfully looking for work. A very dear friend had taken me in because I couldn’t afford to live on my own, but I had a very hard time asking for help from anyone. I ended up filing bankruptcy later that year because of all the medical bills that had piled up and all the expenses that I had to put on my credit card while I was unemployed. How in the world could I help others if I couldn’t even help myself? Those were the thoughts I had in my own mind, but my friends told me a different story. They said that I was one of the best people to talk to when they had a problem, that I really helped them. It seemed that even when I was struggling, I was still good at reaching out to help others. When it seemed that I would never find work again, I landed the best job I ever had. Somehow I was given the opportunity to be a private caregiver for a gentleman who was both mentally and physically ill. It seemed that my own experiences with mental illness, both my own and my father’s, gave me insight which qualified me for the position on a trial basis. I took to this job like a fish to water. My client loved me, and I loved helping him. When his health deteriorated, he paid for my CNA training. For over three years I had a position that made me feel like I was making a real difference, even if for only one person. The nurse encouraged me to go further in nursing, but what I really loved about the job, was the one on one patient contact. I enjoyed making a real difference in his daily life. I felt that going on to be a nurse would force me to spend so much more time doing paperwork and scheduling, that I wouldn’t make as much impact on the patients. Most nurses I talked to said that they had very little time to get to know their patients well. That wasn’t what I wanted. Other things in my life improved greatly in those years. I finally found a therapy for my illnesses that allowed me to get off most of the eleven prescription medications I was on. I was in much less pain than I had been previously. I was given what seemed to be nearly a miracle cure for my bipolar disorder, and I felt emotionally stable for the first time in my life. I donated to charity when I could, but still found no time to volunteer because of the strange schedule I worked. I attended a seminar in my third year there that completely changed the way I thought. It reconciled my desire to be rich with my desire to help others through volunteer work. I was asked what I wanted to be when I grew up. Though no one had asked me that in years, and I certainly hadn’t achieved any of my childhood career desires, I suddenly knew the answer. I want to be a philanthropist when I grow up. As a philanthropist, I could help others immensely with charitable donations, and I would have enough money to spend my time volunteering rather than working to pay the bills. I started trying to learn new ways to make money, not just for myself, but so that I could accomplish the most good in the world. I still enjoyed my job, but I wanted more. I wanted to continue helping more people when I no longer took care of him. I had to find a way to be rich so I could then dedicate myself to using my talents to help others. The only problem with this is that I was a great ideas and tasks person, but I wasn’t very good at the business side of business. I was still good at my job, so I focused on that, but nurtured the dream of being wealthy enough to donate half of my income to charity, and spend my time doing volunteer work. After more than three years of caring for my client in his home, the trustees informed me that even though they were very happy with me, they had made the decision to have all shifts staffed by the home health agency that had been covering the time that the other private caregiver and I didn’t cover. This meant that I could apply with the agency, or look for other work. The problem of money once again reared its ugly head. If I stayed on through the agency, I would be making thousands less a year, and I couldn’t afford the pay cut. With this in mind, I looked for a new job that paid well but kept me in the same line of work. I also decided to move back to a city I had missed since I moved out of it years before. I was excited when I took a live-in position as a caregiver. It would give me the opportunity to save to go back to school, and I could continue doing something I loved to help others. The eleven days I spent in this situation were the worst of my adult life. The position had been completely misrepresented in the amount of care involved, along with the other tasks. I almost never slept due to the demands of the client, and I was unable to do everything that was expected of me. The client was also downright mean to me. I left as soon as the placement agency could find a couple more able to deal with abuse to take my place. I was homeless and jobless and disillusioned about trying to help others. I looked for work in the same field because I knew that it was the situation that was bad, not the work, but found that I couldn’t earn enough outside of the private sector to earn a living. After a month, I applied for a temporary position, just to get some money coming in while I looked for something better. It turned out that the same company was hiring for a supervisor position, and I applied for that instead. The first week I spent in the same position as everyone else, a third shift mail clerk. The following week I was moved up to the assistant supervisor. The pay for the position shocked me, and for awhile I was able to pretend that I didn’t need to make a difference in the world, just to be able to pay my bills without scrimping and saving. This of course didn’t last long. I became obsessed with the idea of being rich enough to donate most of my time and money to making the world a better place. This meant that once again I was focused on money. I got the help of a mentor and started building a website for an online retail store. This was supposed to eventually replace my income from the job I had grown to hate, so I could spend my time partly with volunteering, and partly with figuring out how to make more money. I soon found that it required more money than I had anticipated, and much, much more time. I really should have hired someone to build the website for me, but I have always wanted to learn everything, so I decided that I was capable of doing it myself. I had a great vision of what it would be when it was done, and how it would work. Ever so slowly, I began putting together an interactive database. This process is very tedious, time consuming and extremely boring. Even so, I worked on it steadily. During this whole time, my mother was going through some terrible times. I had several friends that were also dealing with some very difficult situations. I spent a lot of my time and energy just to be there for them. Even in just being a shoulder to cry on, I have always felt best when helping someone else. The stress at work was really starting to wear on me. Most of my energy was being spent on just trying to get through work without having a nervous breakdown, and any energy I had left was being given to my friends and family. I love them dearly and would never deny them any support I could give, so I started falling behind in my work on my website. I was emotionally and physically exhausted. About that time was when my brother, whom I am very close to, decided to move halfway across the country. He was one of my main supports at the time, and also a good friend. While his move might have been difficult for me anyway, the timing was such that I really fell apart over it. I think it was the fabled straw that broke the camel’s back. I didn’t think I could handle one more thing. Then my car started falling apart. This seemed to be the last thing that I needed, because I was already spending most of my spare money on training and business expenses. When one major repair followed another I sat down and carefully went over my budget. I determined that if I was careful, I could buy a new car. I bought a new car because it was only a couple thousand more than a used car in the same class. I looked for economy, fuel efficiency, reliability and ratings. I think I made a good decision without being frivolous. My budget wouldn’t allow for frivolous expenses. A couple weeks later when things were settling down, I started working on my website again, though slowly. I was frustrated because after more than a hundred hours worth of work, the database was not transferring to the server properly. Apparently there is a compatibility problem between the program version on the server and the version I used to build it. Unable to resolve the problem, I put it aside until I could steel myself to start over on a large portion of it. A few days later I lost my job. I can only attribute this to office politics, since the reason they have given me makes absolutely no sense. The reason isn’t important anyway, because the result is the same. I am unemployed. For the last three weeks, I have spent my time rewriting my resume, updating my references, and feverishly looking for a new job. I don’t sleep; I don’t eat; and the more I look, the worse the prospects seem. The idea of getting another job just to make ends meet makes me feel sick. Yesterday as part of my search, I had an appointment with a career search specialist. I really didn’t know what to expect, but I know I wasn’t expecting what I got. After looking at my resume, the questionnaire I filled out, and talking with me for a short while, the man I was speaking with gave me hope. He said that they could help me get the skills, marketing, and access to employers to allow me to move from a dead end road that filled me with loathing, to a career that allowed me to follow my dream of helping others. I had a hard time not breaking down into tears. At the time I didn’t understand why I was tearing up, but now I know that it was the combination of hope and relief. I can turn my life around and start becoming what I have dreamed of for so long. I plan to dedicate my life to making the world a better place, one person at a time if I must. That is what I am meant to do. I am committed to that path. Then the reality of my situation hit me again. I have no job and no money coming in. In a couple short weeks, I will be unable to pay my bills. The help that I so desperately need is right in front of me, but it costs money too. I don’t have a lot of credit that I can support myself on for several weeks to a few months. My job search has resulted in nothing so far, and what I applied for wouldn’t be furthering my mission in life. So what to do? It occurred to me that if 10,000 people each gave me a dollar, none of them would be terribly strained by the gift, but that I would then have $10,000. That amount of money would get me through several months without falling behind on my bills, and allow me to focus on developing the skills I need to land a position that allows me to take the first step towards my dream. My dream of giving back. I feel a little ashamed to need to ask for help, especially financially. It seems almost backwards when you consider what I want to do with my life. I find myself in a situation similar to those I seek to help. Yet I know that I cannot do this on my own. My path has not been very direct, or even very clear up until now, but I’m beginning to see the road signs to my destination. This winding road that I have been following has taught me some important lessons though. There have been lessons of compassion, of kindness, and of hope, lessons of humility and lessons of growth. Had I not made the mistakes I have made, or dealt with the challenges I have faced, I would not be the person I am today. I believe that there is a reason for everything and that the reason I now need to ask for assistance is to make me more sensitive to how difficult it is to ask for a hand up. One dollar is not a lot of money. You could buy a paper and a candy bar perhaps, but not many things can be purchased at that price. But one dollar given over and over by many people can provide the necessities to someone who will in turn go on to help untold numbers of people find a better quality of life. That one dollar can contribute to the fulfillment of a dream. One dollar really can make a difference in the lives of many others, by making a difference in life. All money donated that does not directly pay for living expenses will be given to others in need of help, either individuals facing difficult times, or charitable organizations dedicated to making the world better. I do not plan to need help for very long, and hope that I can help so many others with your gifts. This is also an experiment. One to see how many people can be inspired to become philanthropists themselves, an experiment to appeal to the kindness of others. This is an experiment in building a person, but like all good experiments which are repeated many times, given the correct input, the results are almost guaranteed. To donate to building a better world, one person at a time, use paypal to send donations to philanthropyexperiment@yahoo.com If you do not have a paypal account, you may sign up for one free at www.paypal.com Article Source: http://www.articlewheel.com
Direct Link to donation with paypal https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_xclick&business=info%40dreamendeavors%2ecom&item_name=The%20Philanthropy%20Experiment&no_shipping=2&no_note=1&tax=0¤cy_code=USD&bn=PP%2dDonationsBF&charset=UTF%2d8 To learn more about making a difference, go to www.philanthropy.com
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