Many people say that we live to help others. By helping other people, we fulfill our purpose. It is impossible to know how true this is, but we can well know the feeling we experience when we help someone and see the difference. Something happens, we get a feeling of satisfaction and happiness, experience a surge of energy and determination.
I don't know if this is proof that helping others is our destiny, but I do know that there are plenty of reasons to try and help someone when we have the opportunity.
To become a good knight
Catherine became a good knight
I like animals. My husband and I have already adopted a house cat, but we haven’t decided on more yet. I feed the cats in the yard and always carry a bag of food in my bag.
One day I saw an advertisement for the teddyfood project and subscribed to them. The guys have a cool website, each animal has its own page with history, photos and an online camera, several shelters around the country are connected. You can watch your favorite character in real time and provide targeted assistance: for food, care, medical services and advertising. The minimum payment for a portion of food is about 40 rubles. It's very inexpensive and very simple.
Get things done
Compromise is the enemy of long-term commitment. If you make a commitment to help someone, by being a mentor or advocating for the rights of others, don't stop halfway. Finish what you start. Make sure that some changes occur so that your commitments do not turn out to be empty words.
The difference between stopping halfway and finishing the job will not be as big in terms of getting the work done, but it will be very noticeable to the person you are helping.
So that funds can calculate their strength and help systematically
Anna has wanted to do something useful since childhood
I have always been inspired by my father: first he helped a large family that asked for help on an Orthodox website, then a person with a disability, then a lonely elderly woman.
When I was in 11th grade, I had a lot of free time, knowledge of mathematics and little teaching experience. I saw an advertisement looking for teachers for orphans and got excited about the idea, even sent a letter. I was refused, but the desire to help remained. Unfortunately, now there is less time and money than I would like, but this is not a reason to do nothing.
Six months ago, I started supporting a well-known charity project. I really liked their materials - such work, it seems to me, should be rewarded.
I signed up for a monthly donation. It is small - 200 rubles per month, with 2 rubles returned as cashback. But I understand that this is more useful for the organization than one-time large donations - because it is thanks to regular payments that they can plan their budget.
Feel the difference
We all have a unique set of skills and abilities. Given these abilities, we can either do extraordinary things around us or not. It is entirely up to you whether you want to change your life and what exactly you want to change about it.
Many people have high goals in their lives and want to be remembered as visionaries. They want to change and save the world.
Others want to be remembered simply as kind people who are always ready to help and listen to you if you need it.
Which one do you think is better?
The one who changes the world, or the one who helps the individual?
Do what you can with what you have
To be remembered you don't have to do incredible things, just be around people who you can save from a meaningless life and who you can help start leading the life they were meant to live.
What else do you need to know?
You can help not only privately. Recently, corporate charity, that is, the voluntary activities of a commercial organization aimed at supporting social projects and helping those in need, has been gaining momentum in the world. Some large companies go even further and organize charity programs, which are even easier to participate in than making a donation to the fund yourself. For example, they offer convenient digital solutions so that you can help with one click.
“Rounding” works on this principle in Yandex Go. From December 1, 2021, users of the Yandex Go application can do a good deed simply by using a taxi. To do this, just subscribe to “Rounding”, and the application will round the cost of the trip up. For example, from 362 rubles to 370. The difference will go towards paying for trips for the wards of charitable organizations with which the Yandex project “Help is Near” cooperates. Among them: “Galchonok”, “House with a Lighthouse”, “ORBI”, “Perspectives”, “Gift to an Angel”, “Spina Bifida”, “Fragile People”, “Nastenka”, “Leukemia Foundation” and others. Charitable organizations help people with limited mobility who find it difficult to move around the city on their own. A free taxi ride is an opportunity for them to get to rehabilitation, study, or other errands.
In 2021, Yandex has already added 10 million rubles to the project’s treasury, and anyone can join the fundraising through “Rounding” or donating on the website.
Fight for justice
In your life, you will often see that someone has been treated unfairly. This happens both professionally and socially. Many people who deserve recognition don't get it.
By starting to fight and making sure others get what they deserve, you will become a true hero. By doing so, you will make a lasting impact on their lives and will be rewarded with love and help in the future when you need it.
The law of karma says: whatever you do, you will get back three times as much. In this sense, helping other people is a selfish act, but it is still a good deed that you should do without fear, with love and with the knowledge that someday you will be rewarded for it.
Mutual assistance is always relevant
And although the first lesson of self-sacrifice was shown in the Bible, similar actions are still relevant today, despite new social trends. For example, people interacting through new social approaches or social networks often help each other. Internet users, by providing social support to others, without knowing it, are helping themselves.
How does the giver receive health benefits beyond the good feelings that altruism provides? On the one hand, belonging to a group implies mutual approval and exchange of opinions. Giving (and receiving) support can also affect the sympathetic nervous and immune systems. One recent study found that providing support led to lower blood pressure and depression. In married couples, positive changes in the brain occurred when partners provided support to each other, as measured by functional MRI scans.
What kind of help can there be?
In fact, you and I often engage in minimal charity. For example, a neighbor asked us to tell us the recipe for carrot cake and we are happy to try. This is already a good thing, since we are transferring knowledge and skills.
Directions of charitable assistance:
- Transfer of knowledge and skills. A person knows something, can do it and shares it free of charge. This is when you come to an orphanage and teach the girls how to cook. Or they gave the poor man a fishing rod and told him how to fish so as not to die of hunger. You create conditions so that those in need can then provide for themselves.
- Transfer of property, food, household chemicals. You give away without self-interest what you own, or buy items from this group for another. For example, in 2014–2020, volunteers often collected food and household chemicals for refugees from the DPR and LPR. And many took part in these projects.
- Providing services, performing work. This is not a written-off math test, although an underperforming child with an unfavorable family situation can be helped in this way. Here we are most often talking about services. For example, a high-quality lawyer can give advice for free, or a hairdresser can give you a haircut without paying.
- Retail one-time assistance. When an organization or individual needs some kind of acquisition. For example, recently my friends and I donated a laptop to a shelter for children who found themselves in difficult living conditions, because they really needed a PC. This is a one-time donation to meet a specific need, but it is also considered charity.
- Humanitarian assistance. Clothes for charity, medicine for treatment, food, starting an accessible education program or water purification efforts.
- Social help. Selfless work in charity with vulnerable groups of the population. This is help to single women, children, disabled people, and elderly people.
Assistance in training disabled children to adapt to society
There are many areas for assistance. There is actually a lot of grief and worry in the world. In the city where I live alone, there are more than 50 different funds and organizations to help the poor, sick, disabled, victims of domestic violence, etc. At the same time, they will not refuse one-time assistance, New Year’s or any other event .
Examples of charity and patronage in life
You can find the most incredible stories of charity on the Internet:
- Chuck Feeney, the creator of Duty Free stores, has given away almost all of his fortune to date and is not fazed by the prospect of dying penniless.
- Warren Buffett donated $14.7 billion to fight poverty, treat HIV/AIDS and polio.
- George Soros gave about $3.1 billion to programs for the development of democracy and human rights.
- The Walton family supports educational projects with $2.3 billion.
- The Arnold family spent $1.2 billion on education, criminal justice and health care.
- Roman Abramovich takes part in social projects to support art, Jewish communities, seriously ill children, and sports development.
- Vladimir Potanin supports young teachers, students, education and science in Russia.
- Gennady Timchenko helps financially the elderly, families with adopted children, and gives money to cultural and scientific projects.
And there are actually many similar examples. Such people are the engines of progress in civilized countries. They change their lives for the better and help others do the same.
Another example of his charity is given in his Telegram channel by the author of this blog, Pavel Butor.
How to help people and how not to
The main principle of providing assistance: do no harm. You can probably remember situations when you wanted the best, but it turned out...
For example, many parents try to help their children with their studies. But it’s not always possible to do this for the good. Completely doing your child’s homework or some school project because he is tired and doesn’t have time is not help. On the contrary, it harms his development, prevents him from accepting responsibility and learning to distribute time and energy. Only knowledge acquired independently or with delicate, guiding help will be assimilated and retained for sure.
Or when it comes to parental assistance to grown-up children from wealthy families. Present the child with everything ready-made on a platter or give him the opportunity to express himself and achieve everything on his own, providing support and helping with advice - which will bring him more benefit?
Or a couple situation. The husband sits at home, does not look for work, drinks and suffers from his failures. His wife, feeling sorry for him, spins like a squirrel in a wheel and provides for him. That's the only way she can't help him. It is necessary to support each other in difficult situations. But by depriving a person of responsibility for his life, we rob him of the ability to cope with such situations.
Remember the saying: “Give a hungry man a fish and he will eat for a day; give him a fishing rod and he will eat for a lifetime”? You don’t need to solve a person’s problems for him, you need to help him find solutions.
There is no need to help people by taking actions in which you are incompetent. If you are not a doctor, you will not operate on a person who is injured, but take him to the hospital. Help with what you can really help. Let it not be through action, but through words of support and consolation, or the ability to listen, or by simply being there.
The assistance provided must be acceptable to the recipient of the assistance. There are situations when people are offended, insulted, upset if they are trying to help them. Sometimes people just don't know how to accept help from others. And sometimes people don’t know how to provide it. Remember that not everyone is ready to accept alms. Help out of pity comes from top to bottom, demonstrating a certain superiority over the recipient. Help should be based on sympathy, complicity, empathy - on the same level, together.
Next, let's talk about the phenomenon of volunteering.
History of charity
We see a focus on good deeds in Russia back in the Middle Ages.
Tsar Ivan the Terrible adopted laws focused on state charity: helping the needy, creating an almshouse using public funds and private donations. His successor was M.F. Romanov. He paid special attention to the creation of orphanages and caring for the poor, and there were always enough of them in Russia. The disabled, the elderly, the infirm, and drunkards fell under social protection. They were taken to special institutions and kept until death.
A little later, a society of noble maidens began to be brought up, where girls were taught to show kindness, care and compassion.
In the USSR, charity died out a little, since the state was responsible for providing for the basic needs of people. Everyone had at least the bare minimum, so there was no need for charitable organizations or patronage. Although when purchasing a stamp for 10 and 30 kopecks, part of the funds went to the development of the Red Cross Society and the Red Crescent Society of the USSR.
But after the collapse of the USSR, international charitable foundations and organizations gradually began to operate, for example, Doctors Without Borders, the International Red Cross.
Who does charity
There are caring people who want to help others and spend their nerves, money and time to do this. Someone may have experienced the same problem themselves, and someone wants to share their remedies.
Funds
These are non-profit organizations that exist on the basis of voluntary contributions from founders, legal entities or individuals. Foundations have goals: mercy for people, cultural education, educational or social programs. Each fund has statutory documents.
Foundations seek funds to achieve their goals. These could be voluntary donations or targeted fundraising. They can conduct commercial activities prescribed in the statute, invest, and receive grants.
Organizations
These are non-governmental non-profit organizations created to carry out charitable purposes. Organizations fulfill a “social order,” that is, they act in the interests of society or individual people.
They can be created in the form of an institution if the founder is a charitable organization.
These 2 types of institutions are practically no different from each other. I actually thought it was the same thing. But no. A CF (charitable foundation) is one of the types of BO (charitable organization). The point is that the status of non-profitability is different for CF and BO. The BO cannot constantly receive payments; the tax office has every right to collect what it is entitled to, although there will be periodic contributions.
In a charitable foundation, participants, founders, and their relatives cannot receive any profit at all. It only serves the purposes specified in the statute. Therefore, no black bookkeeping, everything should be as transparent as possible.
Churches
From time immemorial, the church was a place of shelter for the disadvantaged, a center of mercy for everyone who needed help. Just remember Hugo’s world-famous work “Les Miserables”. Serving people is the main mission of the church, which is why monastery shelters and rooms for visitors were opened.
And today, different denominations continue to provide assistance to victims of any incident who find themselves in difficult life situations. Volunteer associations often ask for church support for their activities. After all, there are spiritual people there who understand the value of human life and show empathy.
I don’t know about you, but it seems to me that church charitable foundations are almost the only institutions that can be trusted. At least, I have come across different groups on social networks, sites that create hype, collect a lot of money, and then disappear. Although there are also conscientious, proven organizations.
Personal charity
There are still good people on earth. When a person strives to develop internally, achieve success and prosperity in life, he understands that it is important not only to save money, but also to give.
Personal charity can be expressed in helping individuals or institutions. For example, one-time assistance to fire victims in the form of food and things. Or classes with people with disabilities. Or help, treatment and care for sick and homeless animals. Or gifts and toys for children, for example, on June 1 - Children's Day. Or individual assistance to doctors who are on the front line in the fight against coronavirus.
Sometimes it's just about being in the right place at the right time. I know that many psychologists provided free services to the relatives of those killed in a plane crash or after some kind of accident at an enterprise. Simply supporting a person in difficult times, when there is grief, is also necessary and important.
Corporate charity
When not one person, but a department or corporation allocates funds for good causes. In this case, a deduction for charity is legally issued and the institution helps its sponsored organizations.
Rules of altruism:
- help should be selfless and not have expectations of receiving something in return
- help should be refused out of mercy and one's own choice, and not be imposed by feelings
- assistance must be reasonable and conscious, that is, it must not cause harm either to the person being helped or to others
- help should not become the cause of one’s own degradation
- the end result should make the person independent of you whenever possible
- help should be moderate, but constant and continuous; it is better to help little by little all the time than to help once and forget
Altruism is a selfless desire to help those in need, the reason for which is mercy and one’s own choice. Expectations and emotional coloring violate the principle of altruism, making it selfish. The essence of altruism should be understood deeply, but without one’s own experience and practice it will be impossible to conceptually understand it.
Real and naive altruism
Sometimes the necessary help can be ungrateful in the end, and difficult and unpleasant in the process. When there is an idea in the mind that altruism is about rose petals, a red carpet, gratitude and applause, it will not last long. But when help is done not out of a desire to acquire something, but out of one’s own choice, which is built on the basis of selflessness and mercy, a person will be able to easily endure both the difficulties of the helping process itself and ingratitude. Of course, it doesn't always end this way, but naive altruism collapses precisely when expectations collide with reality.
Naive altruism has the image of a benefactor, a savior who descends from the heights of his experience, opportunities, wealth and with one movement changes the life of a person who is then grateful to him all his life. In reality, this is not so, but it is the naive altruists who ultimately become the most hardened cynics who do not care about people. Out of disappointment. Disappointment is a consequence of expectations, and this already indicates that their altruism was self-serving.
Selflessness means no expectations and no reward in any form. Moreover, this means a realistic acceptance of the fact that help itself can be a test for the helper and may not always end well. When performing an operation, you should be prepared for the possibility that something will go wrong. This readiness means greater vigilance, preparedness, concentration. The aid must be precise and sterile, leaving no traces. The point of helping is not to be admired, but to help others overcome their gaps. And we should not only remember this every time we help others, but also always think about it so as not to exceed the measure of help.
Positive aspects of volunteering
We hear more and more often about people involved in volunteer activities. They definitely found the answer to the question of why they need to help people. And sometimes we are faced with calls to devote part of our time to this. However, I would like a more meaningful approach to this activity, a clear understanding of who is able to provide the necessary help and how, as well as an understanding of the benefits and advantages of volunteering.
Benefits for the volunteer himself
Volunteer activities are mainly carried out by people with certain character traits and psychological characteristics. The ability to deeply empathize, a sincere desire to share and alleviate the pain of others are consequences of developed sensuality and the ability to direct emotions outward - towards compassion.
People with a visual vector of the psyche possess such qualities. Realization of sensory potential by building emotional connections with others, helping those in need, trusting communication, good relationships is their desire, their natural task. It is for this reason that they are endowed with significantly greater emotionality compared to others.
Such people find themselves not only in volunteering, but also in such areas as medicine, teaching, art, social activities - where they are able to help others and carry cultural values. This is how they make sense of their life.
When we do not use the properties given to us for their intended purpose, it causes us suffering. And we often don’t even understand what makes us unhappy.
For those with the visual vector, unspent emotionality can manifest itself in the form of fears, anxiety, mood swings, hysterics, overthinking over trifles, a tendency to overthink things without reason, etc.
Not every person with a visual vector will volunteer - you need to be internally prepared for this. For some, implementation in everyday life may be enough - there are many opportunities to show compassion. However, volunteering allows you to make the most of your emotional output. The ability to help someone who is obviously worse off than you, without expecting anything in return, gives much more in the end:
- getting rid of fears, emotional disorders and other negative conditions due to focus on higher-order feelings;
- new acquaintances, a lot of communication - what the owner of the visual vector needs;
- the opportunity to most fully realize one’s inner potential, thereby realizing one’s need and relevance, gaining the meaning of devoting energy and time for a significant goal.
This can be seen as an opportunity to make society and the world around us a little better and more meaningful, to transform them towards what they should someday become. A good reason why you need to help people?
Priority categories of those we help
Sick children
Why help sick children? — Almost no one has such questions. This is due to the fact that most people experience a feeling of extreme injustice when they hear about a child’s illness. It’s very sad when the guys in front have much less than behind, it violates all the laws of nature. The trouble associated with a sick child is aggravated by the fact that the baby is absolutely innocent and does not deserve such a misfortune, so many are ready to help in such a situation.
