An old man walking along the beach came upon a child
Sifting through debris left behind by the night’s tide.
Every so often he would pick up a starfish and toss it back to the Sea.
“The tide has washed the starfish onto the beach. They will die
unless I throw them back,” the boy said.
The old man looked around at the miles of beach.
“There are more starfish than you can ever save.
You cannot make a difference.”
The child bent to pick up another starfish and sent it back to the ocean.
Then he looked up at the old man, smiled and replied,
“I can make a difference to this one.”
My favorite inspirational story has always been this one about the little boy and the starfish. Like the little boy on the beach I believe each person can make a difference. I don’t think every one of us can change the world but each of us can make a difference in our community, our families and the other people we interact with every day. A kind word that improves another’s day or a visit to a neighbor in the hospital are examples of ways we can make a positive difference without belonging to any organized effort. Some people look for ways to share their time and skills on a wider scale in their community or the world around us. An organized volunteer effort may be best for them.
After retiring I took some crafting classes before getting involved in volunteering. I told one of the instructors that I was also looking into volunteering with a local nonprofit. I still have not forgotten her words. She said that would be a silly waste of my time and compared it to spitting into a frying pan – just a lot of effort that would accomplish nothing. I even had a woman ask me if volunteering was not what bored women do to fill their time? I won’t share my answer to her question.
So if it is not just bored women and people who spit into frying pans who volunteer, who does? According to the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS) more Americans than ever are volunteering. Their 2018 Volunteering in America report says 77.34 million (30.34 percent) of adults volunteered with an organization in 2017. This represented 6.9 billion hours’ worth an estimated $167 billion. These numbers are continuing to increase in our country.
When I retired, I was fortunate that my community had a wonderful organization that interviewed prospective volunteers aged 55 and over and helped then find a match for their skills, experience and interests. Conejo Senior Volunteer Program (CSVP) is part of our City’s Conejo Recreation and Parks Department. They currently have 906 active senior volunteers who currently serve approximately 180,000 hours valued at $5,000,000. Their volunteers work with 70 partner agencies including schools, senior agencies and nonprofits, hospices, our library, our volunteer policing group, animal rescue and many others. This quarter, nine CSVP volunteers celebrated their 25th anniversaries of volunteering in our community.
What kind of people devote all these hours for no pay to benefit others? A study done by CNCS and reported on by CNN says volunteers tend to be married, female and to have attained higher levels of education. People between 25 and 54 are the most likely age group to volunteer. Until the end of the 20th century there was a huge gender gap in volunteering with women way ahead of men. Now that more women are working, their volunteer rates have not gone down. The good news is that men’s volunteer hours have consistently gone up. Experts say that men seeing women in the workplace and still volunteering has encouraged them that they can do it too.
What motivates these people to spend their time volunteering? According to Energize Inc, people volunteer for a wide variety of reasons. Some of the major ones are to help others, to feel needed, to share a skill, to make new friends, to comply with work requirements and to keep busy.
Another way of looking at volunteering is to see it as exchange between two people – one who needs help and one who wants to help. Most of us will need help or support at some point in our lives. Today maybe I am the one who can help, but tomorrow I may be the one who needs help. When volunteering is thought of as an exchange rather than an act of charity, it allows the volunteer to feel more comfortable and the recipient to maintain self-respect.
It is no doubt obvious that I am a huge supporter of volunteering and see it as an activity that brings tremendous benefits to both the volunteer and the recipients of the volunteer activity. In a way I see it as an opportunity to pay it forward. Today I am fortunate to be able to help another during a difficult time. I like to think that there will be someone there when I need a visitor, a driver or just a kind word and a smile.