Giving Back to the Community....but Which Community?

Crossposted from my Blogetary:

About a month ago I was asked to help volunteer at a local garage sale. I was asked at the beginning of the week and a conditional (to me) “yes” popped out of my mouth. I tend to promise more than I can do, though. But I thought I would try. I had work, freelance and otherwise, as well as extra paid work coming in and I needed it all. But I also had a couple of previously promised “pro bono” pieces to do that I was running behind on. And then there was basic housekeeping and bookkeeping to catch up on. I just crossed my fingers and hoped for the best.

As the week went on and I took on more of the paying work coming my way, I of course ran out of time and energy for freelance work and the “pro-bono” volunteer stuff, and kept shoving it all until later in the week. And then later in the week came and suddenly it was Friday evening, and I still hadn’t completed all I had promised – freelance or otherwise – still thought about helping at the garage sale and still had guests coming over on the Sunday, so I needed to clean the house on the Saturday. Still hadn’t gotten caught up on spreadsheets and bank balances. So, I decided to power on through on Friday evening and see how much I could get done.

It was 6 a.m. Saturday morning before I could say I was finished with both “pro bono” and paid work and my “maybe” volunteering at the community garage sale turned into a “no.” But I felt really guilty about. I believe in giving back to the community, whichever community that is. But I realized I also felt resentful, which shouldn’t be the case. Volunteer is volunteer. And yes, if you’re going to volunteer to do something, you should commit to it, but ultimately, it’s still volunteer. Right? And when it means the difference between your health and the function, well, choosing your health is the better thing. An example: One summer during college I worked at a nursing home and they were short one weekend and I took on a double shift. I normally worked swing shift – 3 to 11 p.m., so I stayed on through the graveyard until Sunday morning, 7 a.m. And then, because I’d committed to going to church, went home, took a shower, changed clothes and went to church. Well, it didn’t do me a bit of good as I kept falling asleep in the pew, which distracted the people next to me and I actually got called out by the pastor during the sermon because of it. The better choice would have been to go home and go to bed. There was nothing wrong with taking the extra shift, just as there was nothing wrong with powering through to get things done the night before the garage sale. But at some point meeting those volunteer commitments just to meet them becomes prideful. You are no longer meeting those commitments because they’re good for you and the community. You are now doing them because you have some pride in them or because you’re expected to and what if you don’t!? Oh, my! The sky will fall in and everyone will think so much less of you! Not. The point is the initial impulse to help disappears behind the “keep up with the Jones and our reputation” mentality.

This all made me think about volunteerism and the nature of volunteerism. People understand the nature of volunteerism in neighborhood communities – to help people in the neighborhood or to clean it up and make it better for everyone – but not everyone understands that volunteerism also encompasses other communities – say your online communities, your writing communities, your school and Alma Mater communities, your genre communities, pet/animal shelter communities, church/temple communities, etc. And volunteering in these communities is just as important as volunteering in your neighborhood communities.

For example, there are a number of small online and in print magazines that would not be up and running if it weren’t for countless volunteer readers out there who are willing to go through the slush piles and suggest to the editors which ones to consider and which ones to kindly pass on. Many people wouldn’t be able to go forward very well in their careers if it weren’t for mentors volunteering to help them. My college Alma Mater, Western Washington University, runs an online mentoring program and also contacts mentors to help with their leadership classes – all on a volunteer basis. Many public libraries have reading programs where volunteers can come in and read books to kids on a regular or semi-regular basis. Some of those same libraries usually have a Friends of the Library group that help with used book sales and other ideas to raise money for our libraries. But even outside of these organizations, whenever you volunteer to help out someone in your field, it helps make that field a little bit better for everyone in it. Or so I believe. That’s why I volunteer to read slush for an online zine, do online mentoring for my Alma Mater and also volunteer within the writing community to do things like interviews or reviews, etc. I want to give back to communities that have given to me, and I hope that in return has helped someone else.

If you take on too much it can be overwhelming, and as noted above you can also lose sight of why you began volunteering in the first place – to make your community, whatever community that is, a better place. But, in my opinion, if you can keep it in balance, start out slow, then you’re doing that much more to make your community just a little bit better, a little bit friendlier for everyone involved. And you probably make your life a little bit better, too (Plus, you can put it on your resume).