If you caught my post “Is There Such A Thing As A Selfless Act?” you’ll know that I recently participated in just a couple of hours of volunteering and found it surprisingly rewarding. But even beyond that rewarding feeling we get from volunteering, I’ve realised there are other ways to make volunteering benefit you AND the cause.
You might wonder why I want to benefit from volunteering. We all know the idea of volunteering is that we are giving up our time for the greater good. It’s not really supposed to benefit us, right? This is very true, however, benefitting personally in some way, does not diminish the good we are doing for the cause and it also increases the chances of us continuing to volunteer. It is a win win. I hope these tips will inspire you to start volunteering. So how can we make volunteering benefit you AND the cause?
Double Down On Your Interests
Do you want to ‘give back’ but don’t know where to start then start with your own interests. By focusing on your interests you will narrow down your options for volunteering and you will be more likely to actually enjoy doing it. For example, I love dogs so I volunteer with dog charities. Simple, enjoyable and rewarding for me whilst contributing to a worthy cause. How can you align your interests to volunteering?
Build Your Skills
Volunteering is an opportunity to build our skills. A great way to make volunteering benefit you and the cause is to align it to a skill that you are focused on building. This can be anything so it is really important for you to think about areas in your life you want to develop. It could even help you to do better at work. For example, a friend of mine wanted to get better at public speaking so they volunteered with a homeless charity and spoke publicly about the work and fundraising they are doing.
Chase Experiences
The only thing that really enriches our lives are experiences and even more, experiences with other people. By chasing experiences we can enrich our lives, build our friends and professional network, learn new skills, align our interests and help out some great causes. The best thing about volunteering is that there is usually an option that suits everyone.
You can do it for an hour, for a day, for a week or you can travel to another country for months at a time. The level of experience you can commit to is up to you. But the most interesting people I know, have had great experiences that they can share. Could volunteering be an experience that you could share?
These are just three ways to make volunteering benefit you and the cause. There are infinite reasons to volunteer and so many causes out there that there will always be something that is close to your heart. And if you volunteer already, feel free to share ideas in the comments.
To give you some ideas, I am sharing some causes that are close to my heart as well as links to some charities in need below in case you feel compelled to give.
Guide Dogs UK & Guide Dogs Ireland
5 For The Fight (Cancer Research)
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