Reflections on volunteering

I was looking up some quotes on volunteering, trying to come up with a catchy line for a volunteer recruitment drive being planned in office. Predictably there are tons of lovely quotes and stories out on the net. One of the better ones from Winston Churchill reads “You make a living by what you get. You make a life by what you give”

Speaking from my own experience, it is very tough to find one quote or story that spans the whole range emotions that you go through as volunteer. It is indeed quite a journey that is definitely worth undertaking !!

I’ll make no bones about that fact that I was dragged into volunteering kicking and screaming. I did not want to do it, it was more or less rammed down my throat by someone higher up. I had a hundred reasons on why not to do it, and I was quite vocal about them too.

Finally one of my volunteer friends looked me in the eye and calmly asked “At the end of the day, if you go and teach a bunch of kids, would you have done something right or wrong ?” I honestly had no rebuttal to that [ and that holds true even after 5 years :) ]

So what does it mean to be on the other side of the fence ?

To pull out another quote : “I always wondered why somebody didn't do something about that. Then I realized I was somebody”

Sure, there were times at which I have shed a tear or two, there were occasions when i contemplated giving it all up and there were times when I went through soul destroying experiences. But at the end of it all, I am glad that I made a choice to be that “somebody” around 5 years back.

I still have not scratched the surface of what I want to do.

Robert Frost says  “And miles to go before I sleep” and I agree fully.

However it is 11.45 in the night and I definitely need to sleep :)