Giving Of Time
18th Mar 2011
I just got an email from one of the volunteers from ShAFF 2011. Not only was she a star at the festival, helping out for nothing more than a Tshirt and some tea and coffee (she did get to watch a few films too I guess), but she's shortly off to Africa to attempt the Marathon De Sables, raising money for the Christchurch Quake Appeal. If you fancy helping her out you can donate here.
It's a pretty important thing, giving your time, and it's all too easy to claim that life is too busy, things are too hectic, time is money, etc etc. Business and a hectic lifestyle are, at the end of the day, choices that we all make. A friend of mine used to work in the medical profession, but now manages a local shop. When I asked her when she will go back into her medical career she said that quite simply, she prefers the less busy, less pressured lifestyle. It seems that we all spend a large proportion of our lives being busy in order to retire and live a less busy life. A curious way of going about things when you think about it. There are countless parables on the subject, but my favourite is definitely this one:
Once upon a time there was a fisherman leaning on the seawall, smoking his pipe, soaking up the summer sun, watching the world go by and the waves gently lapping the shore.
A smartly dressed young businessman happened along and as a stranger to the place stopped nearby to admire the view. After politely exchanging pleasantries as people do, the young businessman enquired about his trade and discovered that the fisherman had been out early, caught a hold-full, off-loaded it to the market and was now simply passing time away.
The businessman pressed the fisherman as to why he wouldn’t go out again and increase his earnings.
Fisherman, “Now why would I do that?”
Businessman, “Well if you increased your earnings, you could expand the business, perhaps take on another boat, employ people, increase the turnover and build a fleet.”
Fisherman, “Now why would I do that?”
Businessman, “If you did that you would be rich and could put people in to manage the business. Obviously you’d keep an eye on what was going on but it would leave you free to do as you choose.”
Fisherman, “Now what would I do with all that leisure time?”
Businessman, “What do you like doing?”
Fisherman, “I like standing by the sea, smoking my pipe, soaking up the summer sun, watching the world go by and the waves gently lapping the shore.”
Businessman, “There you are. You could do that.”
Fisherman, “What do you think I’m doing now?”
(I actually lifted this from somebody else's blog here).
Our village lost its village shop about 6 months ago. There have been a series of meetings since then to discuss what to do about it. The latest one, just last week, had a real momentum and positive vibe to it. There were around 50 people there (900 live in the village). The talk is of starting up a community shop, run primarily by volunteers from the village. I sincerely hope that people are not so busy that they can't manage an hour or two a week to help out and make it work.