Is it Volunteering?

[JayneWonders]

I sew for family all the time. I don't consider it volunteering. Some of it is just gifting , but other times it is because I was asked to sew.

I sewed for a nursing home to make mitts for a client.
The nursing home offered to pay; however, I chose to not charge.
I considered it just helping the community (volunteer service)

I will be volunteering at the local hospital.


What

 

[JayneWonders]

I did a google check and came up with this:


What is considered volunteering?

• Formal volunteering:
  This involves participating in organized activities, often through non-profit organizations or community groups, to help others.
  
  
• Informal volunteering:
  This can include helping neighbors, participating in community cleanups, or assisting with events that benefit the wider community.
  
  
• Family volunteering:
  This is a specific type where multiple family members, including parents, children, and other relatives, volunteer together for a common cause.
  

What is typically not considered formal volunteering?

• Helping immediate family members:
  Tasks like childcare, running errands, or providing personal care to family members are generally not considered volunteering.
• Academic work or tutoring:
  Helping family members with schoolwork or tutoring them is usually not considered formal volunteering.
  

Why is there a distinction?

• Formal volunteering is about altruism:
  It's about giving time and effort to benefit others without expectation of personal gain.
  
  
• Family support is a different dynamic:
  Providing support within a family is often a reciprocal arrangement, and it may not always fit the definition of solely altruistic service.
  
  
• Family volunteering bridges the gap:
  When families volunteer together, they can experience the benefits of altruism while also strengthening family bonds and values.

 

[Mendalla]

Is that from a search result or the Gemini summary? It's pretty good, just wondering.

But that tallies well with my understanding. When I do IT support for my wife, that's being her husband. When I do IT support for my church (or Wondercafe2), that's volunteering.

 

[JayneWonders]

Is that from a search result or the Gemini summary? It's pretty good, just wondering.

But that tallies well with my understanding. When I do IT support for my wife, that's being her husband. When I do IT support for my church (or Wondercafe2), that's volunteering.

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[JayneWonders]

I'd add that there are times when family caregiving or support, mean that you don't have time or energy for more formal volunteering.

When there are say, 4 or 5 kids, and one says "i can handle caring for our aging mom", then, are they volunteering? I'd still likely say no. It may be obligation or duty, and there may or may not be choice. It doesn't fit the more formal description of volunteering that includes the altruistic aspect.

 

[Mendalla]

I'd add that there are times when family caregiving or support, mean that you don't have time or energy for more formal volunteering.

Yeah, I dropped off a ministerial search committee and turned down a seat on the board for that reason. Between work and family, I had precious little time left for myself, which included volunteer work.

 

[Luce NDs]

Then there are these gilded items of closure ... just because someone wished to hide a talent for personal gain ... not gain of the greater nature ... World View?

Leads to wars and private profiteering ... no prophets! Autonomous bubbles require careful dancing ... pre Carious? Dame ... the great Mother Theorem!

Sixth Insight ... all sewn up ... a stitch in time? Hold on a bit ... literary bit instead of literal!

 

[Luce NDs]

How to confine one self for study, so as to get to know the avarice portion, about restricted accrual of resources?

Is wealth really gained when going to war to commit the alternate to understanding the adept, or is it a waste of resources that are critically limited in a fixed world? Can we help ourselves given the rush of fool sto do something that they think is Beta and yet they haven't come to any sense of that yet?

Thus we continue as fools do go on search improvement that is undeserved ... a rush ... may be the epinephrine (steroidal eh). This may be extracted from a tree as isoprene ... a terpene! Thus the Py'n thing ...

I was cussed by a theolog because of that expression ... sapiens? No end to it but a darker domain ... much unknown there ... un illuminated? Like a night out there ... moths looking for something ... moth Eire 've the thing that's missing ... back to the 6th ...

It is all bound up in the story! Like 4 walls maybe Moe 'r ... it always comes round to great chewing, discussion and other Mulls ...

Tables that look back at yah? Silly boy they tell me ... regarding to sizing up of trees ... its a ho-Moe ... blended essence ... every persona has some of each ... roué 6! Bottom of quintessence ... some never calm ... thus its writ ... dead in the script ... res Ted?

Depends on interpretation from different points of space and temporal condition ... time gentlemen, please! Close the door on your way out ...

Otherwise another myth will raft up ... reorganization? It continues due to noted imperfections ... we didn't have adequate avarice for stability ...

Brute control is tough because you have to play with the steerage on over waters ... there's this sway ... may break down into roll, pitch and Ya'hall ... a long passage ... shadowed abstract?

Imagine having been there ... some still don't get it!

 

[Mrs.Anteater]

Thanks for taking this out of the Room, Jayne.
I have been thinking how to further define “volunteering” and set it apart from things you just do. Is it in the eye of the person doing it? The father doesn’t volunteer to babysit his own kids. When I babysit my grand daughter, I would not consider that a volunteer job.
“ volunteering” has the taste of something “official”. A position recognized by an organization or a group. Between friends/ family/neighbours one would simply help each other out.

 

[Northwind]

If I'm a carpenter who builds something for my child or grandchild, I'm helping a family member. If I build something at a halfway house, I'm volunteering.

 

[chansen]

I mean, they're all ways of contributing or "giving back", but an essential piece of the volunteering thing to me, and I've not looked it up, is "Is there an expectation that your efforts will eventually be returned by the party you're helping?"

That is, are you helping someone who will likely help you one day, so you're effectively "banking a favour"?

If so, that's transactional and not volunteering. Volunteering comes with no expectation of direct reciprocation.

 

[Luce NDs]

I mean, they're all ways of contributing or "giving back", but an essential piece of the volunteering thing to me, and I've not looked it up, is "Is there an expectation that your efforts will eventually be returned by the party you're helping?"

That is, are you helping someone who will likely help you one day, so you're effectively "banking a favour"?

If so, that's transactional and not volunteering. Volunteering comes with no expectation of direct reciprocation.

How does one stabilize the given, take process so the powers will not take too much away from the conception? Empiric collapse ... a point with 2 ends?

It may resemble the power of desire chilled by cool thinking ... not probable as the powers keep pouring on the heat under the wings ...

 

[Mrs.Anteater]

I mean, they're all ways of contributing or "giving back", but an essential piece of the volunteering thing to me, and I've not looked it up, is "Is there an expectation that your efforts will eventually be returned by the party you're helping?"

That is, are you helping someone who will likely help you one day, so you're effectively "banking a favour"?

If so, that's transactional and not volunteering. Volunteering comes with no expectation of direct reciprocation.

I had thought about that as a definition- but- there exist some really tough family members where you don’t get anything back- sometimes not even a thank you. And people help out anyway. Still would not consider this volunteering.

 

[chansen]

I had thought about that as a definition- but- there exist some really tough family members where you don’t get anything back- sometimes not even a thank you. And people help out anyway. Still would not consider this volunteering.

True, it wasn't really meant as an all-encompassing definition, just something to use to differentiate.

 

[Mendalla]

A position recognized by an organization or a group.

I don't think it has to be that formal. The IT work I did for my church wasn't a recognized position or anything, just me contributing the skills and connections I had for work to the church.

 

[Jaebius]

Think an excellent community role would be volunteering at a children's hospital. I've just started to think about that.

I've even heard of cases where RDJ volunteered to be at a kid's hospital as Tony Stark, and Johnny Depp as Captain Jack Sparrow. Good on them

 

[Luce NDs]

Do some people volunteer for questionable purpose ... and then demand there should be no inquiry?

I'd question that too ... actually opening everything to question ... actually stated in the bible but many skip over that portion as a bad shard ...

There are portions of the populace that find such schemes and conspiracies a block in their mental process as a lost thought ... some believe mental blocks can trump everything if unthought!

WE do encounter a great deal of unthinking in reality ... placing knowledge and Sophia in the abstract side ... declared unthinkable!

If you look at it ... it may be whisked away ... the basis of Schrodinger ...

On the other perspective some harden up ... absolutely. One must experience this even if in passing ... so it does as the old goat pushes it uphill ...

Does ... apparently sheepish ... or like cowed in the realm of bull, Baloch and belief when everything turns ... inevitable spin?

 

[Nancy]

Most of my volunteering is through the church. But I sure keep busy with family responsibilities…babysitting, mom care, communication with husband’s large family. Today I thought about how I would like to help people with reading or English skills. But….i need time for that. Right now I have other priorities.

 

[Luce NDs]

Most of my volunteering is through the church. But I sure keep busy with family responsibilities…babysitting, mom care, communication with husband’s large family. Today I thought about how I would like to help people with reading or English skills. But….i need time for that. Right now I have other priorities.

I was told that a' priori was once important but some powers cannot see the initial need of knowledge before rushing into a fools solution ... sound familiar?

The solution comes behind with experience of the backstage ... there's a donkey there for sound effect ... denied or not there is a medium and 2 ends ... many cannot accept a medium for processing ... thus all thought goes somewhere else ... out-of-here ... oak-A? Life cycle ...

 

[Carolla]

Interesting to me that we often refer to 'volunteer WORK' - which seems to formalize what is done in a more transactional way, as chansen pointed out. How would it feel to consider this instead as "opportunities to serve"?

For me, there is a distinction between 'serving others' and 'volunteering to help others'. Serving carries with it a greater sense of humility & perhaps compassion in the offering. An understanding that I too may be changed by my action of serving. Volunteering often is imbued with nuance of 'I can do something they can't', for want of better phrasing, and in that sense connotes a bit of differential bias, often power or status or privilege based.

I think many churches (and many of their people) have lost a sense of being called to humble service, and use a focus of helpful volunteering. A subtle difference perhaps, but one that is meaningful to me. Sometimes when I am at my local food bank serving meals, I have heard other volunteers make snide comments about our guests 'not even saying thank you' to them. Do we volunteer to earn gratitude from those we serve? Perhaps. Is it conscious or unconscious?