I pet cats at a no-kill facility I pick up garbage on my street I try to *Listen to people, carefully when in a conversation Soup kitchen - just 1 day a week
shortly - Meals on Wheels
Service can encompass such a wide variety of things
I don't see people very often. When I do it's in places like stores, or on the freeway. I don't have a lot of physical energy, so it limits the things I can do.
It's just a small thing, but it seems to make so many people so happy. I let people in line ahead of me. It doesn't matter if it's at the grocery store or on the freeway.
I stop at the food bank and ask them what they need the most. Then I go get it for them. It's just small stuff, but it's amazing how it adds up. I find my self paying attention and looking for opportunities. The tiny little old lady that wants something on the top shelf at the grocery store, but can't reach it. The mother who just got the kids and the groceries in the car, but the cart return is a half a block away. If you really look, there are a lot of people out there who need just a little help.
I did hospital nursing for 20 years. I have two children still at home. We have done service trips to Mexico, etc that were fun, but taking care of aged parents is by far the most difficult. It is daily concern & worry that just weighs one down. The shift never ends.
When I am ready to go back to the "real job market, I want a very quiet cubicle where I don't have to provide any services to anyone. (I don't think a job like that really exists:)
It used to piss me off that the women in church who spend almost every waking hour serving others, would be lectured at church to do more. They would make up service projects for these people.
If you're a mother, or a service worker, or both, you don't need more service projects.
I don't consider my slavery to the morgbot church as "service work" anyhow, just senseless busy work to keep me from questioning. Now, I'm so into just doing fun stuff for myself and family on weekend, perhaps to make up for 45+ years of slavery, I haven't done any true service work.
That was my question too. What service work did you do while you were in TSCC? I remember taking elderly members christmas baskets once. I never ever remember doing anything service-like for nonmembers.
But that WAS service work. It still counts as service to take care of those in your organization. That's the point of churches. So people have a community that cares about them. Thus, the tax exempt status.
Some of the mormon service is truly service. Some is just by members for members like some of the callings. Being a youth instructor/ mentor can be a real service calling, if you care for the youth and let them know it. Institute teacher, not so much!
Temple work for the dead is make-work service. Benefits noone at all.
On petting the cats at the no kill shelter, that's So needed. I hope someone is doing that at the shelter where I recently had to surrender mine, reluctantly.
In my neighborhood my young family is surrounded by the elderly, mostly widows, including one who increasingly suffers from dimentia.
I mow their lawns. It takes up a few hours each weekend, but my kids have lots of "grandmas" and "grandpas" and I almost always get a treat at the end (-:
I have to admit with being out less than a year I'm currently feeling pretty selfish with my time and my money.
I intend to do some stuff eventually both in charitable giving and more importantly with service at some point. However, for now I just want a break from it, especially where I feel I have been taken advantage of in the past.
This reminds me of a thread on Babycenter.LDS where they talked about the same thing. Their ideas were.... making cards for loved ones, putting them on the doorstep, ringing the doorbell, and running away.
Also waving at passing cars. To be fair a few of them mentioned helping out at homeless shelters and stuff.
One thing I have done is to help sort donations at the homeless shelter thrift store.
I volunteer my PA sound system to good musical causes, set it up, run the sound and lights for free.
When I perform my own shows, I don't charge a fee, I play for a "donation" based on what people can afford, and I give the donation money and some of my own money (matching amount or more) to a local non-profit music community that is run out of a local music store and performance venue that I play at every few months.
I was an Americorps volunteer working with disadvantaged youth who didn't speak English for a few months. After that I was a Peace Corps volunteer working with some of the poorest people on the planet. About once a month I go to the rescue mission in SLC and help serve food. Just recently I started helping local free care clinics with their outreach programs, specifically with the immigrant or refugee population because I speak multiple languages.
Other than that, I grade papers and teach academics and citizenship all day, but I get paid for that. :)
I'm a classroom volunteer, little league and softball team mom, math mentor, and serve as an elected PTA officer on both a unit level and council level. It's like a whole new world opened up after I didn't have anything to do in church anymore. I have enjoyed the Hell out of my "job" and have made some lifelong friends in the process.....and I don't know how or whether any of them worship. Which is so ironic, because before, it was almost a prerequisite.
I would like to think Mormonism prepared me for leadership and service, but I might have just been cut out for it anyway.
OMG, I totally read that as "I kill cats at a no-pet facility". Wow, I need a nap.
I take a homebound mom and daughter to the grocery store a couple times a month. Actually they are mormons, though I'm not sure that they fully comprehend their church and it's doctrines. I also spend a fair amount of time working with my kids's Venture Crew. Not nearly the time commitment as my numerous callings were, and done with a much more willing heart.
My family is always asking me this question. I have found that living life gives everyone plenty of opportunities to serve-almost daily. The problem with being a Mormon is that you are too busy to notice them. You are too busy to stop and chat for a minute with a lonely neighbor while getting the mail, too busy to listen to a little kid tell you a LONG story, too busy to let someone in the traffic, too poor to drop a few dollars in the Salvation Army can. As soon as I wasn't so busy "serving God," I actually started serving others.
I fix things for people, and do it for free if they are short on cash. Like the lawn mower or furnace, etc. I enjoy that because it's one-on-one service to somebody that needs it.
I help with my wife's Cub Scouts when it comes to teaching the useful arts, i.e. handyman, etc.
I have worked in the LDS cannery because that is one thing they do that I agree with.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/16/2012 09:03PM by rationalguy.