"We rise by lifting others."
-Robert Ingersoll
FINDING MORE MEANING
- By Lorraine Gilmore
One of my missions with creating the M Practice was to help people find more meaning in their lives. This can be done in a number of ways: by finding something you are passionate about to work towards, nurturing your close relationship or working in a fulfilling job. One key way to find meaning is by helping others. As Mahatma Gandhi said "The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others."
According to the charity Action for Happiness, scientific studies have proven that helping others can not only increase your happiness but increase your sense of meaning and satisfaction with your life and can even boost your self-confidence. It can help you feel calmer and reduce your stress levels. People who volunteer regularly experience fewer symptoms of depression and anxiety, are more hopeful and can even live longer! As they say "If you want to feel good, find ways you can do good!" Click here to read more from Action for Happiness about helping others.
I have definitely experienced this first hand working and volunteering with a number of charities in multiple countries over the years and have had some of my happiest and most fulfilling memories during those times.
"No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted"
What I learnt from Volunteering in Africa
I spent a year backpacking through Southern and Eastern Africa and spent 6 months volunteering with a grassroots NGO, DIN Malawi. It was a truly life changing experience and I was amazed and inspired by the local team, their positivity and determination to help others, even in the face of so many challenges and having very little themselves. During my time in Malawi I lived in a village and had only very basic necessities. This time re-enforced for me that it really isn't material possessions that bring you happiness. I learnt that happiness relates a lot more around the basics, living in the present moment, not getting caught up in the worries about the future, not just being driven by success, achievement and productivity. Instead it's about being present, connecting with your community, friends and family and focusing on what is good in your life. These are things we don't seem to prioritise or have lost in the west more in recent times. But, of course, no matter how positive your mindset is, you can't have true happiness without your basic human rights and I also found it heartbreaking and frustrating to witness how few opportunities there were for locals to lift themselves out of poverty (even for the educated) and the reliance people had to have on aid from abroad to help.
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Self-care instead of being Self-less
During this time, I also learnt the importance of looking after yourself and ‘filling up your own cup’ first. If you burn yourself out you won't be able to help anyone. If you don't prioritise your own mental health you're not much good to anyone else. So often we are taught to be selfless but I don't believe this is sustainable. I think we should view helping others as a way of finding deeper connections, more fulfillment and contentment in our lives. This is one of the reasons I created the M Practice - to help people find more peace and happiness in their lives so they can in turn help others and create more good in the world. Click here to try some Practices for yourself.
"We make a living by what we get, we make a life by what we give."
Winston Churchill
About DIN Malawi
One of my goals with the M Practice is to try to help support the incredible work DIN Malawi is doing with some of the most vulnerable people in the world. DIN Malawi is a local, non-profit organization with a mission to alleviate poverty and create lasting change in vulnerable communities in Malawi. Malawi is amongst the poorest nations in the world, with over 96 percent of its people earning less than US$5.5 per day. The landlocked country of 20 million people is plagued by multi-pronged domestic challenges and is vulnerable to severe external climate shocks. The largely remote Chikwawa district where DIN Malawi works lies in the path of persistent floods and drought that wreck the southern part of Malawi. Most parts are inaccessible due to precarious road networks, particularly during the rainy season.
DIN wants to reach the rural community by setting up a Community Radio - The Listener’s Voice. DIN’s Community Radio station would provide an affordable and effective way to reach people in remote rural communities. It will broadcast programs aimed at education, entertainment and information with a view to promote cultural, economic, environmental and social development and responsibility across communities in South Malawi. It will promote education, human rights, livelihood programs, fighting poverty among the communities and will discourage unhealthy behavioral patterns like domestic violence, child marriages and alcoholism. The aim of the radio station is not only to offer more awareness and education for the community; it will also be a means by which DIN will sustainably fund their running costs and ongoing projects as a grassroots NGO. The radio station would be able to generate a regular income from advertising and sponsorship, which would provide a source of funding to help support their ongoing projects like their ‘Women Voices’ initiative, which teaches tailoring and clothing design to allow the participants to develop self-reliance, the ‘Girls' Voice Amplifier’ initiative which provides young girls with strong support networks and a foundational education to reduce child marriage and much more and ‘Happy Heart Preschool’, to name a few. ‘Happy Hearts Preschool’ was built by DIN Malawi in 2016, providing early childhood education to over 90 kids. I helped DIN to fundraise and build the school while I was volunteering there and I saw first hand how this preschool project can help give these children a chance to break the poverty cycle.
It is my wish to help DIN Malawi become more self-sufficient and for them to have a means to generate their own income and not be reliant on foreign income in the long run. As I believe this is the key to breaking the poverty cycle, I think that more Malawians and people living in poverty need to be empowered to run their own projects. They already have the passion and the skills; they just need a helping hand to get started.
I truly believe that one of the greatest ways to happiness is by giving to others. Helping an important cause can bring meaning to your life and research even shows that spending money on others makes you happier than spending it on yourself. Sometimes one of the best ways to get a break from your own problems is to help someone else with theirs.
How you can help:
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Donate - Your donation, however small, will have an impact.
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Spread the word
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Volunteer Online
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Volunteer in Malawi
Thank you so much for your support.