Volunteering

Volunteering our time is a great way to give back to our community, but how do we involve our kids and help them see the value? Brandy shares her personal experiences and gives us great information on making service a priority and being a starfish thrower in all kinds of ways.

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Jen: Hello and welcome to the Parents’ Place, a podcast put out by the Family Place for parents to develop skills that will strengthen families and provide tools that will help each of us in our parenting efforts. No matter our skills, we can always use reminders that help us work towards a safer, happier home. I'm your host. Jennifer Daly, the education director at the Family Place and my co-host is Sara Hendricks, a family educator at the Family Place. Every week, we will interview professionals that will provide valuable information that will make a difference when you apply it directly to your life. Thank you for joining us. Now, let's get started with today's episode.

Jen: Hi and welcome to the Parents Place podcast, I'm your host, Jen Daly.

Sara: And I'm your co-host Sara Hendricks.

Jen: Today, we are so lucky to have Brandy Mouritsen with us, and she is going to be talking to us about the importance of volunteering. I think this is a great topic for us right now, I feel like our country has really stepped up over the last year, and there has been a lot of people who have been volunteering and helping those who are in need and just helping your neighbor. So I'm excited for this episode and will let Brandy tell us a little bit more about herself.

Brandy: Jen, thanks for having me back on the show. Actually, when I found out about this topic, I'm really grateful for it because it made me think back on the experiences that I have had with my family. And I've just had a really great week thinking about the volunteer opportunities that I've had with my kiddos and my family.

Sara: Well, Brandy, you're such a great example of volunteering that I think you really are the perfect person to give us more information on this topic. So, can you tell us why is it important to volunteer? What are the benefits from volunteering?

Brandy: Great question. I think if we talk about what the benefits are, then we'll be able to see why it's important to volunteer. One of the things that I found with volunteering is able to meet new people. You can meet people who share common interests, values, and the same outlook on life that you do. We also know that working together toward common goals will nurture your sense of belonging and purpose and expand your support system. When I served on Adam's PTA, I was very new to Utah. I started just serving in my daughter's kindergarten class, which then led me to be on the PTA, and I gained an entire group of friends. And since then, I'm now in a new school, new PTA. I have those friends reach out to me and I've actually reached out to those friends as well. So, I have developed a new group of friends just from volunteering. Another thing we can do is gain knowledge and understanding of other people's ways. Learning about cultures and ways of life that are different from your upbringing can expand your perception of the world. It also raises awareness of issues other people are dealing with, and it can increase your social skills, such as empathy and teamwork. And actually, volunteering can make you happier. Yep, you can. There's actually been a study that shows that when you volunteer, you gain a sense of accomplishment and increased feelings of happiness. And I know there's been this debate is it just that happy people volunteer? Or is it that volunteer actually makes people happy? But the study has proven that those that volunteer actually have a positive well-being, so they are more happy. And so, the question is how? How does volunteering make you more happy? And what they came up with is throughout your life, you develop social and professional skills that promote your personal achievement. Right? But when you volunteer, you're taking those skills and you're using them for a wider communal impact that can be even more fulfilling. And so, along with being happier, it can boost your self-esteem. The more opportunities you take to volunteer, the greater chance you are to learn new skills and gain knowledge. And I think about what is a more safer way to learn a new skill or gain some knowledge is volunteering their time. And also, when you challenge yourself in volunteering, you will receive appreciation from others and it can make you feel better emotionally. So, I ask you, like think of a time where you volunteered in that moment, you may have been scared at the end of the volunteering. You maybe have been exhausted because it was physical labor that maybe you did for eight hours. But now when you think about it and you look back on that volunteer opportunity, how does that make you feel? And I would guarantee for almost everyone, you just feel a sense of pride or you feel happy of what you did. Volunteering can also help you land the job that you want, right? If you have volunteer experience on your resume, you are going to stand out over job candidates who don't take time to give back to their society where you volunteer to highlight your character, your passion and your determination. And lastly, there are health benefits to volunteering. Yes, we can become healthier. Spending meaningful time with others can reduce stress. That means we're sleeping better. We get sick less often, and we can even prevent heart disease. And when we're volunteering, we actually take our attention away from our own problems and concerns. And it puts our stresses kind of into perspective, and we feel more gratitude in our day-to-day lives.

Jen: I really liked how you mentioned the communal impact. I think lots of us want to make a difference within our own communities, and this is a very simple way to be able to make that impact within our community. I mean, you're not going to have these big explosions of change or anything like that, but you are that person that is making a little bit of a change in the area that you love. So, I'm just thinking like here at the Family Place, we have lots of people who volunteer in our Kids’ Place and they do it because they love children and they want these kids to have positive adult interactions within their lives. But I'm also thinking like people who volunteer for their local humane society. They're doing that so that those animals have a positive experience while they're in the Humane Society until they are adopted. And those are the little changes. Those are the things that make up the big changes. Yes, there are bigger ways, I think, to get involved if you want to get involved with your state legislature and things like that. But these are simple little things that all of us can do. With that being said, Brandy, how do we make sure that we're not taking on too much?

Brandy: We can say no to volunteer experiences. No, we can't. Right? And in fact, we need to. One way the first thing I would say is don't volunteer if you don't have the time. If you do volunteer and end up not having time, it actually creates more problems for the person who's asking for that help. So, don't volunteer if you don't have the time. There are certain stages in our life where a volunteering this might not be an option. If you have a young family, you've got lots of little kids. Paying someone to watch your kids so you can go and volunteer might not be an option. Maybe you're attending to someone who's ill in your family and they're taking up your time. Maybe you decided to go back to school so you know your school, full-time work, and you have a family. There's no time for volunteering in that, and that's OK. It's just not a time in your life that you can volunteer. I also recommend avoiding volunteer opportunities that don't fit your temperament. If kids annoy you, then don't volunteer for a school function. If you faint at blood, don't volunteer in the medical field. I'll share with you. I'm scared of heights. I always have been. I can't seem to get over that. So, if there's a volunteer opportunity to help put on a new roof on someone's house, it's just not something I'm going to volunteer for because you can't get me on top of that house. I'll be more of a problem than actual help. Another way to not take on a volunteer opportunity is maybe if it hits too close to home, if it is something that might retraumatize you, don't take that volunteer opportunity. I had a friend who had become detoxed herself from drugs. She'd been clean for a little while, not a very long time. She didn't feel very confident in herself. And then she then had an acquaintance who realized she needed to stop taking drugs as well. My friend realized that she could not help this friend of hers because it was going to retraumatize her. She didn't feel confident in her sobriety to not use again, and so that's when she reached out for the rest of us to help her. So, make sure that you aren't going to retraumatize yourself by doing this volunteer opportunity. Another thing I want to add is don't be bullied or coerced into volunteering. If that happens, you're going to get burned out and then you won't reap the benefits of volunteering. And burnout is a real thing that can look like maybe you're starting to not feel appreciated anymore for the work that you're doing. Maybe more and more is being expected of you because you volunteer. Or maybe you're a very reliable person, so you're the first one that they call when they need something done. What I do recommend is sit down if you're starting to feel this burnout. Sit down and think through, why is it that you got involved with the volunteering in the first place? If your passion was just to feed soup, then just serve soup. That doesn't mean you have to serve on the board. If originally started helping the single mom because you just wanted to give her a break once in a while, then only give her a break once in a while, you don't have to watch her kids every time she needs help. And then the last thing I want to say is about saying no is don't be hard on yourself if you have to say no. There will always be volunteer opportunities and you can do it when it's right for you.

Jen: I like that you explained all about saying no and ways that we can say no or ways that we can still volunteer in a less demanding way. I struggle with going and being around people I don't know. And so that makes me really uncomfortable. So, when you're saying you can meet new people, that is terrifying for me. So, I think of just little things that I can do. And I use the word service in providing a service for someone. So, I like to make things and give things to people. So, I'm feeling like I'm giving to someone and hopefully making their day a little bit better. I just started sewing and I'm sewing some dresses for friends’ little girls. And for me, it fulfills my need to help someone else. But it does it in a way that is comfortable for me.

Brandy: Jen, I actually love that you said that because in my brain, volunteering is not that grand spectrum of, you know, going to your legislature kind of like what you mentioned. In my mind, volunteering is those little tiny things. So, I'm glad you clarified that that, you know, when we volunteer, it doesn't have to be those grand gestures. It can be those simple little things which we'll talk about later in the podcast of little things that you can do that are still considered volunteering.

Sara: Yeah, I totally agree because I think in the beginning I was kind of thinking with volunteering, it means out in the community and I feel like, as you talked about before, that there's just a time and a season for everything in your life, and maybe being out in the community isn't the right fit for you right now. And that's kind of where I'm at, where I love making dinner for somebody who just had a baby or just had surgery, you know, and lightening their load in that way or watching my neighbors’ kids so that they can go to the doctor without taking their little kids with them. Those are things that I can do where I don't have to leave my home necessarily, but I still feel like I'm serving and volunteering my time to do those kinds of things. You also mentioned to not feel bad about saying no, and we've done a podcast where we've talked about that. That saying no is self-care, and you shouldn't feel obligated to do things if it's too much for you, to not take on more than you can handle. One thing I was also thinking about is there's such thing as good stress and bad stress. And when you're feeling too overwhelmed to do something, it might be too stressful. Don't take that on. That's bad stress. But when it comes to volunteering, you might feel stress doing whatever it is that you're doing. But I look at that as good stress because you walk away feeling so good for what you contributed to the overall grand thing that happened. Would you agree to that?

Brandy: Absolutely. Yeah. It's like I said, even those little tiny things that you think you didn't make a difference. But when you look back on it, even looking back on my volunteering experiences just made my day, my whole week prepping for a podcast because it's just all those good things that I did, even though they were teeny tiny.

Sara: It was good. Yeah, those feel-good moments I think about because I've done a lot of service when I was younger, since I've had kids, it's kind of died out more and it's more specific to like their school or to my neighbors. But there are moments that, like it was a lot of work. I've served on committees for Relay For Life and different things, and you put in your heart and soul and there's a lot of stress that goes into it. But once you see that event come together and you know that you contributed in some way, you look back at all of the heartache that blood, sweat, and tears that went into it and think “I did that” and I feel so good that I was able to make that difference. So how do we encourage our kids and really involve them when it comes to service? And I really I'm asking this honestly and genuinely because it's kind of that season of life for me where I sort of use my kids as an excuse like, Oh, I can't, I have little kids, you know? So, it's easier to say no right now because I feel like they're hurting more than helping. And so, I'm asking, honestly, how can we encourage our kids to volunteer and involve them when they're little, when they're teenagers? What do you got?

Brandy: I love that question, Sara. First thing is, I think you have to be a role model yourself. Which you have set the stage for that volunteering. Tanisha Smith, who's the national director of volunteer services for the Volunteers of America, says two thirds of youth who volunteer become active adult volunteers. And I think that's pretty impactful if we teach our kids at a young age in their youth to volunteer their time to grow up most likely to volunteer as an adult. And also, when a parent is involved and we ask our child to come along, they get so excited about that activity because they get to spend that quality time with you. One thing that you can do is find something fun. Volunteering does not have to be a chore. Find something that your family enjoys doing. If your family loves to bake, bake some cookies and take it to a retirement home. If your family goes on walks together, each of you grab a trash sack and pick up trash on your family walk. Maybe you can see who can find the most unique piece of trash and who can fill up their trash sack the fastest. You're still volunteering, but it's fun. My family walks in our community parades and hand out flyers to advertise upcoming events are happening at my work and it's honestly, to me a lot of work. We're doing that at one o'clock in the afternoon on the 4th of July, it's super-hot, but my kids love to do it. In fact, we haven't done it. We didn't do it last year because of COVID 19. But my little one just said probably about a month ago, I sure miss being in those parades. That was a volunteer opportunity that she misses doing! Finding something easy. You know, volunteering doesn't have to be an all day event. It can be your child's going through their old toys, other clothes and donating to someone else. Now this might be a problem, they'll say, but I like that toy. But what you can do is help your child understand you have all of these other toys you can play with. You can share this one with someone who doesn't have any toys, and I know that that's made a difference in my family. Let's see. You can purchase something extra at a store for like a drive. We have a nonprofit called Little Lambs here in our community. They give out diapers and hygiene kits to those in need. When I'm shopping, diapers a little bit more expensive, so maybe there's times that I can't buy diapers, but I can buy an extra bottle of shampoo and donate that. And I can involve my child by saying, Hey, let's get shampoo for Little Lamb. Which one would you like to purchase, right? And let them put it in the cart. We have food pantry drives all the time where someone is standing outside giving a flyer, Hey, they need these items. Can you pick something up? We always take one of those flyers and we always purchase something, and I let my child choose what they want to donate. That is one way to involve our kiddos with that. Another thing we can do is make it part of your family's schedule. I'm not saying you have to do this all the time, right? It can be a once a year routine that you do like. Maybe you go buy a Christmas tree, you buy decorations and you give it to you, give it to a family in need. That is, every year your family looks forward to that volunteer opportunity, or it can be an ongoing type volunteer opportunity that you do. Our family, before COVID, the first Saturday of every month, we went to go help clean the church. It was just part of our routine. That's what we did the first Saturday of every month. And then another thing you can do is create those volunteer opportunities yourself. Maybe you can go to your local organizations and see what they need, and you stand outside the grocery store and hand out those fliers and collect it. You can have your child, have a Kool-Aid stand and whatever earnings they may donate to a nonprofit organization. My little one has a birthday next month, and because it's COVID, so we're not going to have a birthday party, we’re going to have a drive thru birthday party, and we're going to have her friends bring an item that she can donate to the Humane Society. So they aren't bringing her a gift. It's an item that she can donate to the Humane Society in her name. That is a volunteer opportunity.

Sara: Brandy, I love that idea. You had told me before that you were doing that for your daughter's birthday, and I thought that was such a good idea. And I have two daughters that have birthdays coming up. And so, I started brainstorming like, what can we do where my kids play with the neighbor kids, and so I don't feel like it would be a big deal to do some sort of party, but I thought it'd be so fun to do something service related. And so, I emailed our volunteer coordinator here at the Family Place to see if there is anything that these kids could do, like assembling kits or something that they might need in the future. And it wouldn't be until April. And so, she was excited because there's probably going to be some opportunities with the BeKind Utah campaign that we do. And so, I'm super excited about that and I never would have thought of that had you not have told me that you were doing that with your daughter, some sort of volunteer opportunity for her birthday. I think that's such a great idea.

Jen: I was just thinking of what we did this past Christmas, and I live in an apartment and so I have there's my door and then a door right next to mine of this elderly couple that lives there. And this past Christmas, I had the idea of hanging snowflakes from the ceiling before the stairs started at our apartment complex. And so, we did that with fishing line. And then I had my stepdaughter, Lizzie, cut out all of the snowflakes. And then we went, we hung them up outside of our door and this elderly’s couple's door,

Jen: and they just loved it. Every time we saw them, they said, “You know what? This just makes coming home so much fun to see them blowing in the wind and things like that.” And so, I didn't really think of that as a volunteer thing, but it was something that brightened someone else's day. And Lady said, every time someone comes over to our house, they always mention the snowflakes out, so they do like it. We should start doing it for every holiday. So, there's lots of things that kids can do. So, doing this with my step daughter, how can I go about instilling this value of volunteering within her and making her excited to do volunteer work?

Brandy: Yeah, that's a hard question, Jen. I think first, it needs to start that volunteering and service needs to be a value for yourself. It's hard to expect your child to give up their time, if you're not willing to do it yourself, I think another thing that we can do is share our experiences of volunteering that we've had. I know I share them with my kids all the time and it makes them want to do that as well. I think we can use their interests to volunteer. If your child is artistic, how can they get art supplies to donate to an art club? If your child is into soccer, maybe you can help them clean up the cones or help the coach clean up afterwards after a game or after practice. Or maybe they can go and help with a grade or an age group that's younger than them. I think another way to instill this value in our kids is to let them do it with their friends. Do it as a group of friends. Kids can bond with their friends while they're helping others, and when they have their friends with them, it can make them a little bit more bolder and they'll be willing to try new things. I've mentioned I've had my family stand outside Wal-Mart hand those flyers to get supplies that we need for summer camps. And she was about 13 or 14 at the time was just saying that she didn't want to do it. And so, the next time we went and did it, I had her bring a friend with her and it was amazing to see the change in her. They would each have a stack and they would race to see who could get their flyers out the fastest or approach the next person that's coming. So, it made a difference for her in volunteering, just having that friend with her because it was fun. Another thing I proposed to do is to provide a lot of different opportunities if you can. Do opportunities like Sarah was talking about going to those organizations, maybe doing service opportunities from your home, doing them in groups, actually having them do individual opportunities because by introducing all of these variety volunteering experiences, they can learn which style works best for them and then they’ll more likely volunteer when they know which one works for them. And then the last thing is, and this is really difficult for us controlling parents is let them take the lead. We do something similar, Jan, with hearts. We heart attack people's doors every Valentine's Day and this year I let my little seven-year-old take the lead on it. She got to draw on the hearts. It was really hard to let that go. And she also got to choose who gets to have the hearts put on their door. And it was so exciting to see just how excited she was to be able to do this volunteer opportunity once she's done it in the past. But this year made a difference because she took the lead on it.

Jen: That's awesome. I, as you were talking about all of these things and these ideas, a thought came to my mind that this is a win-win situation. I mean, not only are you helping someone else, you're helping your kids realize the value of service, but they're also having the opportunity to learn social skills. They're learning how to work in teams, they're learning about the different cultures and different lifestyles and things like that. And so what a good just overall experience for them. And just think about kids nowadays, they're inside so much, they're playing video games or watching TV, whatever the case may be. And this is getting them out and working with other people, which is so important to learn for the rest of our lives of learning how to work effectively with other people.

Sara: I totally agree. And I was thinking one other thing that it's really helping them learn is appreciation. Like when you mentioned, if they enjoy playing soccer to clean up the cones, they're learning that playing soccer, there's more that goes into it than just showing up that by helping clean up the cones, they're participating in that extra work that goes on behind the scenes. And so that's helping them be more appreciative of the people that are making those fun things possible for them. I also love that you said, to try a variety of different things. I was just thinking about my teenage years. I did a lot of volunteer service. When I was in high school, I participated in a class that required us to volunteer 90 hours a semester. And so, I did all kinds of volunteer service. I volunteered in an elementary school classroom four days a week, and that's when I started to get involved in Relay For Life and be part of the committee. And there are so many things I can't even begin to list all the different things, but it gave me opportunities that I never would have experienced otherwise. And from there, I learned what I felt passionate about and like Relay For Life carried into college. And I was on the committee for a long time in college, helping organize that and just gaining so much appreciation for all of these things that I do think that that is such a great piece of advice to try all kinds of different things, and that will help our children find what they feel passionate about that they can carry on into adulthood. And I mean, you had mentioned earlier about not doing things that make you feel uncomfortable, like I was thinking like if working with animals, you don't feel comfortable around animals. That's probably not a good place for you to be volunteering. But like my kids, I think they would love to volunteer in an animal shelter and feed them and groom them or whatever goes on, I'm not even sure, but it would give them experience that they would really enjoy.

Jen: That makes me giggle because I would love to go work someplace where there's horses and just groom the horses. So, I'm like, looked this up of volunteering opportunities at stables and things like that where people house their horses and one of the jobs is cleaning out their stalls and picking up poop. And that's really deterred me from going because I really don't want to do that part. I just want to groom a horse, so I need to talk to the people who we use for our horse classes. See if I can just go over there and groom your horses for them every once in a while.

Sara: It's funny that you say that because when I was in late elementary school, we had a neighbor that had horses and she had a lot on her plate. I was young. I don't know everything that was going on, but she needed help with her horses and that's what we did. We went over there and we cleaned out the stalls and they had, I mean, they basically had a farm. They had so many animals. So, the positive side, because cleaning out the stalls, not fun, right? But they had a ton of bunnies and we got to hold the bunnies and that was the reward for cleaning out the stalls. So, I'm sure you'd get to spend time with the horses, but you have to do the dirty work too. All right, Brandy, so you've given us tons of ideas for different activities that we can do for surveying, but how can we find out about volunteer opportunities, maybe within the community or elsewhere?

Brandy: That's a great question because I work for a non-profit, so I know of all of those volunteer opportunities that come up so it's readily at my fingertips of, you know, these opportunities they need help with. But I got to thinking about someone who doesn't know where to reach out to for volunteer opportunities. So, there are websites we can go to, these websites you put in your zip code and how many miles away from your zip code you're willing to travel. And it'll tell you those volunteer opportunities. So justserve.org, volunteermatch.org, allforgood.org, and idealist.org. All great places that if you're looking for volunteer opportunities, you can go there and they'll have a list of volunteer opportunities for you. I can tell you that they do kind of post on all of them. So, if you go to one, you're probably going to find that volunteer opportunity on another one. But there are lots of different ones. I do want to share the one that I found that was really cool and it was called dosomething.org. This is a youth-led campaign. And so if your child is wanting to do a volunteer opportunity, but they just can't come up with a good idea, they can go to this website and look at all of the different things that other youth their age have done, and they can do a volunteer opportunity similar to that one in their own community. My oldest daughter's aunt on her dad's side got cancer, and so her step-sister, my daughter’s step-sister, did this Coins for Chemo for her aunt in her school district, and that was in Oregon. And my daughter loves that idea so much that she went to her principal and said, Can I do this in my school? And she was able to. And so, she took someone else's idea implemented in our community, and she was almost $200 for her aunt that was going to chemotherapy. So, it doesn't have to be a general idea that we come up with. We can borrow that from someone else, and that's what this dosomething.org is. And then the last thing I would encourage you to do is find out what is a non-profit organization in your community and ask them, “Do you have volunteer opportunities? Because I'm pretty sure being a non-profit, they will have volunteer opportunities. Or you can ask them, what is your greatest need? What can I get for you?

Sara: Thank you, Brandy. That is such a good list. One more, I would add, is to pay attention to what you see happening on social media. I always see opportunities posted in community pages where service is needed. You can also create opportunities where you see a need. Maybe someone in your network posts about feeling sick and you reach out to them and ask if you can take their small children for a couple of hours so they can take a nap? Or maybe a friend shares that they lost their job and you make them some freezer meals to help ease the financial stress they might be feeling. The whole purpose in service is to make a difference for someone else. This is the very root of our podcast, and what we try to accomplish at the Family Place is doing what we can to make a difference, one person at a time. Volunteering our time is one more way that each of us can be a starfish thrower. Thank you, Brandy, for all that you've shared with us. It's very apparent you love volunteering. And listening to your passion has rubbed off on me and made me want to get out and do some service. I hope it has inspired our listeners as well. Which brings me to this week's challenge. Brandy gave us some great resources, and while I'm not asking you to get involved in your communities, I am challenging you to check out those websites and just see what kinds of opportunities are posted near you. Who knows? Maybe it will inspire you to put yourself out there and work towards making a difference in your community. Thanks everyone for tuning in today. All of the resources mentioned and our contact information is listed in the show notes. All you have to do is click the links and they'll take you right where you want to go. That's all for now, but we'll be back next week right here on the Parent's Place.

Thanks again for listening. The Family Place is a non-profit organization in Logan, Utah, with a mission to strengthen families and protect children. We call ourselves starfish throwers. If you're unsure what that means, refer back to our introduction episode where we explain it. The good news is you can be a starfish thrower too by subscribing to the Parents’ Place podcast and liking our social media pages. If this episode resonated with you, please share it with others and help us get our message out to more people. Also, be sure to check the show notes for links to information referenced in this episode. That's all for now, but we'll catch you again next time on the Parents’ Place.

Subject Resources

- Just Serve: https://www.justserve.org/ - Volunteer Match: https://www.volunteermatch.org/ - All for Good: https://www.allforgood.org/ - Engage (All for Good's new website): https://engage.pointsoflight.org/ - Idea List: https://www.idealist.org/en/ - Do Something (for teens): https://www.dosomething.org/us

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