The ongoing conflict
Things are going well in my life right now,
- I am in total and maddening love with Vancouver
- I’ve been walking 2 hours a day, eating right, challenging myself with physical activities which makes me feel great and busting with energy (not to mention how great my butt is looking HAHAHAH)
- I have great friends whom I would literally throw myself off a cliff for
- I’m single by choice and happy to be such (mayhaps because I’m still hung up on someone buuuut I think that being single is what I do best)
Annnnnnd
- I really love the people I work with AND my new job….
Soooooo, this begs to question - why am I feeling such an overwhelming sense of unfulfillment?
Don’t get me wrong, my job is great. I have a corner office with a view, everyone loves me and gives me the support that I need to achieve great things, I have good friends who pull me out for lunch and beers, I earn significantly more money and am above the poverty line again, they spoil us with heaps of vacation time blah blah blah… but at the end of the day I don’t feel that the work that I do is making the impact that I want to make.
Actually, let me correct that, the work that I do impacts the entire healthcare community in some way. The work that I do ensures that programs are set up for health care workers so that programs are in place to help them deal with environmental stressors, disease control, work reintegration, injury and disability prevention, education and training, mental health, etc… BUT and the end of the day I’m a typing monkey and I don’t get to see first hand the impact that I am personally making.
This question that is stinging my brain is this - am I doing all that I can to make an impact in my community?
The answer, of course, is no. I am completely living a selfish life devoted entirely to trying to make my own life better without regard to those around me every day that are in serious need. I feel selfish and dirty and lately I can’t sleep at night.
I’ve been doing some research this morning and here are some of my ideas on how I could make an impact in my community:
- Volunteer in a Rape crisis centre (to be there for others the way I wish I had allowed people to be there for me)
- Disability - I would love to work recreationally with disabled children again.
- Big Sister? I’ve been contemplating this for a while. For a couple hours a week I could be a positive role model for a youth in my community that really needs someone to be there for them (even if it is just to run around on the beach or bake cookies).
- Help the homeless/low income… this is a tough one for me. I think a lot of the time I turn a blind eye to one of the biggest problems that is impacting various communities in Vancouver and that is poverty, starvation, drug and alcohol abuse, low income families, etc. I think that it would be good for me to get to know the people behind the problem and not just turn a blind eye.
Of course once decisions are made you, my faithful readerage, will be the first to know.