Without Expectations

I have to admit up front that I have rather comfortable retirement years. I don’t have to worry about where the money is going to come from. But, I do worry to a certain degree if that comfortable next egg will suddenly disappear due to the insane political environment of today. But that’s not the purpose of this post. Instead, it is about donating to different worthy causes.

I regularly give, at least from my perspective, somewhat substantial sums to various causes such as the Alzheimer Association and Habitat for Humanity. I am an empath so that gives me joy in my life. But then comes the other shoe.

As a result of some donations, I get a continuous myriad of snail mail letters, text messages, voicemails and such, asking me for more. I don’t know if they realize it or not but those constant contacts after the initial contribution do not entice me to give them more.

Instead of bombarding me with the “MORE” messages, I wish they would just say “Thank You”. For the past several years I have given Wikipedia a significant contribution. About one year after that contribution they send an email asking me to support them again and I do just that. There are no annoying “weekly contacts” from them.

2 thoughts on “Without Expectations

  1. I stopped donating to Wikipedia when their editorial policy started removing entries of autistic people who use non-speaking forms of communication. That was about 5 or 6 years ago. I won’t donate again until I see those entries restored.

    I’m with you regarding pressure for bigger donations. I used to donate to several causes but I stopped when their canvassing pressure became too uncomfortable. Many still canvas me regularly for more money – usually by phone. So now I treat them like I do every unsolicited sales call. I simply put the phone down and walk away. I don’t hang up because that would allow them to pester someone else. Sometimes they may be several minutes into their sales pitch before they realise no one is listening.

    These days I donate what I can to a Quaker charity fund that distributes to a variety of social justice causes and environmental causes. They make an annual report in the Quaker newsletter and that’s it. No direct or indirect canvassing at all.

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  2. I don’t really understand how “non-speaking forms of communications” can even be on Wiki? I know the organization depends on voluntary “experts” reviewing the entries that anyone can place there. Maybe there were no on the category you listed?

    The one thing that disturbs me the most about AI is that there doesn’t seem to be anyone who validates the stuff they put out, so I immediately assume that it is not truthful. It could be total mis-information meant to deceive. AI is just computer code and who writes the code is in control of the validity.

    I no longer belong to any religious organizations but if I were to join one now it would be Quaker.

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