Be the change you wish to see in the world ~ Gandhi
My friend, professional organizer Julie Seibert recently gave a great presentation at Calm and Sense on reducing stress through de-cluttering your life. Not only does the act of getting the junk out of our home or office feel liberating, but by reducing, reusing or recycling, we help the planet reduce some of the stress it feels! Julie had great suggestions for using existing things around the house, like wine boxes (goodness knows we have plenty of those in my house!!) to store Christmas ornaments, decorative gift boxes to hold office supplies, and more (check out her site at www.healingorganization.com for more helpful tips and links).
But one of the unfortunate consequences of reducing clutter in your home is that it can cause clutter – or trash – elsewhere. Far better to extend the life of what we don’t need anymore by donating it to someone who can use it, versus sending it to the landfill. For example, right now there is a real need for safe shoes for the earthquake victims in Haiti, so Calm and Sense is serving as a collection point for shoes to be shipped to survivors, through Shoes 4 Souls (www.myoldshoes.com). And there are dozens of stores here in the Triangle area that take your unwanted clothes, household items, furniture and more and sell them to benefit worthy causes like the SPCA, Battered Women’s Shelters and more.
It was explained to me that the term for this is “tangible karma” because your good deeds directly benefit others. I love that concept and I was excited to find the website that told me that the first Saturday in April is Tangible Karma Day, where for 1 hour each of us could do something tangible to help another individual or a cause. Suggestions included visiting or volunteering at a shelter, cleaning out a closet and donating items, or helping a friend or neighbor. My thought is, why limit it to one hour??
I would love to hear your ideas for things we can do, on that day or any other, that will offer Tangible Karma for our world.
One Comment
Hello my name is Steven Barbry and I am a senior at Southeast Raleigh Magnet High School, I found your website while doing an online search for stress managent techniches. As a requirement for graduation every senior is required to do a “Graduation Project” where they are required to first choose a topic, on which the majority of the project is based on. My chosen topic is Stress Management and I have written a research paper on this topic, now I must find and log 15 hours on a product that will help back up my research. By product it does not mean that we have to make anything, it means that we must come up with some sort of physical evidence that corresponds the research. I was wondering if it would be possible for me to come in one day within the next week and speak with you, and maybe if it was possible that I could possibly shadow you for a day as information for my product. Please feel free to email me back or you may call me at 919-637-4224, I would really appreciate any information that you can offer and I thank you in advance for your assistance.
Steven D. Barbry