Core Purpose with Power

“You give but lit­tle when you give of your pos­ses­sions. It is when you give of your­self that you tru­ly give.” — Kahlil Gibran, Lebanese-Amer­i­can artist, poet, writer

In my last blog, I talked about Medix, one of the com­pa­nies I work with that is tru­ly core pur­pose led, and an expe­ri­ence we recent­ly had help­ing at a children’s shel­ter in Mexico.

As a team we expect­ed it to be great – but it was real­ly, real­ly dif­fi­cult – and a reminder of how much eas­i­er it is for us to cre­ate a thriv­ing life because of the envi­ron­ment we grow up in.

We went with a vision of what an orphan­age would be like. We expect­ed to see kids like in the movie ​‘Annie’ — for the kids to look dif­fer­ent. But they looked like kids in my neigh­bour­hood, like my kids – not like ​‘orphans’. They were so nor­mal it was heartbreaking.

Heart­break­ing, because we real­ized that these kids — rang­ing from a year old to 13 – are with­out their par­ents. Their par­ents are lost to them, have been tak­en from them, or are in jail.

Heart­break­ing, because these bright kids are grow­ing up in a sys­tem that makes it extreme­ly dif­fi­cult for them to succeed.

Heart­break­ing, because we were only there for one day to play soc­cer, and boun­cy cas­tle, and have fun. And then we got to go home.

We are all prod­ucts of our envi­ron­ment – and are so for­tu­nate to be born into one that helps us to thrive. That gives us access to dif­fer­ent types of learn­ing, role mod­els and oppor­tu­ni­ties and support.

It’s tough. These peo­ple don’t even have easy access to laun­dry soap, or clothes – to med­ical sup­plies or a dentist.

Any­thing we think is a chal­lenge pales in com­par­i­son to what they have to deal with.

I’ve been on crews that sup­port home­less peo­ple in Vancouver’s down­town east side, and helped build hous­es for fam­i­lies in Mex­i­co. These expe­ri­ences are very ground­ing. They remind me of what’s most impor­tant — and to be incred­i­bly grate­ful for what I have.

The kick­er? When you do these things, it’s fun! You couldn’t tell who was get­ting more out of it – the kids or us.

Remem­ber, the giv­er often receives more than the receiv­er. That’s why these things are so powerful.

PS If you are ever in the Puer­to Val­lar­ta area, vol­un­teer to help out at the children’s shel­ter – or send sup­plies or make a dona­tion to sup­port those who live and work there. You’ll be glad you did.