Meaningful Reward
In my journey to accomplish the things that I desire, I can see a direct connection between my values, religious beliefs and the cultures, I have lived in. I have lived most of my life in America, a wealthy country where people strive for riches, and I also can relate to that. Belize, where I was born, is a relatively small country, and its citizens focus more on building relationships, as opposed to money. I can understand both cultures because who I am today can be attributed to both cultures. I learned how to persevere from living in this country. My respect and value of people more than material things can be contributed to my Belizean heritage. This does not mean that I do not appreciate the things I have. It simply means that I love my family and relationship more than I do my stuff.
When I was growing up in Belize, I aspired to become a missionary. That also can be attributed to my surroundings. I attended a conservative Christian school in my elementary years. Most of my teachers were unmarried women that were missionaries. Missionary: in the sense that their purpose in life was to teach others about God.
My mother mainly stayed at home; occasionally, she worked outside the home, in retail. My father was an electrician and was self employed. I had extended families that were Doctors, teachers, policemen and accountants. Yet I wanted to be more like the women who taught me. I did not see myself as a teacher, but I had a strong desire to help others. I hoped to accomplish this through the field of medicine.
Bellevue, the hospital I worked at in New York served a large number of its homeless population. For what I desired to do with my life, it was the perfect place for me. Hence, I worked there starting from before I graduated from nursing school.
I stayed pretty busy as a single woman, but after I had gotten married that changed. The hospital I worked at after we relocated was one close to where we lived. It was privately owned and was for profit. I was a little disappointed about that. My motivation for working that job was also different from the purpose of my first job. My first nursing job fulfilled my desire to help others. My second job was to obtain money to buy our first home. It enabled me to realize that goal but left me with a longing.
As time went on, and my responsibility grew, my availability to do what I desired decreased. So I felt that I was not accomplishing my life’s purpose. Well, I was inactive for a short time. Needless to say, that was a difficult time for me. I was raising my children and was intensely involved in their lives. I got some satisfaction from doing that, but I was frustrated because I had other ideas of what I wanted to do.
On occasion, opportunities to work in mission presented itself, and I did that. After I had published my poetry book, I was asked to speak at a dinner for entrepreneurial women. At that meeting was a woman who worked with Spaulding for Children, a united Way Agency. Spaulding for Children provides post adoption services for families that adopt children through the state of Texas. We adopted our children from the state of Texas and, therefore, are a typical family, they provide service to. They helped me with a lot of the testing my children received. After that employee of Spaulding returned to her place of employment, she suggested that the agency asked me to talk to their donors on their behalf. As a result of that, I became a spokesperson for United Way. I did that for several years up until my daughter started having behavioral issues.
Being able to participate in an Agency that provides services to others was extremely relevant to me. It helped to fulfill my longing of wanting to help others. Most importantly, after having experienced the struggle of parent that adopted special needs children, I wanted to contribute to that work. I thought I would have been able to accomplish that by contributing a portion of the sales of my book to that work. My book, however, did not enable me to do as much as I would have like. Instead, sharing my experience with donors and relaying the need to continue supporting the United Way enabled me to impact even more lives than I had envisioned.
Visit ruthspoetry.rahtimes.com/ for more on the Author.
When I was growing up in Belize, I aspired to become a missionary. That also can be attributed to my surroundings. I attended a conservative Christian school in my elementary years. Most of my teachers were unmarried women that were missionaries. Missionary: in the sense that their purpose in life was to teach others about God.
My mother mainly stayed at home; occasionally, she worked outside the home, in retail. My father was an electrician and was self employed. I had extended families that were Doctors, teachers, policemen and accountants. Yet I wanted to be more like the women who taught me. I did not see myself as a teacher, but I had a strong desire to help others. I hoped to accomplish this through the field of medicine.
Bellevue, the hospital I worked at in New York served a large number of its homeless population. For what I desired to do with my life, it was the perfect place for me. Hence, I worked there starting from before I graduated from nursing school.
I stayed pretty busy as a single woman, but after I had gotten married that changed. The hospital I worked at after we relocated was one close to where we lived. It was privately owned and was for profit. I was a little disappointed about that. My motivation for working that job was also different from the purpose of my first job. My first nursing job fulfilled my desire to help others. My second job was to obtain money to buy our first home. It enabled me to realize that goal but left me with a longing.
As time went on, and my responsibility grew, my availability to do what I desired decreased. So I felt that I was not accomplishing my life’s purpose. Well, I was inactive for a short time. Needless to say, that was a difficult time for me. I was raising my children and was intensely involved in their lives. I got some satisfaction from doing that, but I was frustrated because I had other ideas of what I wanted to do.
On occasion, opportunities to work in mission presented itself, and I did that. After I had published my poetry book, I was asked to speak at a dinner for entrepreneurial women. At that meeting was a woman who worked with Spaulding for Children, a united Way Agency. Spaulding for Children provides post adoption services for families that adopt children through the state of Texas. We adopted our children from the state of Texas and, therefore, are a typical family, they provide service to. They helped me with a lot of the testing my children received. After that employee of Spaulding returned to her place of employment, she suggested that the agency asked me to talk to their donors on their behalf. As a result of that, I became a spokesperson for United Way. I did that for several years up until my daughter started having behavioral issues.
Being able to participate in an Agency that provides services to others was extremely relevant to me. It helped to fulfill my longing of wanting to help others. Most importantly, after having experienced the struggle of parent that adopted special needs children, I wanted to contribute to that work. I thought I would have been able to accomplish that by contributing a portion of the sales of my book to that work. My book, however, did not enable me to do as much as I would have like. Instead, sharing my experience with donors and relaying the need to continue supporting the United Way enabled me to impact even more lives than I had envisioned.
Visit ruthspoetry.rahtimes.com/ for more on the Author.
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