Choosing volunteer projects is a good way to share your time and talents. Here are some things to consider before you commit and guidance on finding the right fit for a meaningful, long-lasting, and FUN volunteer experience.
Are you experienced?
Before you decide, consider your years of lived experience and your diverse professional skills. Also, consider vocational callings that never materialized into careers with compensation. Write them all down. Then consider places that would need or benefit from your expertise. This way you’ll have your choice of plum volunteer jobs. It’s not only a chance to give back but it keeps your hard-won education and work success up to date moving forward.
Lonely nights and isolated weekends
If you have lost someone near and dear to you, you may think it will be a long time before you are ready to face your post-loss world. The same feelings can accompany the loss of work relationships and a post-work lack of busyness or decline in feeling needed by others. Sometimes giving of yourself through volunteering can channel your energy from situational depression to a place that needs your love: a veterinarian’s office, daycare, or library are just a few examples of places to volunteer that will keep your mind off of loneliness and isolation by offering meaningful service for you and them. It will also give you something to look forward to and plans for the evenings and on the weekends if you choose an evening and weekend volunteer schedule.
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Temporary or Seasonal
Faith communities and non-profits that help the poor, like soup kitchens or homeless shelters, are also other examples of organizations that always need volunteers. During the holidays, however, you may have competition for the services you are donating. Don’t lose heart, call your local United Way to find a volunteer opportunity near you or get in touch with AARP to do volunteer work virtually.
Getting Out of the House with a Reason to Get Up in the Morning
Since you retired, you may have relaxed into a routine: sweatpants, ice cream, and a LazyBoy recliner chair primed and ready for a day of television game shows and celebrity judges. You need a reason to get up and get out of the house and gas and groceries plus doctor’s visits don’t count. Volunteering is a great way to add a social component that you had while working and may now miss.
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Purpose through Service
Many retirees can feel a loss of purpose which leads to depression. Volunteering for a mission-driven organization can boost your feeling of being needed and enable you to stay active. It can help you to continue to contribute to the world beyond your four walls or the buzz and glow of your laptop and its virtual world of Facebook and online solitaire. Choose an agency that serves the community or a company department whose mission aligns with your own and you’ll find yourself excited and engaged in mental, social, and physical activity once again.
Be Professional
Show up when you say you will. Although it is not paid work, it is a commitment, and they are counting on you. However, when you no longer want to give up your time, talent, or even treasure and you feel like the project you started volunteering with has run its course, it is okay to reconsider wanting to continue or quit. This includes being honest with yourself and leaving on good terms when the time comes. You may want to write a resignation letter that includes the positive elements you got out of the experience. Lastly, you may choose to voice your intention to stay connected with other volunteers and link up from time to time although you are no longer an active volunteer.
Burnout
Your circumstances may change (for example, health, availability, interest, energy, or patience) or you may discover, after a decent amount of effort, that this volunteer role is just no longer a good fit. Recognize and acknowledge this before you suffer burnout and what was once a joy becomes a burden. Some short-term and long-term, seasonal or temporary volunteer opportunities can be increasingly more demanding as your passion for the cause leads you to take on more duties that can lead to more stress.
If you start to feel burnout or dread going to fulfill your commitment, it’s okay to step back and go back to searching. Find your closure with your current volunteer gig by talking it over with your project leader, the volunteer coordinator, or whomever you report to. If nothing can be done to make it work better for you in the organization, then it’s time to move on. You have used your skills and maybe even developed some new ones. Maybe you have even made some new friends. Bid a warm farewell to this volunteer position, but rest assured, there’s always room for quality people like yourself in the volunteer space, and if you keep trying and you want to volunteer again, you will find your next spot soon.
