Giving and sharing have health benefits

With the Christmas season in full swing, gift-giving is causing a boost to the sales of the commercial establishments.  But most people are now doing away with the usual custom of exchanging gifts among friends and family members and instead requesting donations to their favorite charity.  Most of us don’t need that extra dress, bag, trinkets or shoes.  Sharing our blessings with the less fortunate seems to be the mode du jour of the times.  Millionaires and billionaires of the world are adopting  P. as their middle initial —  they all want to be known as philanthropists. 

Philanthropy comes from the Latin and Greek word philanthropia meaning love for mankind.  It is an altruistic concern for human welfare and advancement, usually manifested by donations of money, property or work to the marginalized.   
There are billionaires who have pledged to give away most of their money during their lifetime to be used for philanthropic causes.  Berkshire Hathaway CEO Warren Buffet and Bill and Melinda Gates created the Giving Pledge, which  invites the wealthiest people to dedicate the majority of their wealth to philanthropy.  There were 40 billionaires who signed up, like New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, George Lucas, Ted Turner, Larry  Ellison, Barry Diller and his wife, dress designer Diane Von Furstenburg, among others.
The latest addition to these billionaires is the founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg.

All of them have their own advocacies, which they state in their wills.  They have certain preferred charities, which will profit from their foundations.  But the fact remains that the very wealthy are stirring people’s consciousness into helping those in need, to make this world a better place for their children and future generations to come.
They also want to act as philanthropic role models so that the next generation of rich people will give away money to charitable causes to improve the lot of the poor and the needy. 

Education, clean water, better nutrition, climate change, green revolution, improvement of the environment, research to cure diseases seem to be the top priorities of the donors. 
But one does not have to be a billionaire to practice philanthropy.  We all know the famous saying from the Bible, “ It is better to give than to receive.”  And it has been proven by  researchers at three universities that many people derive happiness when they provide assistance to others. Being a giver protects our health and lengthens our lives.  Principal investigator Michael J. Poulin, PHD, assistant professor of psychology at the University of Buffalo, says, “This study offers a significant contribution to the research literature on the relationship between social environment and health, and specifically to our understanding of how giving assistance to others may offer health benefits to the giver by buffering the negative effects of stress.”

Poulin, along with colleagues at Stony Brook University and Grand Valley State University, produced the study, “Giving to others and the association between stress and mortality, “ which was posted online by the American Journal of Public Health.  “Specifically, over the years of study, we found that when dealing with stressful situations, those who had helped others during the previous year were less likely to die than those who had not helped others,” he says.  “These findings go beyond past analyses to indicate that the health benefits of helping behavior derive specifically from stress-buffering processes and provide important guidance for understanding why helping behavior specifically may promote health and potentially, for how social processes in general may influence health,” Poulin says.

I have a group of friends who derive so much joy in going to orphanages and poor barangays around Metro Manila to help the marginalized.  We call ourselves the Angels to Street Kids and we are a motley group of friends from all walks of life who share one purpose in life: to give back whatever blessings we have to those who have nothing. 

Looking back to where and how we got started, we indeed have come a long way.  More friends have joined us so we have more resources to give.  Some very wealthy people who don’t have the time to join us on our feeding days donate substantially to our cause.
Some very civic-minded individuals like chef Jessie Sincioco and Tina Cuevas of Sulo Hotel, offer their kitchens to cook the food for the poor people we feed.  A French priest, Father Matthieu, together with a French couple, introduced to us by chef Jessie, is running 15 orphanages all around Metro Manila.  They need 55 sacks of rice monthly to feed the children in their orphanages.  We ASK members have pledged a certain amount of sacks monthly to help them with their quota.  Interested donors may help their foundation via email partnerships@tnkfoundation.org or go to any of chef Jessie’s restaurants  (Rockwell, Top of the City, and 100 Revolving Restaurant in Eastwood, Libis) to drop their donations of rice or cash.  One orphanage in Project 8, the Children of Joy Foundation, relies solely on donations to educate, clothe, and feed the orphans left on their doorstep.  Interested donors may contact Virgie, 09166239485 or Gina 09166115868.

This Christmas, we are looking to going to the poor sections of Antipolo, Taguig, and Mandaluyong to give joy to the marginalized.  The poor people also deserve to be blessed during the holidays.  Indeed, the saying “It is better to give than to receive,”  Acts: 20:35) proves true for most of us. It has been proven that human generosity is truly a bedrock feature of human nature.