know read this blog. Or at least say they do :) So here's a question
for you, one that looms large for us here in Cameroon: what do we do
with the massive disparity in wealth between us and the people we see
around us every day?
You can get an education here, but you can't get a job unless you know
somebody. For those with a job, income seems to be about a tenth of
what it is in the US, based on a few people I've talked to. And while
rent is about a tenth of what it is at home in San Francisco, food is
just as expensive and gasoline is more than double. Starting a business
is impossible unless you have what they used to call "clout" in Chicago,
because the official taxes and fees will kill you and the paperwork will
take forever to get. I recall that unemployment is about 50%, but I may
be wrong. But most people here do at least have family in the villages
and enough to eat.
We were in a taxi last night, and the driver asked us about what we do
here. When we told him we work for a microloan program, he asked us
point-blank what our NGO could do for him. I didn't have much of a
response. I wish I did.
Ray K said this question came up at the missionary church gathering, but
that nobody had concrete answers. I don't feel like I can change
anything, other than perhaps myself. But is simply cultivating an
awareness of other people's poverty, and living mindfully, really
anything more than pious self-help? I wonder that about our choice to
volunteer here.
So what do you think? The question again is "what do we do with the
massive disparity in wealth between ourselves and the people we see
everyday."
Please post anything you have to say about this in the Comments section,
below. I'd love to know your thoughts.
8 comments:
Hi guys. I'd say if one person can improve one other person's life, that person has done pretty well. Just because you can't help everybody doesn't mean what you're doing isn't worth doing.
I guess you might have to improve two lives in order to take up my slack though :)
I have a co-worker who always says, "you have to take care of yourself before you can take care of anyone else".
This originally struck me as self-centered, however the more I reflect on it the truth rings clear.
You are volunteering your personal time and wealth to be there for a year in the hopes of doing some good.
That counts.
Doing the best job you can in the organization in which you are working is likely to have the greatest long term impact to help the most people. You need to have confidence in that fact. Creating a database may seem pretty meaningless… but it could facilitate immense results. Easily more then if you step outside and pick up a shovel or simply hand a dollar to a passing stranger.
I agree with DAG. It might be useful though, to try to find answers to the question "what can this microloan program do for ..." Having a solid idea of why you're there, and what you're working towards and how it helps the people you see around you will be crucial to you sanity, I think. No program can help everyone, of course, but the more you learn about what your organization IS doing, and where it IS having an impact will do much combat any encroaching despair.
It strikes me that this is THE question, Chris. Even though I am not so obviously confronted by great disparities of wealth (as you are), this question is often up for me, too.
I agree with many of the comments offered thus far, especially Dan Wilson's. I would only add that allowing the question to fester and irritate and bug you is also something you can do. (Yes, I am getting dangerously close to Rilke's advice to "live the questions.") When confronted with hard questions, it's sometimes easy to dismiss them with platitudes or even sound-seeming advice. But sometimes questions just won't go away that easily and demand more of us. Being sensitive to what this question continues to ask of you is part of what you can "do with it," I think.
Thank you for the thoughtful comments. I found a quote today that bears on this and really brought me up short:
"In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends." -- Martin Luther King, Jr.
Hi Chris and Ann- this is Matt from Chicago. Your brother told me about this blog yesterday- After casually skimming through, this question that you posed remained to haunt... One thing that has always struck me while debating similar questions with friends (or within my own head) is the power of my own perception of poverty: for me, living in Chicago, my concept of poverty is somewhat mired by a sense of desire. It seems that there is a sense of longing behind the eyes of the poor here at home- a realization of what one does not have and what others have in abundance- I wonder, is that the same where you are? In the past I have measured my own fleeting poverty against what was promised; against the contents of a shop window and the presence of expensive restaurants- against success and the idea of a career. I thought that poverty was a strictly numerical concept until I realized that desire was a much stronger factor in its definition- at least here in the land where possibilities abound. I know my understanding pales in comparison to what you are experiencing- but when you posed the simple question- "what can I do", it resonated. I don't know anything about the technical work you are doing... but, as an artist, your experiences are vital- and sharing them can certainly open peoples eyes. As for me, I have not a clue what I can do for Cameroon- but pondering your question, I am beginning to realize that as an artist, I can seek to eliminate desire- and it may be that the only way to eliminate such a concept as desire is to expose it while exposing and living in all that is positive, any joy and unity that coexists under the clouds of disparity... seems like that's the kind of thing that inspires people in the books that Oprah likes anyway.
hmmmmm.......
hi ann and chris! -- i miss you very much!
i had written a whole bunch of thoughts out in response to this killer question.....as i wrote, i pondered, and kinda came to a couple of simple points:
1) the golden rule! simply be good to people. all people! even if you can't assist them in a major way, be good to them.
2) life is one grand experiment! if you don't feel comfortable doing what you're doing, try something new.
with love
Hi Ann & Chris! Al here from Toronto, and I'm laying here reading your blog in my hand-made solid wood bed on the third story of our expensive house in Toronto. Funny, though, we were just driving around an area where we'd like to move (again in Toronto), close to a public school for the arts where we'd like to send our kids, but also where we couldn't buy a third of this house for the same price. Slightly depressing that we can't afford to live there, and yet we're in the top of the top of the top on any global scale, and even most local scales.
I think often about the question you pose, and I don't have great answers either.
One idea that does come to mind, along the lines of what Matt said. In the beatitudes, when Jesus said "Blessed are the poor", he actually said, "blessed are the poor in spirit". It strikes me that, while basic necessities are of course ... necessary, the consumerist culture convinces us that the "rich" are better off some how. Is it possible that true richness is available to us all, through, as you said, mindfulness and care for others.
Another one. "dag" said "you have to take care of yourself before you can take care of anyone else". There was an ancient Rabbi (can't recall the ref) who posed three questions: 1: If I am not for myself, who is for me? 2: If I am only for myself, who am I?, and 3: If not now, when? There is a great book called "3 Questions" by an erstwhile socialist politian in Canada who has come to a more pragmatic view that we must act first in self-interest, but not limit ourselves to such.
OK, you got me going... finally, the Dali Lama says that there can be no global revolution without personal revolutions.
So what revolution are you undergoing?
please pass on my fond regards to ann! Marlys says hello also.
Al
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