December 3, 2008
Are you sick of lame Chanukah presents? Do you think that enough money has been spent on gifts that you just don’t need?
Try something that a lot of people are doing this holiday season: turn presents into charity. Instead of asking family members for new cell phones, sports equipment, or clothing, many people are asking for money to be donated to their charity of choice in their honor.
When families learn to give donations instead of gifts, they understand that their connection to one another isn’t based on the money they spend on each other, but the care they have for one another. Give a card with a personal message along with a card from the organization.
The important thing is to make sure you’re not being a hypocrite! Don’t ask everyone in your family for a present, and then tell them you didn’t buy them presents because you donated money in their honor. Put your money where your mouth is.
But you also don’t have to go Cold Turkey. Declare to all siblings or cousins that you don’t want presents, but allow Grandma and Grandpa to send you some gelt. (I told my grandparents to donate money to my charity of choice instead of sending me a gift, and they insisted on doing both – oh well!)
The really exciting thing is that you will get some people to support your charity who might not otherwise have gotten you a present. So pick a charity (example, example, example, example…) and inform the family!
And because you’ve been so good, here is my (free!) Chanukah gift for all of you: enjoy these 4 free tunes from The Leevees.
And now it’s your turn to give an easy present. Play FreeRice.com‘s vocab challenge, and help send food those who need it most around the world. Who knows, you might learn something while you’re at it!
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Posted by eimatai
December 3, 2008
One of the hardest things to do is thank the people who help make our lives better every day. What’s even harder to do is thank those people who we never even see.
The factory workers, air traffic control operators, medical researchers, farmers, inventors and countless other professionals working behind the scenes are often out of sight and out of mind.
One of the jobs that clearly deserves the most thanks is that of the men and women serving in the armed forces. These people have chosen to serve their country, and defend its citizens and values. They put their lives on the line, and it is important to do what we can to thank them.
It can sometimes be awkward, but one of the nicest things you can do is simply thank anyone you see wearing a military or police uniform. You don’t have to know who they are, but saying “Thank you for your service” can really go a long way.
For those of us who might be a little too shy to do that, Xerox has made it a little easier. They have launched a very straightforward campaign called “Let’s Say Thanks.”
All you do is log on to the web site, and pick out a postcard you would like to send to soldiers deployed overseas. You can then write a personal message, or pick a pre-written message to put on the back of the card. Xerox will print the cards for free, and is partnering with Give2TheTroops who will send the cards to soldiers along with care packages.
If you’ve ever been to camp or away from home for a while, you know how nice it is to hear back from home . Now imagine being in Iraq or Afghanistan patrolling dangerous neighborhoods, and how nice it would be to get a piece of mail from someone you don’t know just to say “thanks”.
Leave a Comment » | Social Action Issues | Tagged: activism, Afghanistan, chessed, Give2TheTroops, Iraq, Soldiers, Thank You, Xerox | Permalink
Posted by eimatai
November 16, 2008
The past six months have been devastating for many homeowners across the United States as foreclosures are on the rise, and mortgages are becoming harder to pay off. This mortgage and credit crisis has been in the spotlight for many months, and is at the top of President Elect Barack Obama’s to-do list for January 21, 2009.
Unfortunately, a new threat is facing a slew of homeowners in California this week. A number of wildfires have broken out across Southern California, and have destroyed hundreds of homes. The greatest fear is clearly that the current death toll of 0 will not hold, and that lives will be lost to these ferocious blazes.The most destructive moment of the fires so far was when the Oakridge Mobile Home Park was nearly completely wiped out.
Thinking back to the destruction of Hurricanes Rita and Katrina in the last couple of years, it’s hard to fathom what it’s like when you realize your home and your worldly possessions are suddenly lost.
So what are we supposed to do? How do we help those who are losing their homes to fires in California? Are the multi-million dollar homes of Christopher Lloyd, Ophah Winfrey and Rob Lowe more important to save than the mobile homes in Oakridge?
Is it a worse feeling for a fire to destroy your home, or to have the bank repossess it?
These are not simple questions, and they do not have simple answers. Hopefully none of us will ever experience the loss of a home. Take a moment to think about what that might be like – how hard it would be to lose everything in an instant.
Tap into those emotions and feelings when you hear these news stories, and make sure not to just flip the channel without realizing the seriousness of the situation. I’m not sure what exactly we can do to help people in this situation, but at least we can take the moment to care.
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Posted by eimatai
October 10, 2008
By now, many of you have heard about what is called “The Last Lecture” by Randy Pausch.
For those of you who have not, it is an actual lecture, and a subsequent book, by a professor of Computer Science who recently received a prognosis that his pancreatic cancer would leave him with less than one more year on this earth.
Put in this new perspective on life, Randy Pausch wanted to impart a message of life-meaning to the next generation. He spoke in front of a packed crown at Carnegie Mellon University, and answered the following question:
“What wisdom would you try to impart to the world if you knew it was your last chance?”
Listen to this lecture if you get the chance, and think about your goals for the coming year. Listen to Randy’s reflections, and see if anything speaks to you.
Randy passed away on July 25, 2008, and learning from his lecture is a great way to pay him tribute.
Check out this lecture either on YouTube, or as a free download from Itunes.
Another lecture by Randy Pausch on Time Management is great to listen to as well.
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Posted by eimatai
October 10, 2008
This isn’t an example of poor grammar on behalf of the Eimatai staff; GOOD is a new magazine by a bunch of folks who are simply interested in trying to do… good.
This print and electronic magazine focuses on a different issue every month: education, health, war, travel, environment and others.
You may not agree with every opinion in this magazine, but there are a lot of ideas explored through the prism of “doing good.”
Too often in America, the focus of businesses and individuals is making as much money as possible. A famous bumper sticker reads “The winner is the one who dies with the most toys.”
I think many of us feel differently. We believe in a higher cause, and an idealism that demands more than simple profit. We need to be asking ourselves if we will be leaving the earth better or worse than it was when we got it.
Check out this magazine either at a bookstore, or on their Web site. Give their ideas some thought, and share them with the people you are close to.
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Posted by eimatai
October 10, 2008
Over Yom Kippur, I was struck by one line of the Vidui prayer where we are meant to reflect on sins that we as individuals and as a community have committed over the past year.
“For the sin we have committed before you in throwing off the yoke.”
I never really thought about this line so much in the past – I had always focused on more specific things that I could think of in very practical terms.
What does it mean to throw off the yoke? It means we have shirked responsibility. It means that we had a duty to do something, and we neglected it.
I began to think about some of the major problems facing the world – genocide in Darfur, man-made global climate change, terrorism, hunger, natural disasters – and the list simply didn’t stop.
I started thinking nationally to both America and Israel, wondering what I should be doing to influence the outcome of the upcoming election, and what I could do to work towards peace for Israel and her neighbors.
I thought locally about the community I lived in, and the people who I saw every day who might be in need of help or assistance in some way – my synagogue, my neighbors, my friends and family.
That’s not a yoke, that’s hundreds of yokes! Do we really need forgiveness for not solving every woe in this world? Who is not guilty of throwing of one of these countless yokes?
“It’s not possible to do everything,” I told myself, but it’s imperative that I do something. Throwing off the yoke is unacceptable. We don’t need to carry every yoke, but we need to be thinking about what need there is out there in the world, and how we can best fill it.
Shana Tova.
Leave a Comment » | Parashat HaShavua | Tagged: holiday, torah, yom kippur | Permalink
Posted by eimatai
