Engagement

Engagement is a word that I throw around an awful lot. As an instructor it is my job to inspire and motivate my students so that they are engaged in applying their lessons. When it comes to philanthropic work, charitable engagement is the difference between writing a cheque to give to someone to help someone else, and directly helping someone yourself.

I met a man named Rahul Bharti around ten years ago through one of my black belts. Rahul is a guy who lives in Nepal and spends a lot of his time helping the homeless of Kathmandu. Rahul's feedings are major events in Kathmandu, and are often the only meals some of these people will see in a week. What stood out about Rahul for me was how he approaches donations. When my black belt decided to not purchase the new laptop she was saving up for so that she could donate the money to fund one of Rahul's feedings, it was not good enough for Rahul. He wanted Lacie to actually participate in the feeding. That experience continues to inspire Lacie to this day. Her charitable work in our community and throughout the world is beyond compare. Rahul gave her first hand experience that removed the abstraction of poverty that shields most of us living in the west, and inspired Lacie by showing her the power of a single act.

"We must not see any person as an abstraction. Instead, we must see every person as a universe with its own secrets, with its own treasures, with its own sources of anguish, and with some measure of triumph." - Elie Wiesel (1928 - 2016)