The 'do-good' blog.

M: Ry, what kind of charity would you support if you had tons of money? What would be your 'cause?'
R: Like The Michael Scott... what was that? Michael Scott's Dunder Mifflin Scranton Meredith Palmer Memorial Celebrity Rabies Awareness Pro-Am Fun Run For The Cure? Just kidding.
M: Don't you have a cause, you know? Like music education? Keep music in schools?
R: I don't know... Its hard to pick just one! There are so many things people need, not just here, but all around the world.

Thats it. Thats the problem. There are so many problems that beg attention, and sometimes it can be overwhelming.
Pick a cause. Pick two causes. Pick it because you have an emotional connection with it, or pick it because you don't. Stay with them, support them whole heartedly.
My mom's company works with several non-profits, and I have friends who work for non-profits. I used to feel guilty because there were so many charities that I saw the good in, but was too busy or too poor to support them.
Lets rid this guilt feeling by supporting, with as much or as little as you can, a cause that really needs help. There are literally thousands to choose from.
Hunger, illiteracy, homelessness, children without families, sickness.
What blows my mind, and I guess it hit me harder this year, is that it is here. In the US. In California. Where we live.
Those are just the big concepts! What about the arts? Its proven fact that kids learn better when they play an instrument! School budgets are being cut? We're cutting the resources for the next generation. Somehow that doesn't make sense.
Maybe I will cause-hop, and change it up every year. Who knows.
This year, an amazing non-profit has come into my life, and I tear up just thinking about it. Aspiranet is a revolution in the foster care world. There are 75,000 kids and teens who need loving homes. In California. Not in the US. In CA alone. Aspiranet works with the youths by visiting them twice a week, supporting the foster parents and providing a support community for those involved.

I've been putting together a video for their "Hero" campaign, and, like I said before, when I see this footage of these kids... God, I'm tearing up even now. They don't know where they will sleep... or when they will eat. We all saw The Blindside, these are good kids. They just need love. Thats all. The worst was when we were interviewing these foster parents and when they told the child they were fostering that they wanted to adopt him, he looked up and said "Oh no, You don't want me. I'm unloveable."
They had us all in tears. When my mom was interviewing a young man, in his best shirt that had seen many days, who resides in a transitional housing project talking about how much having a foster parent can change a youth's life, she excused herself and had a breakdown in the hallway. Its so hard to talk about it, and it just gets me for some reason.

I'll get down off my soap box now, and invite Ryan back to the blog.
R: You can't please everybody. A lot of people feel overwhelmed with which cause or non-profit to choose, so they don't do any.
Don't be intimidated. People who work with non-profits are some of the kindest people I've ever met, and are overflowing with gratefulness when you just call for information. We encourage everyone who reads this to look into a cause that moves you. We swear that as much as you put into whatever cause you want, it will give back to you three fold. Sometimes even in the most unexpected ways.

Love, and be loved,

Mayan and Ryan in the Niiiightime (okay, thats going to have to change...)

P.S. Here is the Aspiranet video we just made. I just saw it finalized for the first time and I love it! I was eating lunch and starting crying... SO great. What makes this so great is that RYAN wrote and composed the music for it! Yay Ryan!

Aspiranet from Consortium Media on Vimeo.