I’m honored and I’m humbled to share my
thoughts with you today on optimism
particularly in a high school because
we’re living in difficult and
challenging times and we’re reminded of
that yesterday when there was another
school shooting in Texas and how amazing
it is that we’re here talking about
optimism at a time when people are
particularly feeling maybe not so
optimistic but here we are trying to
make our world a better place and that’s
what optimism is about and it couldn’t
be a more important topic at a more
important time so when you think about
optimism what I want you to think about
is how you use your most precious and
valuable resource and what is that
resource that’s the resource of time how
we use our time determines our overall
optimism why because time is our only
resource that is impossible to replace
or replicate think about it
time is our only resource that is not
replaceable so how we use our precious
time determines how full our glass is
I’m really incredibly fortunate and we
we heard about gratitude earlier I feel
very grateful that I am able to use my
professional time and I’ve done this by
working in the nonprofit sector helping
to make our world a better place through
the Jewish Federation of Greater
Rochester and I’m able to put a really
important value into action and that
value is one in Hebrew it’s called
tikkun olam and it’s repairing the world
that’s what G Kuna Lum means and every
day the way that I get to feel
optimistic is by putting my value and my
time into action so I want to share with
you what I’ve learned and observed in
the last 20 years of my career and
answer the question how can we keep our
optimistic glassful by volunteering our
precious resource of time so there are
two points that I want to make
one is that when you put your values
into action by doing good things that
make our world a better place you can
actually breed optimism in yourself and
in others and I think we’ve heard a lot
of that tonight from our speakers about
the kind of optimism that they have
because of how they spend this precious
precious resource of time the other
point is this scientific research
actually has shown us that when you do
good things for other people that it
actually physically makes you happy I
know that’s counterintuitive because we
think about happiness and we think about
what we do for ourselves to make us
happy you know often we’re gonna go and
do something for ourselves and that will
bring us happiness but the truth is
scientifically we bring happiness when
we do for others and not for ourselves
but time is valuable and it’s precious
so how do we determine how do you
determine what to do with your time and
how to spend precious volunteer time
hours so I’m going to give you seven
very important questions that you can
ask yourself about how to spend your
volunteer time to bring yourself and
your community optimism the first
question that you have to ask is this
what is it a reasonable amount of time
that I can spend how much time can I
take creating meaning in my life and
doing things for other people how much
time will it take me to put my values
into action and it’s important to know
how much time you can spend is it an
hour a day two hours a day is it a few
hours a week but how much time can you
realistically spend and the other
question is what can I give up that I’m
doing that takes time away from the
things that matter because we all do
things in our lives that we waste time
you know the expression of wasting time
we can take our wasted time and put it
into action
by putting our values to work the second
question is what do I care about what do
I care deeply about in my core what am i
passionate about we’ve heard so much
passion tonight we’re talking about we
talked about Mary Carey Ola Greg a
minute ago and we talked about the work
of autism up in the equine Center the
people who you hear speaking tonight are
so passionate about the work that
they’re doing so ask yourself what is it
that I care deeply about and you know
what you can’t get that question wrong
is it that you care about children or
hunger or homelessness or gun violence
whatever it is no what you care about
because that’s the place where you can
spend your time because it will matter
to you and to the people that you impact
the third question that you want to ask
yourself is what do I want to accomplish
and why set goals think about the things
that you’d like to make better and why
and what you want to do how do you want
to move the needle what what is it about
that passion that you want to put into
action and what are the goals that you
want to achieve but that goes along with
question number four question number
four is how can I accomplish my goals
and it’s so important to ask yourself
this question because you need to do
some research research is incredibly
incredibly important if you want to make
an impact and with your volunteer time
to serve the hungry you need to go out
and find out what organizations are
already helping with hunger or children
because there are so many places out in
this world that are doing great things
and you can go out there and engage with
organizations that are already doing the
work but in the same regard once you do
your research and maybe you find that
there isn’t something out there that
meets your needs you can create a dream
and you can fulfill a dream because if
you set the goal that you want to
accomplish and you do the research
really anything is possible we heard
that a little
earlier as well as long as you have the
passion behind it the next question is
how can I measure if I have made a
difference so it’s great to spend that
present precious resource of time
volunteering and feeling good about what
you’re doing but you have to be able to
measure the difference and the impact
that you’ve made and we’ve heard so much
about impact tonight so when you take
that resource of time and you apply it
to your passion and you put it into
action and you have your goals how are
you going to measure and it’s very
important to see that you’ve made impact
the last two questions question number
six and seven are actually interrelated
and they’re very important so question
number six is what skills do I have to
share all of us have strengths that we
can offer in our volunteerism that can
help so do you like to speak can you be
an advocate do you have great accounting
skills you could help with spreadsheets
are you an excellent fund raiser
everybody’s looking for good fundraisers
do you like asking people to give money
if you’re a comfortable fundraising I
can I can find a few organizations for
you but but what are those skills that I
have that I can put to use to help
connect my passion with action and
making a difference everybody has a
skill that they can apply to their
volunteerism but the next question is
equally important and that’s the
question of what am I willing to learn
because there are so many things out
there to learn and if you don’t come
with the skill I can guarantee you there
are many people out there who would be
very glad to teach you a skill to help
you put your passion into action so
maybe you want to learn how to fundraise
maybe you want to learn how to speak
maybe you want to learn how to be an
advocate all of those skills are
available to you if you’re willing to
learn and if you can offer a skill and
you can learn a skill the volunteer
world is open it’s wide open for you to
have impact in so many ways and there
are so very many needs that we have in
today’s society so what I wanted to
with you about this issue of time and
how we use our time for volunteering and
for bringing optimism is this I really
firmly believe that if we all picked our
passion and we put our time to the best
use possible and we acted on our values
are positive values that we would be
able to impact our world in the most
positive ways and make a real difference
in our society and we know that we need
to make a difference in so many areas so
not only would it bring us unlimited
optimism but we would make our world a
better place and each one of us wants to
make our world a better place and when
our world is a better place we know that
all of our glasses won’t just be
half-full they will be overflowing so as
you leave tonight I encourage you to
think about your passion figure out how
you can take some of that precious
precious resource of time and put it
into action because not only will you
benefit everybody will benefit and so
will our community thank you [Applause]
thoughts with you today on optimism
particularly in a high school because
we’re living in difficult and
challenging times and we’re reminded of
that yesterday when there was another
school shooting in Texas and how amazing
it is that we’re here talking about
optimism at a time when people are
particularly feeling maybe not so
optimistic but here we are trying to
make our world a better place and that’s
what optimism is about and it couldn’t
be a more important topic at a more
important time so when you think about
optimism what I want you to think about
is how you use your most precious and
valuable resource and what is that
resource that’s the resource of time how
we use our time determines our overall
optimism why because time is our only
resource that is impossible to replace
or replicate think about it
time is our only resource that is not
replaceable so how we use our precious
time determines how full our glass is
I’m really incredibly fortunate and we
we heard about gratitude earlier I feel
very grateful that I am able to use my
professional time and I’ve done this by
working in the nonprofit sector helping
to make our world a better place through
the Jewish Federation of Greater
Rochester and I’m able to put a really
important value into action and that
value is one in Hebrew it’s called
tikkun olam and it’s repairing the world
that’s what G Kuna Lum means and every
day the way that I get to feel
optimistic is by putting my value and my
time into action so I want to share with
you what I’ve learned and observed in
the last 20 years of my career and
answer the question how can we keep our
optimistic glassful by volunteering our
precious resource of time so there are
two points that I want to make
one is that when you put your values
into action by doing good things that
make our world a better place you can
actually breed optimism in yourself and
in others and I think we’ve heard a lot
of that tonight from our speakers about
the kind of optimism that they have
because of how they spend this precious
precious resource of time the other
point is this scientific research
actually has shown us that when you do
good things for other people that it
actually physically makes you happy I
know that’s counterintuitive because we
think about happiness and we think about
what we do for ourselves to make us
happy you know often we’re gonna go and
do something for ourselves and that will
bring us happiness but the truth is
scientifically we bring happiness when
we do for others and not for ourselves
but time is valuable and it’s precious
so how do we determine how do you
determine what to do with your time and
how to spend precious volunteer time
hours so I’m going to give you seven
very important questions that you can
ask yourself about how to spend your
volunteer time to bring yourself and
your community optimism the first
question that you have to ask is this
what is it a reasonable amount of time
that I can spend how much time can I
take creating meaning in my life and
doing things for other people how much
time will it take me to put my values
into action and it’s important to know
how much time you can spend is it an
hour a day two hours a day is it a few
hours a week but how much time can you
realistically spend and the other
question is what can I give up that I’m
doing that takes time away from the
things that matter because we all do
things in our lives that we waste time
you know the expression of wasting time
we can take our wasted time and put it
into action
by putting our values to work the second
question is what do I care about what do
I care deeply about in my core what am i
passionate about we’ve heard so much
passion tonight we’re talking about we
talked about Mary Carey Ola Greg a
minute ago and we talked about the work
of autism up in the equine Center the
people who you hear speaking tonight are
so passionate about the work that
they’re doing so ask yourself what is it
that I care deeply about and you know
what you can’t get that question wrong
is it that you care about children or
hunger or homelessness or gun violence
whatever it is no what you care about
because that’s the place where you can
spend your time because it will matter
to you and to the people that you impact
the third question that you want to ask
yourself is what do I want to accomplish
and why set goals think about the things
that you’d like to make better and why
and what you want to do how do you want
to move the needle what what is it about
that passion that you want to put into
action and what are the goals that you
want to achieve but that goes along with
question number four question number
four is how can I accomplish my goals
and it’s so important to ask yourself
this question because you need to do
some research research is incredibly
incredibly important if you want to make
an impact and with your volunteer time
to serve the hungry you need to go out
and find out what organizations are
already helping with hunger or children
because there are so many places out in
this world that are doing great things
and you can go out there and engage with
organizations that are already doing the
work but in the same regard once you do
your research and maybe you find that
there isn’t something out there that
meets your needs you can create a dream
and you can fulfill a dream because if
you set the goal that you want to
accomplish and you do the research
really anything is possible we heard
that a little
earlier as well as long as you have the
passion behind it the next question is
how can I measure if I have made a
difference so it’s great to spend that
present precious resource of time
volunteering and feeling good about what
you’re doing but you have to be able to
measure the difference and the impact
that you’ve made and we’ve heard so much
about impact tonight so when you take
that resource of time and you apply it
to your passion and you put it into
action and you have your goals how are
you going to measure and it’s very
important to see that you’ve made impact
the last two questions question number
six and seven are actually interrelated
and they’re very important so question
number six is what skills do I have to
share all of us have strengths that we
can offer in our volunteerism that can
help so do you like to speak can you be
an advocate do you have great accounting
skills you could help with spreadsheets
are you an excellent fund raiser
everybody’s looking for good fundraisers
do you like asking people to give money
if you’re a comfortable fundraising I
can I can find a few organizations for
you but but what are those skills that I
have that I can put to use to help
connect my passion with action and
making a difference everybody has a
skill that they can apply to their
volunteerism but the next question is
equally important and that’s the
question of what am I willing to learn
because there are so many things out
there to learn and if you don’t come
with the skill I can guarantee you there
are many people out there who would be
very glad to teach you a skill to help
you put your passion into action so
maybe you want to learn how to fundraise
maybe you want to learn how to speak
maybe you want to learn how to be an
advocate all of those skills are
available to you if you’re willing to
learn and if you can offer a skill and
you can learn a skill the volunteer
world is open it’s wide open for you to
have impact in so many ways and there
are so very many needs that we have in
today’s society so what I wanted to
with you about this issue of time and
how we use our time for volunteering and
for bringing optimism is this I really
firmly believe that if we all picked our
passion and we put our time to the best
use possible and we acted on our values
are positive values that we would be
able to impact our world in the most
positive ways and make a real difference
in our society and we know that we need
to make a difference in so many areas so
not only would it bring us unlimited
optimism but we would make our world a
better place and each one of us wants to
make our world a better place and when
our world is a better place we know that
all of our glasses won’t just be
half-full they will be overflowing so as
you leave tonight I encourage you to
think about your passion figure out how
you can take some of that precious
precious resource of time and put it
into action because not only will you
benefit everybody will benefit and so
will our community thank you [Applause]
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