A volunteer’s credo

I want to be humble. I want to learn that a certainty is often an uncertainty that just hasn’t been considered carefully enough. I want to have the strength to admit my insecurities and lapses in integrity and deficiencies of character.

I want to be spiritual. I want to be conscious and cognizant of a greater force at work in my life, be it God, or nature, or the infinite yet infinitesimal strands of space and time which connect the universe.

I want to learn about the world around me. I want to learn about myself, not for how I perceive the world, but for how the world shapes who I am and influences how I think. Contrary to every shred of evidence I’ve accumulated in the time I’ve spent on this planet, I want to remember that the world does not revolve around me. That it is a massive, awesome thing which is much greater than the sum of the places I’ve seen and the people I’ve met and the books I’ve read, which exists far beyond my capacity to perceive it.

I want to have a genuine curiosity for other people. I want to be witness to their lives, to rejoice in their joy and feel the pain of their sorrows. I want to love fully, to see everyone I meet as the interesting, complex, self-aware, valuable human beings that they are and have been and will be.

I want to love myself.

I want to take pride in everything I do. However, I want even more to be proud of who I am. I want to understand that although what I do may reflect my personality and character, it cannot even begin to fully describe the fiber of my being.

I want to perceive without judgment, to love without consciousness, to live without regret.