Donating to Military Families Makes Good Sense
When was the last time you did something that made you feel really good? Sometimes people get so caught up in their own busy schedules and their own needs that helping others gets pushed to the side. When you are feeling your most frantic and overwhelmed, making the decision to help others can have a calming effect. MAking large financial donations, of course, is one option. But what if you don’t have the resources to do that? What can you do, on a small budget or no budget at all, that can help the greater good. One possibility is to coordinate efforts to help military families. Support for military families can come in many forms, all of which can leave you feeling better about yourself, as well as helping others.
Donating clothing is one way to provide support for military families. Did you know that the typical American family discards approximately 68 pounds of clothing a year? Of that amount, an estimated 99% can be recycled or reused. Consider spending a weekend going through every closet in your home, every box and tub of clothing that you have stored in the basement or the attic, and sift through to find clothing and other household items that you could donate.
The next step of course is to get your items to local donation pick ups and centers where the items will be sorted and distributed, thereby helping families in need. You may even be able to find organizations that pick up donations right from your house. Remember the last time you hung up on that robo call to your house about donating to “Support for Military Families”? Next time, listen more closely to the message and you can find yourself helping others as well as purging your house of unnecessary items. Donating clothing can have a huge impact. An estimated 80% of donated clothing in America is used by charitable organizations for donation to the needy, and for other funding purposes.
Once you get in the habit of donating your extra and rarely used clothing, you can begin looking to other areas of your house for other possible donations. Charities for military families collect household items, toys for children and furniture.
You should have a sense of pride and good feeling when you donate to help veterans and organizations that help military families. From an environmental view you are recycling clothing and household items to keep them out of landfills. You are giving something back to people and families who have served, or are serving, our country. And, you are eliminating the extra things that are cluttering your life.
