The New Volunteerism Project
The Archival
Collection of
Ivan Henry Scheier
Ivan's
Musings
In Loving Memory and with Some Anticipation
from the Rants and Raves Anthology
Permission to re-post this
article was approved by
Energize, Inc.
© -- Appropriate permission must be secured from
the publisher for re-publication
by Ivan H. Scheier, Dream Catcher, 2003
Sitting here, surrounded by packing boxes, breathing the yellow dust of Southern New Mexico (until recently hidden safely behind the couch), I hear a call for words from friends and colleagues on the topic: “The Single Greatest Challenge To My Area of Volunteerism, Right Now and Likely in the Near Future.”My area of volunteerism? I trust that means interest, rather than ownership. Because I never did “own” any area of volunteerism in the latter sense. Indeed, if ultimately volunteers themselves and their clients do not own volunteerism, I don‘t see that it’s worth owning.
Well, how do you do that? I can only hope my friend Susan Ellis will continue her long habit of forbearance re my unconventionalities, and permit more pieties from an unredeemed elder. Essentially then, as free association, but for sure pious, here are my thoughts.
My text is from Pogo and whomever he got it from: “WE HAVE MET THE ENEMY AND HE IS US.” That is to say, the greatest challenge to organized volunteerism is organized volunteerism. It’s also its best friend. We are, at this point in time, something like a gardener who can cultivate a flower—or kill it.
Stated too extremely, of course, but something like this is what I mean in asking all volunteerism professionals and managers to remember, if you can:
• The true measure of volunteerism is not so much what you can count, as who you can count on.
• Volunteerism isn’t about the leavings of work not worth paying for; it is about the dreams that loving work makes happen.
• Volunteerism should aim not so much to control the behavior of volunteers as to trust it, and release it. This, even when control is disguised
euphemistically as management, supervision, evaluation, or training. (None of these have to be raw control, but all of them have to be watched that they don’t become it.) Remember, wasn’t it at one time all about freedom?
• Technology is no substitute for heart. The method has never been developed that can substitute for values. Equipment can support compassion, but beyond that, forget it.
• Volunteerism is not a “program,” it is hope. And it is a process, not a structure.Let us hope it is not too late to shift some focus to all the wonderful kinds of volunteering that can happen outside of programs in staffed agencies, e.g., entirely-volunteer groups, freelance and informal volunteering and, above all, etcetera. Mostly, though, I feel volunteerism is more about individuals than organizations, especially BIG organizations.
Let us remember that resource organizations and their programs exist not ever for their own sake, but only to help field leadership of volunteers; field leadership exists only to help volunteers; and volunteers exist only to help people in need, directly or indirectly. One of the few times I remember seeing Hat Naylor be stern as well as eloquent was some thirty years ago at a conference on volunteers working with disabled children. She did not allow us to go un-reminded that the conference really was not about volunteers; it was about children.
I, too, someday hope to find out what it’s “all about.” Maybe it’s more about always reaching and seeking, rather than firming things up forever.
I wish you were back, Hat.
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Ivan H. Scheier—ostensibly retired but hardly retiring—remains one of the cutting edge thinkers in the field of volunteerism. For over thirty years he has contributed to the formation of the field while being gadfly, rabble rouser, and conscience to those lucky enough to have met him in person or in print. He is presently Consulting Editor to e-Volunteerism: The Electronic Journal of the Volunteer Community (www.e-volunteerism.com), to which he contributes periodic "Musings," and practices and teaches Reiki in Truth-or-Consequences, New
Mexico. More formal details about Ivan can be found at http://evolunteerism.com/team/scheier.html.Here is how he signed his most recent e-mail:
My phone number remains (+1) 505-894-1340
My e-mail remains ivan@zianet.com
My computer equipment remains obsolete.
My archives Web site remains http://academic.regis.edu/volunteer/ivan
I have a new Web site online and still under development, a collection of my poetry over the past forty years: http://www.verseus.net/index.html (the collection is largely not about volunteerism; not specifically, anyhow)
Books by Ivan Scheier on sale in the Online Bookstore (www.energizeinc.com/bookstore.html):
Building Staff/Volunteer Relations
Making Dreams Come True without Money, Might or Miracles: A Guide for
Dream-Chasers and Dream-Catchers
When Everyone's a Volunteer: The Effective Functioning of All-Volunteer Groups
Articles by Ivan in e-Volunteerism and available by individual purchase:Articles by Ivan in e-Volunteerism and available by individual purchase:
"Finding Our Profession"
"A Poetry of Volunteering?"
"Relapse Into Volunteerism: An Unsuccessful Attempt to Resign from the Field"
"The Self-Employed Volunteer"
"They Hardly Ever Do the Hula in El Paso"
Ivan Scheier
Stillpoint
607 Marr
Truth or Consequences, New Mexico, 87901
Tel (505) 894-1340
Email: ivan@zianet.comFor comments and editing suggestions please contact Mary Lou McNatt mlmcnatt@indra.com
