Sunday Service: The Power of Giving

The best of people are those who are most beneficial to people. Prophet Muhammad said that, what does it mean? How does it apply to you and your life? If it even does, that’s what we will explore today. Welcome to the Sunday service. Wanted to highlight and celebrate volunteering. We’re just coming off of a very large, very important election in the United States, as they all are, and you recognize, or I did, just the sheer number of people who are volunteering their time and their attention and just giving of themselves in what is probably normally and commonly a pretty thankless job to be the people who are checking people in at polling locations and Manning and womaning the different stations. When I went and voted earlier this week, there were dozens and dozen, probably dozen people at the polling location that I was at. And then we think about the sheer number of other locations and everything else going on, it is a lot of people. So want to give a big tip of the hat and a thank you, and add a boy and add a girl to everybody who does that? It’s estimated that in 2020 around 1 million Americans served as poll workers. So there you go, over a million people. And just doing that alone takes so much organization and infrastructure. So it’s a pretty incredible thing. So a big thank you again for everybody who has done that. The quote, the excerpt from the Prophet Muhammad, reflects a central value in Islam about the importance of service, kindness and generosity towards others. This saying that I talked about is one of many hadiths or sayings attributed to Muhammad that highlight how Islam views helping others as a fundamental part of living a good and meaningful life. And Islam, the person’s value, is often measured by the good they do for others, not just for themselves. So they have a principle, which is it drives a human humanitarian responsibility. And Islam teaches that every individual has a duty to contribute positively to their community, helping those in need, and that can be done through the giving of time, resources or even just a kind word that’s part of being a good Muslim. They also celebrate and hold up the idea of brotherhood and sisterhood the community itself, or Uma, is viewed as a single body, and everything that affects one part should concern the entire whole. So that concept promotes solidarity and responsibility for everyone. There’s a concept called sadaqa, which is charity beyond obligation, while sakat is a required former charity, sadaqah represents voluntary giving, which can include any act of kindness at all. Intention plays a very, very important role in Islam. They place a emphasis on that which they call it Nia, which is the influence or the intention behind the action itself, and volunteering and helping other people is is with a sincere heart, is seen as a wonderful way to earn God’s favor and purify one’s soul. So all of these things, volunteerism, celebrating others, doing good, very important tenets of of Islam Christianity talks about it is more it’s more blessed to give than to receive. And Christian or Christians, obviously, have a strong sense of community, as well as do, as do Muslims. Judaism Tikkun Allah means repairing the world and inspires acts of kindness and social justice. Hinduism talks about Siva, or selfless service. Siva is the practice of selfless service without any expectation of reward or any kind of a claim. They talk about karma yoga, it’s the path of selfless action and service that’s part of the pursuit of spiritual growth. Buddhism speaks to compassion and altruism. And Buddhism, Corona, also known as compassion, is an essential part helping others as a way to practice compassion, which is one of the four immeasurables. In Sikhism, they talk about Siva and longer. Sikhism emphasizes Siva, especially through acts like longer or community kitchens that offer free meals to everyone in need. Serving others is seen as serving God. So across all major religions, which should not be a surprise, and I’m sure that it’s not a surprise at all, volunteering, giving of oneself, giving of one’s time, helping those who are in need, recognizing when somebody is in need and taking action to do it is a profoundly important thing. So there’s a through line across all major religions. What about volunteerism? Just here in the United States, I want to talk about how that shows up, not just in a monetary standpoint, but also from a time perspective, because there’s a lot of different ways to give, there’s a lot of different ways to donate, and a lot of different ways to have an impact on lives of other people. And you don’t have to be any kind of a rich benefactor to have an important and profound impact. And I know that in my family, we focus on as tricky as it is as parents to get kids to to focus on people that are other than themselves and what their needs are, because that’s obviously a tricky thing for a little kid. That’s something that we really emphasize, and I’m confident that you do as well, and we try and do it in as many real life scenarios as as we can, because the opportunities are all around us for for teaching and for emphasizing the importance of helping others. So every time we go to the park, we look for garbage to pick up. So talk about how every little bit helps, and if everybody did this, then we wouldn’t really have to worry about litter or garbage or our community spaces or our homes being messy, because we’re taking responsibility for ourselves. And when somebody makes a mistake in litters, which we talk about, is very, very bad thing. It’s incumbent upon other people to to pick up the slack, literally, to pick up the garbage. And then the converse of that is, obviously, if everybody spit their gum on all the ground, or if everybody dropped napkins or their soda can or whatever, the place would be an absolute pigs. That’d be a dump, and that’s not a place that we want to live. So there’s opportunities all around us, but to get back to the point of it was, every year Americans contribute, collectively contribute a ton of hours. It’s estimated that we have contributed as Americans over 8 billion hours of service each year. Now tricky to quantify that, but 8 billion hours of service each year. That is an impressive, impressive statistic. The average volunteer spends around 50 hours per year helping organizations or communities. They are especially active in areas like the arts and culture and homelessness and environmental initiatives, with around 46 to 48% of volunteers involved in homelessness and environmental work, respectively. So that’s interesting. So 46% of the hours were devoted towards homelessness, 48% towards environmental work. That’s interesting. Additionally, well, I think it’s clear that there’s certainly so many different benefits to it, but maybe it’s not clear that there’s a clear benefit to the person or the organization or the thing that is receiving the help. Talked about cleaning up a public space like a park, obviously the park benefits from that, whether the park realizes it or not, but everybody else, all the other families and people who enjoy the park, are able to do it more so. But there’s also a sense of you’re you’re honoring your obligation. From a religious standpoint, if you’re religious person, but even if you’re not, there’s certainly a lot that we as individuals get out of doing good for others. So it’s massive personal and societal impact from a financial standpoint, in 2023 Americans contributed, or rather donated, an estimate $557 billion $557 billion and that was an increase of almost 2% from the previous year. So in spite of the fact that inflation was taking a bite out of everybody’s ability to consume and buy things, still increased contributions 2% from the previous year, and again, that number was $557 billion so that is an awfully big number. It’s nothing but a really positive thing. I mentioned

homelessness and environmental concerns, but healthcare and social services, so volunteering in hospitals and clinics, organizations like the Red Cross and blood drives and mental health support that is one of the largest recipients of financial help, but also. Just donating time. The second largest area are happens to be education and youth services. So things like tutoring and mentoring, volunteering with organizations like Big Brothers, Big Sisters, school support going into helping out the classroom. We all know that our teachers are under compensated and overworked and so thin on resources. So it’s a wonderful thing. It’s certainly not a surprise that we have so many people who are helping out with young people in the classroom and in after school activities, things like that. I already mentioned the environmental conservation and animal welfare program, so it’s a lot of wonderful opportunities there. And of course, homelessness and housing, affordable housing organizations like Habitat for Humanity are doing incredible work. I know that my personal experience doing a habitat build is they really got it right. I think that they really got it right by involving organizations to come and do habitat builds, because it’s wonderful team building, even if you’ve never actually rolled up your sleeves and put on a pair of work gloves and put a shovel into the ground or put a paintbrush onto a house or turned a screwdriver or hammered a nail, there’s opportunities to help, and I think maybe more so if you’ve never done it, or you do it infrequently, you’ll get more out of it than somebody who does it all the time. So I know that that’s me. I’m not. I certainly am a knowledge worker, more so than I am somebody who works with my hands. But again, I derived immense satisfaction and pleasure and gotten a ton out of the team building and the personal gratification that goes along with working on a Habitat for Humanity built. So if you’re not familiar with that organization, definitely encourage you to check it out. If encourage you to check it out. If you’re part of an organization looking for to increase culture or do team building. Habitat is a wonderful organization, and they do it all the time, so it’s something that I think they’ll help you to get set up. The next one is disaster relief and emergency services. FEMA is an organization which does a ton of good work. So is the Red Cross, and in this most recent disaster, I know that there have been conflicting reports on on how volunteers have been able to donate, lend time, lend expertise, and things like that. But on the whole, on the whole, these are wonderful organizations, and like one of the challenges when a disaster actually does hit is the organization itself is these are not like all nonprofit or organizations that require or rely on outside resources. They’re already spread pretty thin, they’re doing the best they can in literally impossible situations, so understanding that and going through all the proper channels and not just showing up, I think that that’s probably a more prudent response moving forward, if you’re interested in helping out with disaster relief and working with organizations like FEMA and the Red Cross To make sure that we are following the protocols in place to get signed up as a volunteer. I understand that our hearts in the right place, and it can be frustrating if we just showing up and they’re turning you away, but they’re just trying to make it all work, certainly the arts and culture recreation, things like museums and cultural organization or recreational programs like parks. These need tons of resources and help, food security and nutrition, food banks, mules on wheels. These are wonderful, wonderful, wonderful, wonderful ways to get involved. But again, billions and billions and billions of dollars, and billions and billions of hours, 8 billion hours, and such a massive amount of money as well. It’s just such an impressive thing. And even in the midst of difficult times like inflation, everything else we’ve been experiencing to have increased the total from up 2% from last year, I think it’s just an incredible thing. So another big part of this is that I think that we are all hoping, I think that we were all hoping that, and are still hopeful that we can come out of what has been a very divisive presidential election season campaign and come together. And that might be a pipe dream. It might be a pretty immature, childish thing to. Think, but it’s still something that I do think, and it’s something that I certainly hope for. But I wanted to highlight these different from a religious standpoint, but then also from a very practical non religious standpoint, that we care very much for one another. We care very much for people who are in need. We care very much for people who are struggling. We care very much for people who are the most at risk in our society. We don’t want to see people struggle. We don’t want to see people disenfranchised. We don’t want to see people go through hard times. We want to help lift them up, and we do so through the donation of our time and the donation of our money. And again, reinforcing that it’s such a massive scale that we do it so much, is a reminder to me that we are way more similar than we are different. One of the reasons, or rather one of the arguments that I think is very valid, very compelling, for for military service, that everybody has compulsory military service, even if it’s for a year or two years, is that it breaks down all the walls and all the barriers that are between us, Republican, Democrat, black, brown, rich, poor, east, west, whatever. Same thing with the sports team, playing on a football team together, you’re you’re doing a habitat build forever to together. You’re going through basic training together and serving your country together. That has the effect of, again, getting rid of all these Bs, things that we’ve decided are things that make us so much different and helps us to focus in on the reality that we’re not fundamentally most of our many of our values are the same. We want good, safe places to go with our families. We don’t want people to be starving to death and dying in the streets. We don’t want people to be suffering in in in an emergency. We don’t want that to happen. We don’t want people to go hungry. We don’t want people to not have a place to go after school. It’s a long list, billions of dollars and billions of hours given by you. You and your fellow Americans, we are way more similar than we are different. These are opportunities to come together and to re humanize one another instead of othering everybody. We’ll close with a wonderful story that Jack Kornfield told on, I believe it was the Tim Ferriss podcast some years ago, and it’s just wonderful. It’s a wonderful story. And there was a lady who was working many years ago in San Francisco serving homeless people. That was her full time job, and at the end of her day, when she was off the clock, when she had successfully executed all of her work, what all of her work that her career, all the tasks that her career demanded, she would go home and on her own dime, make sandwiches, make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and then she would take those sandwiches and walk out and distribute them to homeless people. She did this for years, and eventually word got out about this amazing mother, Teresa, which she probably would reject wholesale behavior. I’m not saying she’s like Mother Teresa, but in a lot of ways, she was making sacrifices. You get the idea, word gets out, and people started sending her money. They started sending her money in the mail saying, oh my gosh, thank you so much for the work that you’re doing. The impact you’re having is extraordinary. Thank you. And she would reply to these people. She would get the letter, take the money out, read the note, and then send them a letter back with their money included, and a note saying, make your own damn sandwiches. So awesome story, a friendly reminder that we need individually to be the change that we want to see in the world.

We have the ability to have an impact that is way more than then. Then we realize, and if not you, then who, if not now, then when? Not to be too trite about it, but that stuff’s true. That stuff is true. I. Okay, so you are certainly capable of being a person who is an essential part of your community. You’re a person who can have a dramatic impact on other people’s lives. We need all the help that we can get. People are struggling in every city, every town, every walk of life, every socio economic, every every different background that human beings have or are people are struggling, and there’s opportunities to help out. And who better than you? Nobody. So again, a big thank you to all of the volunteers, to everyone who has donated time, certainly donated money, and specifically today, to everyone who has donated their time or the resources to help with our political or in our political process, who help on election day and year round, if you are somebody who is volunteering, helping our democracy be our democracy, and helping our country be the best country on earth as it is and will remain. Thank you so much as always, do your part, doing your best. You.

george grombacher 16:00
So if I want my iPhone, and my Tesla and my Bitcoin to work, we need to get the metal out of the ground.

Pierre Leveille 16:07
Absolutely. Without it, we cannot do it.

george grombacher 16:13
Why? Why is there a Why has production been going down.

Pierre Leveille 16:21
Because the large mines that are producing most of the copper in the world, the grades are going down slowly they’re going there, they’re arriving near the end of life. So and of life of mines in general means less production. And in the past, at least 15 years, the exploration expenditure for copper were pretty low, because the price of copper was low. And when the price is low, companies are tending to not invest more so much in exploration, which is what we see today. It’s it’s, it’s not the way to look at it. Because nobody 15 years ago was able to predict that there would be a so massive shortage, or it’s so massive demand coming. But in the past five years, or let’s say since the since 10 years, we have seen that more and more coming. And then the by the time you react start exploring and there’s more money than then ever that is putting in put it in expression at the moment for copper at least. And what we see is that the it takes time, it could take up to 2025 years between the time you find a deposit that it gets in production. So but but the year the time is counted. So it’s it’s very important to so you will see company reopening old mines, what it will push also, which is not bad, it will force to two, it will force to find a it will force to find ways of recalibrating customer, you know the metals, that will be more and more important.

george grombacher 18:07
So finding, okay, so for lack of a better term recycling metals that are just sitting around somewhere extremely important. Yeah. And then going and going back to historic minds that maybe for lack of technology, or just lack of will or reasons, but maybe now because there’s such a demand, there’s an appetite to go back to those.

Pierre Leveille 18:33
Yes, but there will be a lot of failures into that for many reasons. But the ones that will be in that will resume mining it’s just going to be a short term temporary solution. No it’s it’s not going to be you need to find deposit that will that will operate 50 years you know at least it’s 25 to 50 years at least and an old mind that you do in production in general it’s less than 10 years.

george grombacher 19:03
Got it. Oh there we go. Up here. People are ready for your difference making tip What do you have for them

Pierre Leveille 19:14
You mean an investment or

george grombacher 19:17
whatever you’re into, you’ve got so much life experience with raising a family and doing business all over the world and having your kids go to school in Africa so a tip on copper or whatever you’re into.

Pierre Leveille 19:34
But there’s two things I like to see and I was telling my children many times and I always said you know don’t focus on what will bring you specifically money don’t think of Getting Rich. Think of doing what you what you like, what you feel your your your your your, you know you have been born to do so use your most you skills, do what you like, do what you wet well, and good things will happen to you. And I can see them grow in their life. And I can tell you that this is what happens. And sometimes you have setback like I had recently. But if we do things properly, if we do things that we like, and we liked that project, we were very passionate about that project, not only me, all my team, and if we do things properly, if we do things correctly, good things will happen. And we will probably get the project back had to go forward or we will find another big project that will be the launch of a new era. So that’s my most important tip in life. Do what you like, do it with your best scale and do it well and good things will happen.

george grombacher 20:49
Pierre Leveille 21:03
Thank you. I was happy to be with you to today.

george grombacher 21:06
Damn, tell us the websites and where where people can connect and find you.

Pierre Leveille 21:13
The it’s Deep South resources.com. So pretty simple.

george grombacher 21:18
Perfect. Well, if you enjoyed this as much as I did show up here your appreciation and share today’s show with a friend who also appreciate good ideas, go to deep south resources, calm and learn all about what they’re working on and track their progress.

Pierre Leveille 21:32
Thanks. Thanks, have a nice day.

george grombacher 21:36
And until next time, keep fighting the good fight. We’re all in this together.