How Volunteering Improves Your Life

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Volunteering is more than an act of kindness; it’s a transformative experience that impacts both the community and the volunteer. Beyond boosting your professional profile or network, helping others can improve your physical, mental, and emotional health. Below are notable ways that volunteering can improve your life.

1. Develops New Skills

Volunteering provides new opportunities to learn and build new skills that can benefit you both professionally and personally. Community service involvement gives hands-on experiences that can develop your skill set and boost your confidence. Whether you’re helping to distribute food to underprivileged communities or creating landing pages to promote a crowdfunding concert, there are plenty of soft or hard skills that volunteering can teach you.

2. Expands Your Network

Volunteering allows you to meet new people and grow your professional and social network. You can build relationships with individuals from diverse backgrounds by engaging in civic engagement.

Meanwhile, an increasingly diverse network can open doors to new ideas, opportunities, and collaborations. Moreover, these relationships can easily extend beyond the scope of volunteering to enrich your professional and personal experiences.

3. Improves Your Mental Health

Civic engagement improves professional appeal and mental well-being, making you a better person. For instance, researchers have proven that volunteering helps to manage stress, as volunteers turn their attention from themselves and build a supportive community network.

Beyond helping to alleviate stress, volunteering is known to reduce feelings of depression and boost people’s overall happiness. Talk about a seamless way to build life satisfaction and become a better friend, colleague, parent, or partner.

4. Fosters a Sense of Community

Volunteering links you with others who share related interests and values. By helping others, you can build strong community ties and foster a supportive network of like-minded individuals.

Many volunteers have found lasting professional connections by helping others. While working towards a common goal, you can anticipate long or mid-term connections and contribute to a broader sense of belonging and shared purpose.

5. Helps You Gain Perspective

Civic engagement exposes you to diverse life challenges and experiences, which offer a larger perspective about the world around you. It develops empathy and understanding for others, diversifying your worldview while deepening your appreciation for your uniqueness.

6. Enhances Your Resume

Taking time out to better other lives via volunteering can also enhance your resume. It shows potential employers that you’re committed to social causes while demonstrating your ability to fit into diverse work environments. Many employers value the experiences and skills obtained via volunteer experience, which can set you above many other applicants in the job market.

7. Enhances Your Mood

Civic engagement is also renowned for its mood-boosting effects. According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, volunteering can alleviate symptoms of depression and anxiety, enhancing your overall mood and emotional well-being.

8. Enhances Your Physical Health

Many civic activities involve physical tasks, which can improve your physical health. Regular engagements in civic activities can offer exercise and contribute to a healthier lifestyle.

Moreover, research has shown that volunteering can reduce mortality rates and enhance physical functioning. Other studies have also linked civic engagement to enhanced physical activities, strength, and self-related health.

9. Boosts Your Self-Esteem

Studies show that helping others via volunteering and impacting their lives can boost your self-esteem and sense of accomplishment. Researchers have also found that people who volunteer regularly are more likely to experience increased happiness and less depression.

Seeing how your efforts make a difference and gain genuine appreciation from others can reinforce your self-worth and personal sense of fulfilment.

10. Creates Positive Impact

By its very nature, civic engagement helps you to contribute to meaningful causes and drive positive impact in or beyond your community. Your actions help to make the world a better place, whether you’re distributing clothes, contributing ideas, or creating content. Volunteering directly contributes to the actual lives of everyday people.

Conclusion

All other benefits of volunteering in this list all converge at one point: they enhance your personal growth. While helping others, you also gain insights into your weaknesses and strengths, while building the right character that helps you navigate different situations, as you work towards goals that are larger than yourself.