The Truth About Raising Money for Charity | Life Lessons

The process you are about to read taught me the most important lesson of my recent life. If you manage to read all the way through I hope the lesson helps you too...

I've always wondered why we do things for people we love, we do things for money, but we rarely see people doing things for strangers.

Why is your family the recipient of your unconditional love but the person on the other side of the planet that you've never met not even considered for a second.

There is so much suffering in the world, so much injustice, so many people being exploited and yet very few people care.

If it doesn't directly involve them then they pay no attention.

This is such a limited way of thinking.

Where does your family start and end? Is it in your house? Is it by blood? Is it your local community? Or is the human race one big family? The way I see it is the latter, we are all one big family and to see my brothers and sisters suffering upsets me.

There are people on this planet with big hearts and loving intent, those are my people, and those are the people I choose to help if I have the means to do so. It's not my responsibility, it is my choice.

I choose to help children because more often than not they don't have the capacity to help themselves.

In 2019 I started my journey towards supporting charities more publicly when I raised money during my live events and impromptuly spoke at The Little Angels Foundation gala dinner albeit a little tipsy.

At the start of 2020 I discovered the INSANITY that is happening all over the globe, namely Human Trafficking, and decided to find out more and direct some of my energy into raising awareness and financially supporting end the horrific experiences these humans are subjected to.

It is one of the largest illegal trades on earth, coming second only to the drug trade. It is however the fastest growing and will soon surpass the drug trade for the core reason that humans do not cost anything to manufacture and humans can be sold after they are used.

Drugs cost a lot to manufacture and once they are gone they are gone.

Human Trafficking is used by people all over the world, from parents selling their children as slaves, all the way through to people in very high positions of power around the world to create their wealth.

The sad news is that it is hidden, suppressed and censored by the news and media because the reality is so chilling.

I chose to support Project Rescue Children, an Australian based charity that is protecting and rescuing children across the globe from these atrocities, and I decided to do it first by setting up monthly donations from my company, but I also wanted to do something more bold and decided to try and raise $20,000 by doing the only thing I really knew how to, but boy did I bite off more than I could chew.

I love a physical challenge so naturally I thought that people could sponsor me to run a marathon (it was on my bucket list anyway). I've never been one to do things by halves so to make it interesting I decided to add a 9kg weighted vest into the mix...

The photo below was taken at the end of the 43km (yes I missed the turn around and ran an extra kilometre 😅)...

Here's the thing, training for your first marathon is hard enough, doing it in a vest is a little harder, but nothing compares to trying to raise money for a charity with no experience and only using a social media account.

I honestly thought more people loved supporting good causes and $20,000 would be relatively simple, but it destroyed me, my self confidence and my physical body. It felt like squeezing blood from a stone and my expectations got crushed!

In the military we learned what brotherhood and sacrifice was all about. You learn to put your own needs aside and look after those beside you, and even after the military I continued that trend.

Those expectations are what cost me a lot of pain as reality did not match, in fact the gap was huge, but here's where the lesson comes in.

I was trying so hard to raise the money through my social media account but it was relatively ineffective and I soon realised that my goal to hit $20,000 was much harder than I imagine. This put me under pressure, I went into a sympathetic stress response, I'm not one to fail to reach my goals or my targets and deep down I felt that if I didn't reach this goal I was a failure.

The pressure got so high and I started to get angry at the world, I started to get angry at people for being so selfish and for being useless.

I was running about 8km one day which is a fairly easy run and I remember the frustration and anger I was carrying towards peoples lack of generosity, I was fuming mad and I could feel it through my whole body.

About 5km into the run my calf started to tighten up and it just got worse and worse the more I ran, it got to the point of unbearable like someone had shot me in the calf.

At about the 6km mark it felt like a lightning bolt shot up the back of my leg and I couldn't put weight on that leg anymore. I had torn my calf and hobbled home and got into bed feeling absolutely sour.

As I calmed down in bed I reflected on what had just happed, I knew it was the emotion that had caused the injury. All illness and injury are simply a reflection of our soul. They are signposts to tell us that we are out of alignment.

I realised that instead of focusing on the AMAZING humans that HAD donated, I was focusing on everybody else that hadn't donated. It became clear to me what I had to change. I had to start appreciating and focusing on the people that did give to the cause and also hold compassion for those that couldn't find the resources to support in this time.

That switch from frustration to gratitude and compassion created the perfect chemical and energetic concoction for healing. Within 24 hours I was walking and within 72 hours I was running again.

Spontaneous healing is real when you tune into the frequency of love.

The other thing I learned was that it's good to aim high, but it's the expectations that crush us. It was my own mind that had caused me to become sour and resentful towards humanity.

As soon as I decided that I wasn't a failure if I didn't manage to raise the $20,000, and that in fact I was successful just by trying, then my whole world shifted.

The pressure was off, I was feeling good again, I enjoyed the running and the raising money, and overall it became and enjoyable experience.

In the end I managed to raise $13,188 which was delivered to Project Rescue Children to support their new safe house in Kenya.

I was meant to run the official Gold Coast Marathon but due to the plandemic it was cancelled and I ran instead with a local running club that was hosting a substitute event.

We don't truly understand a lesson until we feel it. Then it becomes hard wired into our body instead of just a concept in the mind. These lessons are usually quite painful at the time but lead to a greater level of mind in the long run.

We must keep moving towards our vision for the future and we must expect leaving the comfort zone to hurt. This is the process of growth and learning.

To anyone that runs charities or raises money for charity my hat goes off to you, it is a tough gig to raise money and there are 1,000,000 things more enjoyable to be doing.

To everyone that donated, you are truly a gift to this world. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. Every dollar that came through gave me hope, and every dollar will go directly towards the improvement of someones life that is less fortunate than we are.

To the people that supported in other ways with podcast interviews and sharing my posts, thank you!

This won't be the end of my charitable work, but I will definitely approach it differently the next time around.

Much love.

Become More, Live More, Give More xxx