Tag: Poverty

Don’t Hit the Traffic Cones

Published on by Kieran Johnson - The Generosity GuyLeave a comment

I heard a story of a defensive driving instructor teaching people how to safely navigate obstacles on the road. He set up traffic cones on the roadway they were using and instructed each driver to drive straight towards them, then when they got to a certain point, brake and avoid hitting them.

Every single driver ran into the cones.

He then asked, ‘What are you looking at when you are braking?’

‘The cones’ they all said.

To which he replied, ‘Don’t look at the cones, look at where you want to go’.

Every driver was then able to navigate past the cones without hitting them.

Often, we can get so caught up in what we are trying to avoid that we focus all our attention on that one thing, and keep running into it.

Ending poverty can sometimes feel like that. We know that we want to avoid people suffering in poverty. We don’t want people to go hungry. We don’t want people to get sick and die from easily curable diseases. We don’t want people to fall into generational cycles which traps families in a vulnerable state.

We know what we don’t want, but what do we want instead?

Jacqueline Novogratz, CEO of Acumen nails it when she says, “The opposite of poverty is not income, it’s dignity.”

So we are not just aiming for everyone to have more dollars in their bank account, that would help, but it is only one part of the process of each human being having dignity. We are aiming for every human to be respected, belong to a community, receive justice and have the capacity to reach their full potential.

Take your eyes off the traffic cones and aim for where you want to go.

One in a Million

Published on by Kieran Johnson - The Generosity GuyLeave a comment

‘You are one in a million’ is not as good as it sounds. It’s definitely not as good as it used to be.

It means that there are 7,600 more of you around the world, which doesn’t make you feel as unique. It is possible to meet them.

‘You are one in a billion’ sounds better.

Although that still means there are 7 of you out there.

One in 7.6 billion is the best, although it’s a bit clunky and not as easy to say.

This is one of the downsides to population growth.  

The global population in 1700 was about 600 million people.

By 1800 it had reached around 1 billion.

It had reached 1.6 billion by 1900, 2 billion by 1928, 5 billion by 1987 and 7.9 billion in 2021.

Since 1800 the global population has increased by 700%.

People used to freak out about this and worry about our impending doom as the sheer amount of people would surely overrun the planet, use everything and bring about the end of the world.

Why is no one worried about this now?

Because we have lifted hundreds of millions of people out of poverty. When that happens, families have less children because they can be confident that they will survive, they no longer need to think about who will look after them when they get older, and they become more educated about contraception. People’s generosity did this.

At this stage the global population should plateau at around 11 billion in 2100. Crisis just about averted.

Now, on to climate change.

Always Poor

Published on by Kieran Johnson - The Generosity GuyLeave a comment

“The poor you will always have with you” – Jesus

Jesus was talking to a room full of people after someone used an expensive item in an extravagant act of gratitude towards him. Some in the room criticised this act, and in their moral superiority suggested a better use of this gift would be to sell it and give the money to the poor. Jesus essentially said, “if God is in your living room, then shower Him with your best. Spend up big on him because it probably won’t happen again. Tomorrow, when God is no longer in your living room, give generously to those who are living in poverty.”

What we think it means…

We take this interaction and think that it means that we don’t need to worry about trying to end poverty, because you can’t. It’s a fool’s errand. People will always be poor; it’s just how thing are. Give up now and save yourself some heartache.

What it actually means…

Aside from the main point of giving your best to God if He is literally sitting right in front of you, Jesus was talking about situational poverty, which is a transitional time that people go through. Life has all sorts of ups and downs and sometimes the downs can put you into a place of poverty for a season, which is when you require generosity from others. Situational poverty is a short term experience.

This is stark contrast to systemic poverty, which is generational in nature and ensures that those who are poor today will also be poor tomorrow – you know, the kind if extreme poverty we see in the world today. Systemic poverty is man-made and exists in the structures we have put into place which, among other things, ensure that those who are vulnerable are the ones that earn less, suffer greater life shocks, and end up living without what they need to flourish. It doesn’t matter what they do, the system is stacked against them and they are unable to work their way out of it. Most are born into it, and some fall into it, but it doesn’t matter how it happened, it doesn’t need to exist and we can end it.

Poverty will always exist, people will fall into poverty through challenging life circumstances, but to think it will always be the same group of people, and their family for generations to come, or that some people should live their entire lives in poverty because of where they were born, is arrogant, ignorant, and wrong.

Fortunately, we have been making some pretty great headway with some smart structures and a bunch of generous people. We know that systemic poverty doesn’t need to exist and that we can end it, one family and one community at a time. We can’t do it without you though.

Donate here

Empowered Mothers are our Ticket out of this Mess

Published on by Kieran Johnson - The Generosity GuyLeave a comment

How’s your relationship with your mum?

This is a question fraught with danger.

You might have a great relationship with your mum. You might have an okay relationship. You might have a rocky relationship. You might have none.

You might have had a step-mum instead of, or as well as.

Maybe you’ve lost your mum. Maybe you never knew her.

Or, you might be a mum and love it. You might be a mum and like it. You might be a mum and tolerate it. You might be a mum and hate it…some days.

You might be a step-mum and trying to figure this whole thing out.

You might be expecting and about to become a mum.

Maybe you’ve never been able to become a mum.

Maybe you’ve lost a child.

It’s heavy. Mother’s Day, am I right? It’s a challenge to full encapsulate all if this into one day.

This we know for sure; we wouldn’t be here without mothers. Everyone has one. Everyone needs one. They carry such a burden for their children.

Imagine, as a mother, not being able to feed your kids. Not having some shelter for them.

Having to tell them they need to leave school and work because you don’t have enough money to pay for their education.

But then someone gave you a loan. A small one. Just enough to grow a small business, maybe a small vegetable farm or a tailoring business.

The regular income you earn means you can feed your children consistent, nutritious meals, give them a warm bed with a roof over their heads and a proper education.

You even employ other mothers from your community, giving them an income too.

This is more than receiving money from some unknown person so that you can feed your children, which is disempowering.

It is an opportunity that allows you to take care of your own family. One that you can pay back so that someone else can receive the exact same opportunity. That’s empowerment.

An empowered mother takes care of her family. She makes sure that everyone has enough. She raises kids that are educated and have dreams of what they can achieve in their life. She raises kids that love their family, respect their culture, and give back to their community. She raises the next generation of world leaders.

Empowered mothers are our ticket out of this mess. (‘Mess’ being the issue of global poverty, but also pretty much every other issue we have as a world).

And it all starts with a donation.

Just $100 is enough to provide one small loan to a mother in need in Indonesia or India.

Empowered mothers create a better world.

Generosity is Not About You, But it’s About You

Published on by Kieran Johnson - The Generosity GuyLeave a comment

“Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is an organized conspiracy to oppress, rob and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe.”

– Frederick Douglass

It is generous to help those living in poverty, but not the way that you think.

Outside of the positive impact it creates in overcoming poverty (and the fact that it is the right thing to do), it’s generous to you.

But it’s more than how it makes you feel. It’s more than the health benefits, be they physical, emotional, psychological or spiritual (and it is all those things). It is about the world. Your world.

We are fortunate that there are so many benefits for us when we give. What makes it more extraordinary is that an act of generosity towards a just cause shifts the balance, one step at a time, from oppression towards freedom. It helps to remove the foot of injustice off the neck of those living in poverty, so that they can not only breathe but create a life that provides for their family and improves our world in the process.

We cannot be content with our progress and success at any level when there are those who are unable to meet their basic needs. Until we are able to fix that, ‘neither persons nor property will be safe’. If you want to overcome the problems we have in society, help lift those living in poverty out of that man-made cycle.

What do we do from here?

Make a stand for those suffering injustice. In whatever way that looks for you. Be it donating to an organisation that helps people work their way out of poverty, or finding your way to restore justice so that we can all be safe.

The Entrepreneurial Panic

Published on by Kieran Johnson - The Generosity GuyLeave a comment

If you have ever been overcome by the sheer weight of just trying to provide for your family, then you will understand it. The panic that comes when there is not enough to get you through. You can see the end of your financial runway and it is getting closer at a frightening speed.

Entrepreneurs feel this frequently. Many of us have felt it this year, even if we aren’t entrepreneurs, as the reality of financial insecurity hits and all of sudden we start to think of other ideas that could create some extra money. “What can we sell?”

There is a versatility that comes from this. A special ability to adapt and change as the world around you shifts.

I see this in the world’s poorest entrepreneurs. I have always said that if you can survive in a slum in Delhi, India, then you already have some incredible skills which give you an astute business mind. In fact, some of the savviest minds that I have come across are from small business owners in India and Indonesia. They have created something special, seemingly out of nothing, and are forging a path forward for their family – a path out of poverty and into a life that is not defined by trying to find their next meal, or to save enough money to buy medicine for their sick child.

If you place a global pandemic into the mix though, that is obviously going to create further challenges. And it has. The true impact will not be seen for a long time yet and it is so disheartening. But I am confident that these savvy minds will continue to find a way through, though they just need a small amount of help.

“How Can They Do That?”

Published on by Kieran Johnson - The Generosity GuyLeave a comment

It’s a question I have heard often over the last few weeks as we have seen people buying up big in preparation for the end of the world brought about by coronavirus. I must admit that it has been a bit confusing to watch people race for, and fill trolleys with, toilet paper and other inane items that 4 weeks ago were annoying necessities. What drives people to behave in such a way?

Apart from those that are purely taking advantage of this situation and profiteering (which I am choosing to assume is a very small percentage) people that are hoarding are doing so out of fear. Fear of the unknown. Fear of not having enough. Fear of scarcity. Fear of poverty. I can understand this fear. The word for 2020 so far is ‘unprecedented’. We have never experienced anything like this…in the developed world. (Millions of people go through upheavals of life regularly, but that is a conversation for another time). So, fear of not enough is understandable. But fear breeds more fear. Scarcity breeds scarcity. Scarcity subtracts.

To overcome the fear of hoarding requires acts of generosity. To look outside of our immediate needs and see those around us. Instead of acting as a single family unit we connect with those in our community and work as a larger entity. Together everyone achieves more (corny acrostic of T.E.A.M but has the added benefit of being true). When we act as a community, both locally and globally, it creates a generous mindset within us. Generosity comes from a hope that we can achieve things together that we are not capable of as individuals. Generosity breeds more generosity. Generosity multiplies.

When faced with the fear of scarcity, choose to act in generosity and it will have a positive, long lasting impact on our world.

Oh, That Hurt.

Published on by Kieran Johnson - The Generosity GuyLeave a comment

I recently hurt my back. You may have heard about it if you have seen me; it seems that I can talk about nothing else.

I didn’t do anything specific to cause the injury, just a combination of a newborn baby, lifting things and a minor history or back complaints. Every couple of years or so something like this happens, but this one was worse than normal. If you have ever experienced back pain, you will know what I am talking about because you use your back to do everything. I couldn’t put socks, shoes or pants on, I couldn’t sit in chairs, or find a comfortable way to stand and sneezing was a nightmare.

My effectiveness at work plummeted. If you can sit or stand, you can’t email, or plan, or meet or pretty much do anything that a job requires. But the worst thing was the threat of a sudden burst of pain at any given moment. It was all I could think about because one false move would conjure significant pain.

It gave me a glimpse of what it is like for someone who constantly lives with pain, where it permeates every area of your life, it wears you down and changes the way you think. It gets to a point where you cannot imagine life without pain, and it is terrifying. Things that were previously possible are no longer possible because of your pain. That is the cruel psychological effect that it has.

Not unlike the effect of poverty. I have often referred to the psychological effects that poverty has on people, because not having enough to feed your family becomes all that you think about, it permeates every area of your life. Things that were previously possible or may seem possible to someone on the outside looking in, are not possible because of poverty. You cannot imagine a life without it, and it is terrifying. Unless…

Unless someone does something to overcome it. Unless something changes.

Now, I can see a specialist and do my rehab exercises and work to improve my back. That’s up to me, no one else can do it for me.

Poverty doesn’t work the same way. It is a trap that no person can work their way out of by themselves. It requires someone to step in, make a donation and take what seems impossible and make it possible. That is what ending poverty looks like.

2 Selfish Reasons to Care about Developing Countries

Published on by Kieran Johnson - The Generosity GuyLeave a comment

Somewhere along the lines we decided that if we got something in return for being generous, then that wasn’t okay. For some reason it was thought that for an act to be a good thing to do then we should receive no benefit from it at all.

It’s an interesting thought and has led to hundreds of years of miserable generosity. So many people have been missing out experiencing the joy of giving purely because they thought it was wrong. There is a danger though. A danger of only doing a good thing for a completely selfish reason without concern for others at all. I think we can all admit that that behaviour feels wrong and we should probably avoid it.

In saying that, I consider some things too important to care about whether people are doing it for the right reason. Like ending poverty for example. Australia lives in amongst some of the poorest countries, they are our neighbours. Why should we care?

Well, here are two selfish reasons from Bill Gates:

  1. For Our Safety

It is to our benefit to see developing countries improve their income which improves education. Education equals stability, and less reason for radical idealisation and terrorism.

Also, and this is a big one, if we can overcome poverty in developing countries this will lead to improved healthcare and less disease because they will be able to diagnose and treat diseases more effectively (did someone say Coronavirus?). If we can equip all countries with the best medical care, it will literally save our lives down the track.

2. For Our Prosperity

This should be a no-brainer for us, living in a capitalist society and all. If we have more countries overcoming poverty, creating extra income, then all of a sudden we have hundreds of millions of new potential customers for our products. In short, history shows us that a richer Japan equals a richer world. What about a richer Indonesia, or India, or Pakistan? We are leaving money on the table.

There are other non-selfish reasons as well, but surely these two are pretty significant by themselves.

Foreign Aid Makes Australia Safe

Published on by Kieran Johnson - The Generosity GuyLeave a comment

The Australian Federal Government says that helping our neighbouring countries transition people out of poverty “will be important for Australia’s economy and security.”

Giving money for the purpose of aid, development and education is not just a nice thing to do, it’s not just about creating more customers who are able to buy more of our exports, but it makes the world a safer place.

We know that when there is a higher proportion of people living in poverty in developing countries, who have little to no opportunities to improve their lives, the region will become unstable, and young people will become “prone to radicalisation, and susceptible to the influence of countries and ideas at odds with Australia’s interests”.

So we must act, because if we don’t “create opportunities for people to lift themselves out of grinding poverty, instability will grow and people will continue to seek refuge from violence and economic hardship on our shores.”

It sounds blunt, and it’s not the only reason why Foreign Aid is important, but if we want to stop the rise of radicalisation, violence and refugees seeking asylum, giving aid to the countries around us will do that. In fact, we should be giving more.