Empowering & Fulfilling

One of the things that I had promised myself that I would do more, once my little ones were a bit more independent, was to find ways to help out with my community and some charities. Being of service is an important part of life, it fulfills you, and empowers you. It's also a part of being a role model and growing as a leader. However, it's been hard to find the time, and too easy to keep your head down and be busy with jobs, responsibilities, families, and focused in solving our own problems. I've always made small monetary gifts to charities I support, based on whatever budget was available at the time, but felt like I wanted to do a bit more. I am taking baby steps towards fulfilling that promise, volunteering for small projects at the groups I belong in.

One project led me to get to know the Empower Nepali Girls Foundation. What a wonderful organization it is. ENG supports schooling for at-risk Nepalese girls, from rural villages, who have the biggest risk for being pulled out of school for work and helping the family to scrape together a living, or worse, being sold into domestic or sex slavery. ENG provides each girl $125 per year, which pays for tuition, uniform, school supplies, etc. and gives girls (and their families) guidance, counseling, emotional support. The goal is to change the culture to appreciate girls, and to educate future leaders, teachers, and doctors, i.e. empower women to rise above their circumstances to make a positive difference.

Of course, as a mother of three girls, who have the access to the best educational resources, as a career woman with an MBA degree, and as a person from a country where quality education is everyone's birth right, I can't think of a better cause to support. If you are interested in donating to ENG, please know that the foundation functions on a very tiny overhead, and almost all the work is being done by volunteers. This means that the donation actually goes to the girls, not to further fundraising efforts or supporting some huge bureaucracy. You can make donations via the Empower Nepali Girls web site. 

Empower Nepali Girls