People measure success in many different ways and on many different levels. When setting goals in life, it’s important that we identify what success means to us personally, so that when we succeed we will know it. For example, most people measure success in business according to how much money they make; however this may not be an accurate assessment. If your job provides a substantial monetary reward but you don’t enjoy what you do, can this really be called success?
At South Coast, we have been fortunate to work with some very good estate attorneys, but not even they have been able to figure out how to let our clients take their assets with them once they go. So can net worth define success when eventually we have to give it all back? Defining and measuring success is going to be different for everyone. At South Coast, once of the ways we measure success is by being in a position to help those in need. By that definition, we have some very successful clients who have turned us on to some very noble causes. In this month’s newsletter, we thought we would share two causes that are very close to our hearts, No Kid Hungry and Operations Smile.
Did you know that one in five children can’t count on having enough to eat? And I am not talking about children around the world, I am talking about here in the United States.
HUNGRY CHILDREN CANNOT THRIVE. YET MILLIONS OF KIDS IN AMERICA ARE AT RISK OF GOING HUNGRY. SHARE OUR STRENGTH IS CHANGING THAT.
Every parent knows that a hungry child is a disadvantaged child. He can’t grow, develop and learn like other kids. She has trouble focusing and getting along. They complain often of headaches, stomachaches and other ailments. They fall behind in virtually every way. It doesn’t have to be this way. There is plenty of nutritious food in America to make sure every child grows up healthy and thrives. What’s missing is access to this food. If families don’t have reliable access to healthy, affordable food, they can’t possibly feed their children well.
Share Our Strength’s No Kid Hungry® strategy provides that access to families all across the nation, so that every child, regardless of circumstances, can get the healthy food they need to thrive.
FOOD-FOCUSED FUNDRAISERS ENGAGE AND RAISE MILLIONS
Food events are the cornerstone of Share Our Strength’s fundraising efforts. Each year, they engage millions of people across America in Share Our Strength’s solution to childhood hunger. All of them – Share Our Strength’s Taste of the Nation, Great American Bake Sale, Dine Out for No Kid Hungry (formerly Great American Dine Out), A Tasteful Pursuit and a growing collection of localized dinners and festivals – raise funds to support Share Our Strength’s No Kid Hungry Campaign to end childhood hunger in America by 2015. Make a difference this year and join the South Coast Team along with over 128,000 others who have taken the pledge to end childhood hunger in America by 2015.
PLEDGE WITH US
I believe that no child in America should go hungry. By pledging today, I add my voice to the national movement of people committed to ending childhood hunger in America by 2015.
128,643 Have already taken the pledge…CLICK HERE to join us.
Operation Smile is an international children’s medical charity that heals children’s smiles, forever changing their lives.
As a children’s charity, they measure themselves by the joy seen on all of the faces they help, literally. At Operation Smile, they really are more than just a charity. More than an NGO, they’re a mobilized force of medical professionals and caring hearts who provide safe, effective reconstructive surgery for children born with facial deformities such as cleft lip and cleft palate. Operation Smile sends doctors to other countries to perform these operations.
For each mission, Operation Smile verifies the credentials and organizes the participation and travel arrangements for a team of volunteers. The team typically includes a mission site coordinator, plastic surgeons, anesthesiologists, a pediatrician, an intensive care physician, head or coordinating nurse, pre- and post-op nurses, child development specialists, speech pathologists, dentists and/or orthodontists.
Every three minutes a child is born with a cleft — often unable to eat, speak, socialize or smile. In some places these children are shunned and rejected. And in too many cases, their parents can’t afford to give them the surgeries they need to live a normal life. That’s where Operation Smile comes in as an international charity providing much needed surgical services. Since 1982, Operation Smile — through the help of dedicated medical volunteers — has provided more than 2 million patient evaluations and over 200,000 free surgeries for children and young adults born with cleft lips, cleft palates and other facial deformities.
PRESENT IN OVER 60 COUNTRIES
As one of the most prominent children’s charities in the world and with a presence in over 60 countries, they are able to heal children’s smiles and bring hope for a better future. Every child deserves the ability to smile and a chance to thrive. But in many parts of the world, children with cleft lip and cleft palate are hidden away, too embarrassed to attend school and face uncertain futures because their parents cannot afford to provide the surgery they need.
LIFE CHANGING SURGERY THAT CAN TAKE AS LITTLE AS 45 MINUTES
Operation Smile’s free, life-changing surgeries take as little as 45 minutes, and can give a boy or girl with a facial deformity a lifetime of smiles. Plus, every child they heal creates a ripple effect on the child’s family, community and country. After surgery, the child can become a more productive member of society and enrich their community. And when they leave a country, they leave behind a legacy of education, training and equipment building a self-sufficient global health network focused on continuing the mission and transforming lives.
We hope you’ll join the South Coast Team with your support for such a wonderful organization.
-Posted by Chris