ReStore the Giving

Make your Home a Castle of Giving:

If you're anything like me, this is the time of year when I start thinking about how much STUFF I have and how I don't want anymore STUFF to clutter up my home.  As The Fly Lady, Marla Ciley  says, clutter steals happiness, and who wants their happiness stolen? Not me! 

As I go through household goods, building materials, hardware, etc, its sometimes difficult to know what to do with all that?  Garage Sales are fine for many, but they feel like alot of work with not alot of reward for me. I prefer to donate. Now, what if I could make my home a virtual CASTLE of giving? Well, guess what? I can! And so can you.

And the best part, is, you can do it by either donating items no longer needed, OR purchasing items you find yourself in need of. That means if you're not in the position to donate, but still want to help, and have some home projects to complete Habitat for Humanity's ReStore has the perfect opportunity for you to make generous living a literal part of your home life. How? 

Items are brought TO ReStores, then they are bought FROM ReStores, generating much needed money for Habitat for Humanity building projects! Need more information?  Check out this two minute video from Habitat for Humanity's ReStore official site where you can read about how ReStores work, what they raise money for, and where your nearest ReStore is located.

Tax Deductible Contributions to 501(c)3 organizations

Tax Deductible Contributions to 501(c)3 organizations

 the season for making gifts to charity and you may have some questions about what makes your gift tax deductible. First, the disclosures: The Generous Giant is not a financial advisor, and cannot give any tax advice. Please see your financial advisor to determine what deductions you may or may not be able to take.

Even though I can't give tax advice, I can point you to some widely available information regarding charitable giving. Two frequently asked questions are "what is a 501(c)3 charitable organization?" and "How do I know if my donation is tax deductible?" We found the best answers to these questions on the official website of the Internal Revenue Service: IRS.gov and 501(c)3.0rg

What is a 501(c)3 organization? A 501(c)3 can represent a wide variety of entities each of whom maintain their existence according to a stated mission.  Those missions can also range widely. In short: " an entity must be organized and operated exclusively for religious, charitable, scientific, testing for public safety, literary, or educational purposes, or to foster national or international amateur sports competition, or for the prevention of cruelty to children or animals."

And what makes a contribution to one of these types of entities tax deductible? Again, you'll need to check with your financial advisor on your own deductions, but here are some rules the IRS made available to you with a simple search of the IRS.gov website (this according to the latest update made September 12, 2012):  To be deductible, charitable contributions must be made to qualified organizations. Payments to individuals are never deductible. SeePublication 526, Charitable Contributions.

There are some limits on how your contribution might be deducted, for example, if you receive something in exchange for your contribution, your total contribution may not be deductible. Your tax advisor will have the best answer for you, but here's the general rule: If your contribution entitles you to merchandise, goods, or services, including admission to a charity ball, banquet, theatrical performance, or sporting event, you can deduct only the amount that exceeds the fair market value of the benefit received..

There are some additional things you'll want to keep in mind. Keep a record of your monetary and non-monetary contributions, and be prepared to fill out some special forms to include with your itemized deductions. 

All in all, deducting charitable contributions is not difficult, but there are some hard and fast rules that your financial advisor can help you navigate. 

Charitable giving outpaces economic growth

Wow! We certainly live in a time when one might expect charitable giving to be down, but according to this article on AdvisorOne, not only is giving not down, but gifts are outpacing economic growth!

According to author Micheal S. Fisher (heavily citing the Atlas of Giving), this year's expected giving of nearly $360 billion dollars outpaces last year's giving by nearly $38 billion dollars.  And so where is this money coming from? It may or may not surprise you that 75% of donated dollars are coming from individuals just like you and I.  Corporations will donate about 5%, with the remainder coming from foundations, bequests, and other similar giving tools.

Want to know more?
Check out the links below.

AdvisorOne
Atlas of Giving

Sunday Somethings

This week we have seen emotions swing with the pendulum of prospective change. Fear, anger, disappointment, elation, confidence, excitement.  Many of us have felt one or all of these sentiments as America chose its leader for the next four years.  While we here at Generous Giant don't aim to be political, we do aim to be aware of the events happening around us.  It is without judgement that we watch and listen and simply observe the goings on.  As many of our friends became distraught at the prospect of four more years of what they had viewed as failed leadership, we saw others come out to encourage and comfort.  One of the favorite reminders we saw was a quote attributed to James E. Faust that reminded us that our success as families, and our success as a society had more to do with how we lived in our families, than whom we voted for, or how that person chooses to lead.  As the quote gained in popularity throughout the week, it was great to observe this wonderful reminder being shared and shared again.  It was wonderful to see so many comforted to be reminded that success starts at home.  Last week's challenge (which sadly was deleted and is unrecoverable due to formatting changes made to our Generous Giant blog) for living in generosity was to observe the tone of your own internal conversations.  Was it fearful? Negative? Insulting? Or are you habitually a kind person, even unto yourself?  If you can answer that you are in fact habitually kind, we congratulate you! What a wonderful trait to possess. Have you always been this way? Or is it a learned habit? But if you found instead that your thoughts lingered in the realms of negativity, what did you notice about this habit? Were there specific activities or places that prompted this kind of internal discourse? I challenge you to observe the pattern, and then to prepare to change it.

Success does indeed begin in the home, and by my thoughts, success at home begins with love at home, and love is best given by one who knows love.  This is a journey my friends, and it has a beginning and a destination.  Will you join us on our journey to discover love in our hearts and spread it through our homes, into our communities, and over the world?

We hope you do.

For today, start the journey with a promise. A promise to love yourself more, by using kind words.

Sincerely,

~Gg.

Generosity is relative

Yesterday was somewhat of a milestone for Generous Giant, we finally were able to bring together Generous Giant and Chef Tess Bakeresse to open and begin expansion on Gg's Pantry.  This has been a long time coming, something Chef Stephanie Petersen whom I also call friend, and I have been discussing and preparing for, for nearly a year (maybe longer!) As wonderful as it was to finally put into place the Chef's fabulous spice line (seriously, your mouth will water just reading the descriptions) the best part of the day was spending time with a dear friend and sharing ideas and thoughts.

One of the topics that came up during our wonderful visit was the idea of relativity.  You know, wealth is relative. I think we all accept that as fact.  What is wealthy in one part of the world may be very small means in another. But Generosity is relative too.

I was once stuck in a place where I knew I wanted to be able to give to my community, but I had no financial resources with which to do so. I knew I had a generous heart, but I feared that my financial circumstances would not ever allow me to satisfy my desire to give. And then a good friend pointed out that serving others with a happy heart was generous. That preparing a meal for another in need out of my small means was generous, that offering forgiveness to someone I had felt wronged by was the very definition of generosity!

We each have within us the capacity for living generously.  It is not simply the giving of money, though money does further the ability of organizations to do the good work they are engaged in, it is the giving of one's heart.

This Holiday season, we are going to celebrate the Giving Heart.  We hope that those of you able to give monetary gifts will do so and that our non-profit partners will benefit from your giving. But we want all our friends to know that generosity is relative to your capacity to give, and sometimes all you  have to give is your heart...a gift more generous than any dollar amount.

Love,

Gg

What is generous living?

Living generously is a lifestyle, and anybody can live it.  Its about being kind. seeing the best in people, seeking to be a positive part of our community.  Its about philanthropy of the heart and mind, not just the wallet.