Journey’s End Refugee Services, Inc. is a Christian community-based refugee resettlement organization. Their mission is to welcome refugees without regard to ethnic origin or creed and to assist them to become healthy, independent, contributing members of the WNY community. Journey’s End offers an array of services on top of assistance with refugee resettlement including education services, employment services, immigration legal services, and interpreting services.
How did we get involved?
Immigration and refugees are such important topics in the US, but one of our ComputerPeople Staffing employees, Beth Courtney, was really inspired to help incoming refugees from her son.
Beth’s son and two friends spent the summer of their junior year at Notre Dame researching the refugee crisis in Europe. They spent two months visiting refugee camps and hearing the heartbreaking stories of brave families from war torn countries who were fleeing for their lives. He showed Beth hundreds of pictures of these families and shared their stories which inspired her to do something to help.
Beth found out about Journey’s End and suggested our company could help by volunteering with their Home Again Program. This program has groups of volunteers clean, furnish and set up an apartment or home for incoming refugee families. Journey’s End describes it this way, “Barren apartments are transformed into cozy homes for newly arrived refugee families. After long and arduous journeys to the United States, a warm and cozy apartment brings a sense of security to families that have lost and left so much.”
About Friday.
The CP Staffing divisions of ComputerPeople, FinancialPeople, and MedicalPeople spent two months working together to collect furniture, bedding, lamps, dishes, pots, pans, and everything else needed to furnish a home. On Friday, the staff from our Buffalo office went to work and scrubbed the house down, moved in, set up all of the furniture and household items, and decorated the house to make it feel like a home. This week, a refugee family from the Congo with four boys arrived and moved into the house for their new start in Buffalo. We are so grateful to have had the opportunity to work with Journey’s End and give this family a brand new start!
You can view video highlights from Friday’s home upgrade on the YouTube Video by FinancialPeople’s own Faith Drew
*Featured image: Delana Flowers (far right and front) during a performance in 2015*
I think that the greatest talent that humanity has is making excuses, and the greatest impediment to our goals is actually having these said excuses. However, a lot of us have been able to get around those impediments and work toward our goals anyway. Some of us have come to a place in our lives where we tell ourselves, “So, I can’t do this… but I’m going to do it anyway and see what happens.” Woody Allen once said “80% of success is showing up,” and I can’t think of a better example of this notion than our very own Delana Flowers, who starred as Lorrell in the musical, Dreamgirls, at Pittsburgh Musical Theater this past week.
Delana Flowers, our awesome admin at FinancialPeople Staffing in Pittsburgh, has an incredible preforming talent, and some pretty amazing pipes – the girl can sing! As we all began to talk about her show around the office, I asked Delana to tell me more about her performing side. As it turns out, most of Delana’s performing success all started with her decision to simply show up to things she didn’t even intend to take part in. As she went on to tell me her story, something she said immediately stood out to me:
“I moved to Pittsburgh where there was plenty of Community Theater. I got involved almost immediately, but totally by accident, after being dragged to a rehearsal supposedly to observe. From then on, God continued to open doors for me.”
Delana went to a rehearsal just to “observe,” and out of this no-biggie attendance to something she wasn’t even a part of, she began to be involved in the things she was passionate about. What’s interesting is how she stated that she was “dragged” to this rehearsal, so it doesn’t look like her heart was necessarily set on going to this – but she went anyway. So, what happened? Well, she showed up, which led to her being cast in Ain’t Misbehavin in 2008, she was cast as Dinah Washington in 2015 (a show with 25 plus songs she had to learn from scratch), she was cast in JH: Mechanics of a Legend, and, in Delana’s own words, she “did more community shows than I can count at this point.”
The story of attending that rehearsal alone demonstrates the power of showing up, but it doesn’t end there. To land her role as Lorrell in Dreamgirls, Delana had some more showing-up to do. Not only did she have to show up, but she had to do what most of us dread: wait (Ugh! – right?). This is what she had to say about her audition for Dreamgirls:
“I saw an ad for a regional theater holding auditions for Dreamgirls. I wasn’t going to go because I didn’t feel like I knew how to audition on a professional level. My leading man in John Henry pushed me to go. He told me I had nothing to lose. I was nervous, but I went. They called me back 3 times and a whole month went by before I heard anything. Meanwhile, my co-star who pushed me to go to the audition found out in a matter of days that he had been cast. Finally, the call came and rehearsals were to start a week later.”
I’m sure we can all empathize with Delana in one way or another, like being a nervous wreck before an interview, doubting yourself, waiting for that call afterwards to know whether or not you got the job – just to mention a few. Nevertheless, she hung in there, she showed up, and boy did it pay off! Of course, this is not to say that allyou need to do is just “be there,” Delana also talks about the hard work that came afterwards:
“I walked into a room full of actors and dancers… with musical theater degrees, music and/or dance degrees and classical training. I came with none of these things! We had a 3 week rehearsal process to put up this Broadway level show. If you added up the rehearsal hours which were typically 8 hours a day, it amounted to about a week and a half. It felt like boot camp! …This was my first professional show and my first show at one of the big theaters downtown. I was terrified and I had several meltdowns along the way.”
Finally, with heartwarming joy, Delana ended her story with this:
“I made wonderful new friends who refused to let me doubt myself. They worked tirelessly with me to learn everything I needed to learn. This was the hardest and biggest thing I have ever done. All I could do was keep showing up, keep working, and cry when overwhelmed. By the time we closed the show last Sunday, I couldn’t believe I had been part of such a spectacular show. It was an absolutely amazing experience I will never forget.”
Needless to say, working toward your goals will most definitely require hard work, but the hard work will never get started unless you start showing up – like Delana did. There will always be times in which the possibilities we dream of seem almost unattainable, where we will doubt ourselves, have meltdowns, and wonder if that small step will even be worth it. Well, Delana’s success story raises two very important questions that we should always keep in mind: How many doors could be opened for you, if you simply show up? How many doors will you continue to miss? Maybe you should just start showing up. 😉
In a society where we are sometimes embedded in putting ourselves first, where “me, myself, and I” are the greatest priority in our lives, we may fail to see where “I” fits within the community around us. When I see people so ready and proud to tell the world “I have to take care of myself first,” I can’t help but feel a slight sense of sadness. While I agree to an extent (you certainly can’t pour anything out of an empty cup; you should definitely take care of yourself in order to give), such a strong notion of always putting yourself first might take out a very important element that oftentimes comes with the word “give:” sacrifice. The very act of giving is sacrificial – whether that may be of your time, money, or interests. In order for a community to always flourish, there will be times in which “I” will need to stand for something other than “myself.”
“I” for “Include”
Although some of us may be introverts or “anti-social,” at some point in time we may enjoy the company of others (even if that means just one person in your life that you can stand to be around 🙂). By nature, we are relational creatures, and if there was no interaction within our communities then we wouldn’t have one! When you choose to give your time to help a cause or someone in need, you include those who need our interaction the most – you make then an important part of our society, even if their circumstances may lead them to feel hopeless. This might mean giving up that golf outing with your friends, or that weekend you had set aside for an awesome full-body massage – for your community that needs you! There are people out there that will thank you for including them in your busy schedule and letting them know that they matter.
“I” for “Impress”
As I briefly stated before, some of our people in need oftentimes feel hopeless. When we decide to give to our community in a sacrificial way, the love behind that very sacrifice impresses hope on those who need it most. You give them hope that there are people who care, hope that they are not alone, and hope that they will conquer whatever they are going through. Even if you’re volunteering for a cause that seems fairly generic on the surface, the “behind the scenes” of it all is always much greater. Additionally, a great thing about this impression of hope on others is that it’s reciprocal; you also become hopeful! Giving to your community and to those in need has the awesome effect of changing us for the better: we become more hopeful for our society, we become more empathetic, more motivated to be involved, and we become more loving; all great attributes that are needed in a great society.
“I” for “Inspire”
Did you know that giving is contagious? This is especially true when you are willing to sacrifice something of your own in order to do it. Sacrifice shows caring, it shows commitment, willingness, and it shows love. All of these things make those around you think to themselves: “I guess if he/she can do it, I can do it too.” The result: More people are inspired to contribute, bringing our society that much closer as a whole. When I think of inspiration in this sense, I like to think of my marriage. Do I always feel like loving my husband? No – sometimes he annoys the heck out of me. Nevertheless, it is during those times that I try my best to demonstrate my love for him anyway, even though I really might not want to (i.e. sacrificial love; purposeful love). What usually happens is that he’s inspired to love me back, and vice versa. Are we always perfect following this “sacrificial-loving” rule? No, but I notice that when we do, it always works out for the best; we never regret it. The take-away from this: the same way that marriage needs self-sacrifice in order to work in harmony, our society will also need our sacrifice in order to work in unity. Sacrificial giving inspires more giving! 🙂
“I” for “Improve”
It is no surprise that when we work together, we improve together. I’m drawn to think of the phrase “there’s no ‘I’ in team,” but this is my way of showing you otherwise 😉. Volunteering and giving are some of the great ways in which we work as a team and contribute towards the improvement of our society. We have to keep in mind that we are all in this together – I know, cliché, but very true! Think about your children (if you have them), and the example that you set for them (or anyone who looks up to you); by sacrificing part of yourself for the benefit of others, you’re teaching them that it is not always about “me.” And, of course, what comes out of this teaching is a future society of self-giving citizens, willing to help each other when needed, deviating any sense of entitlement and selfishness that may otherwise form (are you with me yet?). In other words, children are our future, and we are the guide they need for the purpose of improving our world – I am rocking it with the clichés, aren’t I?
“I” for “Interconnect”
The very last “I” in “Sacrificial Giving” is for interconnection. Everything that I’ve touched on in this piece shows the many ways in which we are all interconnected with each other. I truly don’t mean to sound all gushy, although I think I’ve outdone myself here (I blame it on the entire goopy, Valentine’s Day atmosphere), but it is so important to not forget this essential fact. The truth is that we need each other; we need each other for strength, encouragement, success, and our overall well-being. The minute we forget this truth and begin to drift into the “I come first” state of mind, that’s the moment we begin to lose sight of what we need: connection. This being said, by all means make sure that you take care of yourself (and do put your family first), but when you can, try to “care for yourself” also as a means of preparation for giving your help to those who need you. You’ll be surprised how much greater it is to give than to receive; you will not regret making a difference every now and again. 🙂
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