Meaningful contribution to society even in retirement

68-year-old Ms Evelyn Tan’s first brush with volunteerism begun in early 2017. After retirement, she had attended an Active Ageing exhibition held by the Council for Third Age (C3A) and got to know of RSVP Singapore and their volunteering activities. At that time, she made a note but was not yet keen to take up volunteering.

 

However, she changed her mind after being at the forefront of a challenging yet meaningful experience. Being a caregiver to her eldest sister with dementia, her experience and learnings has motivated and prepared her heart and mind to volunteer.

 

Cultivating her ‘inner garden’ through volunteering

 

It has been 3 and a half years since Ms Tan placed that fateful call to RSVP Singapore to sign up as a volunteer. She is now an active volunteer in the Episodic Volunteering Programme, supported by Council for Third Age (C3A). She is involved in different activities that have ranged from distributing food to low-income families, walks with seniors, and even handicrafts.

 

More recently, Ms Tan is also a regular volunteer in HCSA Community Services (HCSA) food gardening initiative, part of the ‘Giving a Future and a Hope’ volunteer programme, also supported by C3A.

 

“Being told to retire 6 years ago came as a shock for me, as I had been working since 18. I was not ready to stop and didn’t take it very well,” Mdm Tan recalled. She was glad that she has found volunteerism in retirement, as it keeps her occupied and instils calmness into her life.

 

Flourishing by serving others

 

An avid nature lover, Ms Tan shares that gardening has a special place in her heart as it brings back fond memories of her younger days. Despite being a greenhorn, she was undaunted in her pursuit. With much diligence and effort, she “eventually got to see (her) flowers blooming everyday”. Armed with more experience today, she now volunteers to tend to food gardens like the one in HCSA.

 

In caring for the food garden, both residents and volunteers, including Ms Tan, enjoy a therapeutic experience and pick up useful skills that may benefit their communities. Through social interaction between volunteers and beneficiaries from diverse walks of life, it can be a potential catalyst to inspire the individual’s self-improvement and improve their own physical and mental well-being.  

 

A similar thread that underpins the “why” of volunteering among many volunteers is the desire to “give back to society”. Ms Tan echoes this sentiment, explaining “when beneficiaries “feel happy with (our) companionship, we as volunteers also gain in intangible ways – for example, our social networks are wider.” She intends to continue volunteering well into retirement and as long as she can.

 

**If you would like to be a volunteer like Ms Evelyn Tan to help others, check out the various volunteering opportunities available here.

 

Source: HCSA Community Services. Reproduced with permission.