The Most Wonderful Time of the Year: Giving Tuesday

Tomorrow's the day: you'll get emails all day long from every charity you've ever donated to or signed up for emails from, probably including a few that you forgot you ever connected to. (Unsubscribe if you want, but please think twice before reporting them for spam. Just because you don't remember signing up doesn't mean you didn't, nor is being tired of the email blasts a good reason to overreact. Nonprofit orgs are a lot more likely to be hurt by an email spam report than a nationwide chain store is, so please don't.) (Unless the org you're reporting for spam has done other terrible things, in which case: report away.)

I love Giving Tuesday. Love it. Ever since the first one back in 2012, it's one of my favorite days of the year. It's a day that I look forward to and strive to extract every drop of joy from. Obviously, this is related to me working for three nonprofits--it's fun to do our outreach on the day, connect with donors on social media, get donations that we can put to immediate good use--there's nothing not to love about this day from the point of view of a communications person at a nonprofit. Even the work leading up to it is fun work (although I will say I'm exhausted from the past few weeks and dancing on the very edge of burnout, so it's possible I went a bit overboard this year).

I also enjoy seeing what other orgs are doing for Giving Tuesday. Every sigh of "Oh, I wish I'd thought of that!" is an opportunity to learn from others. The nonprofit sector is huge, lots of groups are doing the hard work of making the world a better place, and to take a stroll through the Giving Tuesday hashtag on any network is to be inspired.

And for all that, it's also great for me as a person who donates to nonprofit organizations. I start the day with a dollar amount and usually one or two charities in mind, then I wait to see what happens. Who has a compelling ask? What group have I never heard of that suddenly gets shared into my Instagram feed? Who's been in the back of my mind, but so far back that they were all but forgotten, who might spring into the forefront of my brain today? I love finding new-to-me groups to donate to on Giving Tuesday, and every year, I've gotten to the end of the money I'd planned to donate that day and thought, "Maybe just one more." It's my personal biggest giving day of the year. and it's a delightful way to discover other nonprofits.

Maybe you don't feel the same way about Giving Tuesday. Frankly, it's hard to imagine anyone who's not in the nonprofit sector having this same level of passion for a day of giving, although I'm sure such folks exist. Maybe you like to give in other ways, or maybe the spark just hasn't caught yet for you. Maybe you're cranky about your inbox filling to the brim after you've only just emptied out all the Black Friday and Cyber Monday blasts.

But maybe you're ready to wake up tomorrow looking for ways to make the world a better place, and if so, I invite you to join me on the Giving Tuesday hashtag on the social network of your choice. Tweet me and tell me about what org you've found that I shouldn't overlook before the clock strikes midnight on Wednesday!

Thanks for stopping by Cheekyness! I hope this blog can be a calm/fun/bright space in your day. If you like what you see here, find me on Twitter for more random nonsense, or follow me on Instagram to see what a terrible photographer I am. If you have thoughts, too, share them in the comment box below, but please note that I ignore and remove spammers, jerks, and trolls without remorse.