I came across this website this morning and thought I would share it: http://www.servicespace.org/about/ 

I have only had time to have a little look around the site so far, so I can’t say I fully understand every aspect of what they are doing, but on the surface there seems to be a number of similarities to Give Freely Receive Freely, and a number of differences too.

Similarities are that things are given freely, and there is an emphasis on personal change through this process.  Differences are that these seem to be collectively organised projects with an emphasis on just the giving side of the equation without attention to the receiving side.  This is reflected in their previous name ‘CharityFocus’.  the projects seem to be run by ‘volunteers’  ie, their involvement in the projects is a special act of service – not how they earn their living.

I think my interest is more in finding out if we can integrate these principles of giving and receiving so fully into our lives that this is how we earn our living, these acts not being something special that we do with part of our time, but the way we live our entire lives.

Differences aside, it is interesting to see other people working with these types of ideas and finding their own way to live in a more compassionate way.  I guess the differences also spark a desire in me to write some more of the blog posts I have been thinking about but haven’t quite got to writing yet to more fully explain aspects of Give Freely Receive Freely.  These include topics such as what is charity really, and how do we integrate it into our lives, and the importance of balancing the give and receive sides of the equation.

Servicespace also have an ‘inspiration’ page with stories of kindness and good news.  This is similar to another idea that I had awhile ago of having a website dedicated entirely to good news, so its nice to see they have started something along those lines.