Tommy Wilson: No one has been made poor by giving

What have you done to have an attitude of gratitude this year asks Tommy Wilson. Photo / NZME

OPINION

Sometimes we need a wake-up call to recalibrate our lives and for me it came last week when I went with Scotty, my social worker, to visit some of the 180 of our whānau sleeping in their cars.

When you look into the sad eyes of a frightened child, sleeping in the back of a car - with their equally frightened mum, who can’t go home because all that is waiting there is the bash, the bash for no other reason than she can’t put a kai on the table because the money for the kai has been spent on meth - you look at yourself for answers.

That’s when I had to look at my own attitude of gratitude. What have I given and could I give more?

Yes, there is no question we live in crazy times and have done ever since the bat and the cat bumped into each other in a Wuhan wet market.

And now that summer hasn’t shown up, there is a sense of the unknown shrouded in a long dark cloud of uncertainty up and down Aotearoa.

So, what have I learned in troubled times when one’s wairua (spirit) has gone a little wonky? For me, it is sanity from the sadness that comes from giving to those who have little or nothing. I guess it’s all about having an attitude of gratitude and in my experience thus far on this crazy planet we call home no one has been made poor by giving.

Last Friday a bus load of our Te Tuinga “Awhi Angels” headed out to a Maketu marae and wharekura (school) to celebrate Christmas with the kids and by doing what Jesus would do, not in the church pew but out in the community, breaking bread with those who matter most when it comes to sharing the love.

To our own trusts and “flush” whānau please ask yourselves “what have you given back to your own who are looking at spending their Christmas in a car?”

When we look through the lenses of kindness toward the 200 whānau and families under our care today the proportion of iwi-based organisations helping us can only be described, in my view, as miserable. We have had more kindness to our homeless from a predominantly Pākehā golf club.

The same can be said of some community trusts that, in my view, seem to have a sense of it is their own money and if we jump through their hoops, we will be recipients of their hard-earned putea, when in fact it is the community the funds belong to.

My question to all these trusts and the gatekeepers of them is “what have you personally put in from your own pockets to help the pohara of Tauranga Moana?”

No one has been made poor by giving.

To all of you who have helped us help others, may your Christmas kai taste sweeter than tupelo honey, and your dreams and aspirations for 2023 be sent out into the universe wrapped in a korowai of kindness - with an attitude of gratitude.

What can we do? You may well ask. Whangai is my answer. If we had 180 kind whānau prepared to whangai a homeless family, then we could end this situation where people are having to sleep in their cars.

Money will not take care of our homeless, but the community can. Not the police, the hospital, or the government - central or local. It doesn’t matter what political potae you wear. It is the community that has the capacity to show what an attitude of gratitude can do.

Perhaps this could be a New Year’s resolution for you. To have an attitude of gratitude and give your time to a family who fears a future where they are sleeping in their car.

Hold their hand and help them help themselves.

It doesn’t take much more than your time.

What’s their Christmas looking like and who is caring about them? Obviously not many – if any.

How are your attitudes of gratitude whānau?

What has happened to our korowai of kindness?

The answer to all the challenges we face at Te Tuinga, where we get to celebrate the beauty of the broken when they are put back together, is having an attitude of gratitude.

This is how we fix up families and communities, whānau, we whangai them, one family at a time.

Bon Joyeux

Tihei Mauriora

Ko Tahi Aroha

Tommy Wilson is a best-selling author and executive director of Te Tuinga Whānau, a social service agency committed to serving the needs of the community.