5 Heart-Centered Holiday Activities.
We believe in the power of an individual to influence their own life - and the lives of people around them. This can look like protest, politics, and social transformation, but it can also look like celebration.
At The Hunger Project we have 10 principles that guide our work to end hunger. We challenge ourselves to ensure that each of our innovative strategies builds on these principles. In preparation for this holiday season, we challenge you to consider which of these principles can guide your holidays. We have some ideas to get you started below!
1. Human Dignity.
We believe in a world where every woman, man, and child leads a healthy, fulfilling life of self-reliance and dignity. One of the simplest ways to ensure we can achieve this goal, is simply by asking people about their vision for their life, their family, and their community. This holiday season, ask about someone’s lived experience and be curious before anything else! If you can find a way to do an act of kindness for them - that’s amazing. But above all else, listen.
The Principle Explained: All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights, including the right to food, health, work and education. The inherent nature of every person is creative, resourceful, self-reliant, responsible and productive. We must not treat people living in conditions of hunger as beneficiaries, which can crush dignity, but rather as the key resource for ending hunger.
2. Interconnectedness.
We believe in working together and in community. This holiday season, we are featured alongside 23 other Canadian projects and non-profits in the 24 Good Deeds Advent Calendar. With a purchase of a calendar, you can contribute to 24 great causes, and countdown the holiday season with your values at the forefront.
The Principle Explained: Our actions are shaped by, and affect, all other people and our natural environment. Hunger and poverty are not problems of one country or another, but are global issues. We must solve them not as “donors and recipients” but as global citizens, working as coequal partners in a common front to end hunger.
3. Gender Equality.
Spend time reading stories of powerful women from across our Program Countries. There’s Ndeye’s story of personal and economic transformation, there’s Anju’s story of catalyzing her community during COVID-19 or Victoria’s story of achieving gender equality in her personal life.
Want to create gender parity in your own household? Emotional labour is a big part of the holiday season - planning meals and travel, creating shopping lists, generating gift ideas, and organizing Secret Santa gift exchanges for the office. Ask a female family member if there’s a task you can take on during the holiday season to lighten their load.
The Principle Explained: An essential part of ending hunger must be to cause society-wide change towards gender equality. Women bear the major responsibility for meeting basic needs, yet are systematically denied the resources, freedom of action and voice in decision-making to fulfill that responsibility.
4. Leverage.
Get started on your new years’ resolutions early this year. Take December to assess if your year has been aligned with your values, if there’s any areas where you can improve, or any areas where you can have a larger impact. Alternatively, commit to reading a resource that focuses on systemic changes we need to make - such as The Epicenter Strategy Toolkit or New Horizons for Community Led Development.
The Principle Explained: Ending chronic hunger requires action that catalyzes large-scale systemic change. We must regularly step back — assess our impact within the evolving social/political/economic environment — and launch the highest leverage actions we can to meet this challenge.
5. Sustainability.
Find a way to make your holidays more sustainable. For example, if you love to give gifts, find wrapping materials that have low or no impact on the environment - recyclable wrapping paper or furoshiki gift wraps are both environmentally friendly ways to wrap presents. Consider buying local or purchasing only from sustainable companies for your gift giving, too. With your friends and family, go through your favourite holiday traditions and brainstorm ways to make them more sustainable.
The Principle Explained: Solutions to ending hunger must be sustainable locally, socially, economically and environmentally.
The holidays are a time of gathering, community, connection, gratitude, and generosity - and ensuring they are aligned with your values means you really have something to celebrate. Which principle are you going to bring into your holiday season?
