Charity is Work, Work is charity

From http://e450.upside.com/texis/mvm/opinion/story?id=3708e5e80:

"Twenty years ago, Gerald Chamales was homeless and unemployable, stumbling around Los Angeles' Venice Beach in a drug- and alcohol-induced fog. Today, at 47, he's the president and CEO of Omni Computer Products, a $30 million computer parts enterprise in Carson, Calif., just outside Los Angeles.

That he crawled out of hell is a testament to his sheer willpower and entrepreneurial vision. But even more remarkable is how he uses his business to pull others out of despair. A third of his 304 employees are former homeless people, felons and drug addicts--most of whom credit their second chance at life to Chamales. Along the way, the company has grown an average of 20 percent a year and expects to hit $30 million in net sales in 1999, proving that good will and fiscal success are not mutually exclusive."

People often tend to associate goodwill as a part-time activity. We do all our routine activities and then from whatever time we have left, we try to do some charity work. As a householder with responsibilities, work is an essential part of life but it doesn't have to be segregated from our charitable work. Like Gerald Chamales, we can also seek creative ways to help others and increase the compassion in our everyday routine, for charity isn't a part-time activity, it is a way of life.