This afternoon I attended a session on tolerance. A tough subject, especially when it was aimed toward individuals who volunteer for hospice. I volunteer for this wonderful program. I started in 1994 and worked for a few years. Eventually, I became a volunteer for hospice and have loved the experience.
Sometimes the adjectives tolerance, diversity, acceptance are thrown around a conversation. Well, today all three were the main topic and caused some emotions to fly. Most of the volunteers in the room look like seniors (you know, 60 years and up) so they had their opinions on the topic. I found it interesting that half the group believed they were making the right decisions and the other half thought, "does it matter who's right or wrong?" The point was, we are there as a volunteer to assist the person who is dying and not place judgment or attempt to sway the hospice patient toward our values or opinions. This was a difficult subject for the speaker to convey and caused some nerves to unravel. Although, at the end we all agreed on one thing: hospice is a choice and we chose to be there in the time of need.
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Your volunteering for such an important cause is admirable. VERY admirable. And you are wonderful when it comes to helping people. The etymology, or origin, of tolerate comes from a latin word that means "to suffer". So when we tolerate people, what we really mean, is that we suffer through whatever situation we are in with that person. Go figure...
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