Charlotte Darnell
Bio
Charlotte Darnell
https://www.centreforeffectivealtruism.org/community-health/team
Posts 4
Comments17
I don't have this fully worked out for myself yet, but here are some things I've been considering recently. They're not exactly novel but might be helpful nonetheless.
1) Not having runway/savings has been really quite stressful/ inconvenient at times. I think there is some amount that does just seem robustly good to have. I don't have a clear idea of exactly how much that is though. Maybe thinking through the specific scenarios that have either happened or I'm worried might happen may point me in the right direction of a figure.
2) I've really noticed the hedonic treadmill now that I (and my friends) earn a salary. I also expect the pressure to use money for things other than donating to only increase as I get older (more responsibilities, unexpected life events, social pressure etc.). By donating now, at the same time as I'm trying to build up savings, I feel like I'm locking it in as part of my identity and habits, rather than waiting and trusting a future me to donate, when in the future my goals might change.
3) For me at least, it doesn't feel like I'm only weighing up savings and donating, it feels more like I'm weighing up
- donating (you could say ~investing in my values)
- investing financially in my future (savings)
- investing in other ways in my future (eg. getting fit, eating well, going to therapy, taking care of important relationships, trying to have experiences that help me grow and learn).
3) There is a chance though that money is disproportionately more useful sooner for the 3rd category - eg. getting help for (mental) health issues before they get worse, acquiring skills you can then use for longer, being able to do experiments that help you make life decisions. However, the benefit of acting sooner likely applies to savings and donating too, so I'm not too sure how to weigh them up.
4) If you're waiting to donate while you build up savings, (or invest in other ways) I'd consider having a specific set goal/plan in advance. I have a (non-EA) friend to whom saving is really important. No matter how much he saves, though, it never feels 'enough' and he keeps moving his goalpost.
5) If I really sit with it, most of the things I think I need, I really don't, but giving them all up would likely make me very sad. On the margin, however, I absolutely could (and should by my values) give more. Elliot recently wrote "Do what you can. No more. No less". I personally need to do a big sit down and think hard about where the no more, no less, truly lands me.
I’m not super familiar with your work but I can imagine this is a great resource for lots of people, and I recognise that therapy or similar support can be really hard to access. I think it's was worth noting though, that I’ve really valued having my main therapy and some of my support be outside of EA.
I think this actually allows me to look more honestly at my feelings and feel more psychological safety when exploring them. I do think the shared context of EA can be really helpful (I do seek support from EA friends about things) - but just wanted to note that there are pros and cons, particularly if you’re aiming to work on “deeper seated issues” which is quite a vulnerable spot to be in.
For those considering this, it might be worth taking a minute to check in with yourself about if you’d benefit more from the shared context this provides, or you’d benefit more from being able to talk about your hard stuff with people who you’re much, much less likely to cross paths with professionally.
You've probably already considered this, but there are lots of vegan UK facebook groups who I think would be interested in this, with some quite active members who might be interested in volunteering. Is there a plan for sharing in those sort of places? I'd be happy to post in some but also don't know if you've got a more specific comms plan, or reasons you might not want that.
Thanks for writing this Alix. Something I hadn't been tracking much before this post was how events like EAGs and retreats might be especially tiring if you're doing lots of 1:1s in a different language. I remember being surprised by just how tired I got spending all day in a different language when I worked in France, and can't imagine how much that's multiplied when discussing complicated EA topics and ideas.
This sounds really cool! I'd love to hear about what you end up doing.
Minor thought - It might be worth changing the title of this post. I initially clicked on this expecting someone looking for career advice, I wasn't expecting someone generously offering so much of their time and expertise. I expect there might be a bunch of orgs or projects that don't click on it because they don't have specific career takes for others, but who would be interested or have ideas of other projects that could benefit from your help.