One snowy day, in the high school library where I taught, I researched children’s charities on the Internet for the very first time. I read every word on UNICEF, Save The Children, and a few other websites.

Though I had donated to children’s charities regularly and read the literature they mailed, I could not believe what I was seeing. My insular life had kept me separate…separate from all of this suffering now before my eyes in one review. As I perused the websites, I was stunned.

I was also simultaneously moved by a calling to help humanity’s children on a larger scale than the public school teaching job I was in. In the moment as I sat there on that snowy Winter day, I knew I would be resigning from teaching one day even though it was a career I loved.

Teddy's hometown of Brownsville, PA.

I grew up in Pennsylvania near the West Virginia border, where I witnessed poverty. My family was not poor, but we were not rich by any means.

We lived a life of “just gettin’ by” like so many families in the area. The area where I grew-up is now devastated by rural and small town blight.

Teddy's Grandfathers were both coal miners.

Both of my grandfathers were immigrant coal miners who gave their lives to manual labor. My father was a high school shop teacher who had to work in a machine shop on nights and weekends to care for us. While with four children, my mother worked her way up in the postal service hoisting boxes and sorting mail, working weekends as well.

Watching my parents’ unwavering devotion to bettering the lives of us children instilled in me a deep respect for people who struggle to fight against a systemic cycle of poverty.

Aside of knowing how hard families have to work to avoid living in poverty, I have also seen how poverty affects people --- how it hinders educational growth and child development, how it stifles cultural opportunities that can open a young mind to see a world full of abundance, and how it depresses people and closes their minds to even the potential thought of human possibility.

Not to mention the shame side of poverty, for poor parents who feel quietly embarrassed that they cannot care better or give more to their own children. Plus the shame of being a poor child – from being teased or shunned, to being taught false beliefs that make a child feel unworthy or simply not good enough.

As a middle school reading teacher and a private tutor, I also experienced closely how poverty affects child development. The vast majority of my private students, who were deficient in reading, lived in economically disadvantaged home situations lacking the resources or parental support a learning child needs. As a teacher, I realized fully how education can be extremely powerful in ending the cycles of poverty.

So, I left teaching and committed to building a giveback business in LoveHumanity.com. I started by creating t-shirt designs, with two goals in mind – inspiring greater compassion and raising funds to help children living in poverty.

Love, togetherness, and human possibility were my muses. They still are.

Though others have made much progress, there is much more to do. There are so many causes I want to help, so many children still suffering and so many people still in dire need.

My stance is not to always “just aid” the poor, but “to empower” them too. As a company, empowering others will always be a fundamental defining aspect of our giveback mission and the charities we align with.

Two lovers of humanity just being goofy!

I believe children hold the key to humanity’s future. Our children we now nurture are the future generations of humanity’s caretakers.

In reasonable ways, all I want to do is change the world. I want to make it more compassionate. I want to make it more loving.

Let’s do this together. Let’s make humanity more loving…together!

 

Remember... "Love Begins with You!℠"