The topic of openness and honesty is the most significant for the initial stage of volunteer service, when the future volunteer and the volunteer organization first get to know each other. I want to emphasize that the decision to join a volunteer organization is mutual, and each party has its own rights, duties and area of responsibility.

The most important thing when getting to know each other is a truthful mutual desire for mutual understanding, an attempt to find an area where the desire of the newcomer coincides with the need of the volunteer organization and in the end coincides with the request of the beneficiaries.

I talk more about this in a separate instructional post.

In the end, before the final decision to join a volunteer organization is made, a newcomer must become more deeply and honestly aware of his motivation, not the first one – emotional, but correlated with what he has learned and experienced; aware of areas of personal responsibility at least in relation to his family, friends, work (studies) – because now he will devote part of his free time and energy to service; aware of his personal, emotional, time, material and other resources.