Tuesday, November 17, 2015

Lin Zhou shares her skills as a Volunteer Income Tax Assistant


Currency of the Heart as expressed in the volunteer activity of an international graduate student from China who helped our CT senior population file their income tax returns.

Lin Zhou, born in China, educated in China and the US, has recently joined KPMG LLP, in the Stamford as a Tax Associate. After her graduation from Fairfield University with an MS in Accounting, she volunteered with Women's Perspective as Social Media Coordinator. She will continue in this capacity, hopefully for a long time.  Lin has a helping habit, a generous heart and a cheerful spirit.  She wrote the piece below describing her volunteer job as income tax preparer for seniors in Bridgeport.


My VITA (Volunteer Income Tax Assistance) Experience

VITA is an IRS-sponsored program operated by local volunteers to provide free, confidential, and secure preparation and filing of Federal and State income taxes for taxpayers who qualify.

My story with VITA started in my senior year at college. It was also the second year after I transferred to the U.S. Hoping to have a better understanding of individual tax and wanting to be involved in some volunteer work, I signed up for the VITA program.

My job as a volunteer included greeting clients, helping them file their tax returns, reviewing tax returns prepared by other volunteers, and explaining finalized numbers to the clients. The volunteer experience changes with each VITA site as the target client group varies. I worked at two sites: one had a lot of senior clients and some low income families; the other site was mainly for international clients including international students, scholars, and immigrants. It was interesting to work with people from different backgrounds. I met all kinds of people. For example, some people are talkative. They shared their stories with me.

Some people are quiet. They came to me and just answered the questions I asked, without saying one more word. Although I majored in accounting and had good grades, I was confused about the tax system because I was from a country with a totally different system.  The VITA experience helped me gain real life tax experience. There were many Aha moments, when I assisted my clients with their tax returns. It was very exciting when those Aha moments happened.  The feeling was just like that after conceptual trainings, when a student driver starts and drives a car by himself/herself.

The most valuable aspect of the volunteer work is that I can make a difference for people with my knowledge. There was a time when a lady who came to me with her tax return, was very surprised with the results.

After having calculated and finalized all the numbers I told her she could get couple of dollars refund from IRS. She stared at me for seconds and started to weep. I thought she expected more refunds like many other clients, which happened all the time. Because people always want more money back. I explained to her that the numbers were finalized, so there should be no errors. But I’m happy to go through the tax return again with her. She stopped crying and explained that her own business bankrupted that year and she thought that she still needed to pay hundreds of dollars as in previous years. She said, "I am too happy to cry."

In my past two-year VITA experience, I met many people like her. I did not know what happened in
their life, but I did know that they needed my help. So, after I moved from Colorado to Connecticut to pursue my Master’s degree, I contacted the VITA site coordinator here and continued to volunteer again this year.

Rosemary Williams launched Currency of the Heart to inspire readers to “pay it forward” from the heart’s most precious currency. We’d love to hear from you! To share your story or to request permission to republish this blog post, please email rosemary@womensperspective.org.



Monday, June 15, 2015

'In my dream, the angel shrugged and said, if we faii this time, it will be a failure of the imagination and then she placed the world in my hands.'

- “Imagining World” by Brian Andreas

Hello Everyone,

This blog is about entry points. Where and when does currency of the heart energy enter our world? In the video below, Lucia Aschettino from Connecticut found an entry point for her "currency of the heart" by becoming a mentor to Beatrice Migaliza, from Kenya.



Currently Beatrice is a third year undergraduate student pursuing Computer Science at Ashesi University College in Ghana. She will graduate in 2016 with a Bachelors in Science degree. 


Beatrice Migaliza - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ooTAEkha48




Mentoring opportunities can be found here. www.globalgivebackcircle.org/

Please visit the Global Give Back website. Perhaps you will find an entry point for your heart energy.

Or you might send us your story . We would like to highlight many examples of currency of the heart.



Rosemary Williams launched Currency of the Heart to inspire readers to “pay it forward” from the heart’s most precious currency. We’d love to hear from you! To share your story or to request permission to republish this blog post, please email rosemary@womensperspective.org.



Sunday, January 4, 2015


Currency of the Heart: An invitation to life’s dance. 


On New Year’s day, it is my habit to call friends and write thank you notes for kindnesses received during the past year.  As I was writing on January 1st this year, a good friend who died about eight years ago came to mind.  Ken Beirn taught me a great deal about gratitude, kindness and true currency of the heart. His thoughtfulness often lifted my spirits during difficult times.


One day when I was particularly down he bought balloons and conspired with my children to tie them to my chair at the dinner table.  When I came home and saw the colorful bouquet of balloons  I had to smile.


He also took on a grandfatherly role towards my five children, inviting each one for outings, separately and unexpectedly.  No fanfare, no call ahead. He would ring the doorbell and ask if a particular child could come out to play.


“May Lee play tennis with me?”
“May Aimee go for ice cream with me?”
“May Sharon come for a swim with me?”
“Is Tama home? May we talk?”
 “May I take Heather for a walk on the beach?


Again and again, Ken offered us the gift of his time and presence.


Years later he gave me books of E. B. White’s letters with page notations on the inside cover. He underlined the words he wanted me to read. In one particular essay about Walden, Ken underlined the phrase an invitation to life’s dance.  I have come to understand that life’s dance may be the movement between giving and receiving.  When E.B. White was moved by his heart to be in touch with someone, he wrote a letter that spread kindness across the page like jam on bread.


Ken, like E.B.White, was always on the lookout for opportunities to be kind and generous.  Today I pay homage to him and other kind people in my life whose examples of currency of the heart are seeds of this blog.

It is my hope that 2015 is filled with kindness and generosity for you.

Happy New Year.

Rosemary


Rosemary Williams launched Currency of the Heart to inspire readers to “pay it forward” from the heart’s most precious currency. We’d love to hear from you! To share your story or to request permission to republish this blog post, please email rosemary@womensperspective.org.


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