During the pandemic, many of us realised more than ever the priceless value of friends, family, connection, generosity, empathy compassion and gratitude. When one is unwell one knows that he/she can do better with support but how about when we are not in a crisis mode — do we still believe we need each other in our daily lives?

Now that the crisis has fortunately abated, how do we use this realisation to make sustainable changes in our lives that we know holds the power to transform us, our own world and the world at large?

This is difficult to grasp as a teenager as you seek your independence but pause and search for answers within and ask: In a world where everything has a price, what happens to the priceless? How do we bring them back into circulation?

• What we do for love will always be far more powerful than what we do for something purely monetary. Think of a time you did or received a kind act unconditionally.
• What we can do together is often far greater than what we can do alone. Think of a time when you worked as a collaborative team for a common goal.
• We live in a time where we have mastered the art of “liking” each other online but have forgotten the art of loving each other in real life. How does it feel having a face-to-face conversation with some of your true friends?

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Do you know of a friend, family member or even a distant relative diagnosed with cancer? Unfortunately, most people answer ‘yes’ to that question. The statistics agree that around 1.3 million people are diagnosed with cancer every year in India, and 800,000 pass away. That’s over half the patients who were diagnosed. 

Such an alarming statistic is attributed to the financial toxicity of cancer treatment in India, wherein over 50% of patients consider or do drop out of chemotherapy. The average cost of the treatment is twice the annual income of the average Indian. The impact of this toxicity can be debt-accumulating for several generations, child labour within the family and even the need to work overtime or take up part-time jobs, sometimes even during chemotherapy. 

Shaken by this statistic, Varshini Vijay started looking up important stories and talking to patients. One such story is of Anchal Sharma who was diagnosed with third stage cancer. She faced financial difficulties initially, since she came from a humble family, with six people living in one room. She had to sell everything she had for her treatment and even borrowed money from her friends; in spite of this she hid her condition from her parents as she didn’t want to worry them. Strangers pitched in to help finance her treatment and provided support, too. While undergoing her treatment, she would talk to other patients, providing them with motivation and optimism. She would help provide meals to people even when she was unable to raise funds for meals by cooking on her own.

These stories and statistics led our founder, Varshini Vijay, to pursue her passion for helping people. “Having a family member diagnosed with cancer was extremely painful for me. The impact on the whole family, the financial burden, the emotional trauma, and the big question, ‘Will they survive after all of this?’ all haunted me. After doing some research, I was shocked to find out that there are very few international cancer NGOs for teenagers currently. I realized that this needed to be changed, and I saw myself contributing to find a solution to innovate and play a part in bringing this change. Because of this vision I had, I created my non-profit venture to help the underprivileged.” 

Thus started Teens for Cancer Patients (TCP), an international youth-led organization dedicated to battling cancer. Since launching in September 2021, TCP has served over 400 persons in 12 countries with 10+ chapters, hosted the successful event, “Impact of COVID-19 on Cancer Prevention”, with over 90+ attendees, provided 10,000 menstrual products to combat cervical cancer, and fundraised over 3 lakhs for financially sensitive patients.

Our success is largely owed to our motivation that we find in seeing the smiles of patients when they receive treatment. It is a truly humbling and inspiring experience that makes all our hard work worth it. Our work has taught us that no matter who you are, or where you come from, you can be a changemaker in your community and society at large. 

Experience the joy of joining a close-knit, international family that wants to make a difference and the joy of volunteering, giving back, and of saving lives. Go to teensforcancerpatients.org or e-mail teensforcancerpatients@gmail.com and review linktr.ee/teens_for_cancer_patients for more information.

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A movement by The Teenager Today, Rotary and Rotaract Clubs of Mumbai Bravehearts, Kindness Unlimited and the World Kindness Movement

The world has seen nearly two years of uncertainty, hardships, untold misery and grievous loss as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic. However, even through this trying period, what has shone through and endured have been the stories of indomitable courage, compassion and humanity — not only from the medical fraternity and the frontline workers to whom we owe so much, but from the common man on the street, our friends, our relatives, our neighbours and even complete strangers.

The Year of Kindness is an attempt to highlight these acts of kindness which we keep performing on a regular basis in our lives, and even more so in troubled times, and create a movement wherein every such act gets felicitated and encouraged in such a way that ‘being kind’ and ‘doing good’ becomes a habit and a way of life for every human being on the planet.

A Year of Kindness will roll out from 1 March 2022, exactly two years after the first official declaration of the Covid-19 pandemic and the subsequent lockdowns, and run through 28 February 2023, in its first phase.

The initiators and drivers of this project are the Rotary and Rotaractor Clubs of Mumbai Bravehearts, Kindness Unlimited, the World Kindness Movement and The Teenager Today. Through its tenure, more organizations and individuals, across India and the world, will be encouraged to join the movement.

How will this work?

All founder organizations, including the readers of The Teenager Today, will reach out to individuals and organizations in their network to participate.

The basic idea is for everybody to do at least one kind act a day — this could be an act of kindness to oneself, to others (friends, family, strangers), to animals and birds or even to the environment.

The project will be supported by an app and a web-based programme, developed by our technology partner, Inventeam, which will be used to facilitate and track every act of kindness.

Every participant will need to record her/his act of kindness on the app giving details of the person the act has been done to and the story behind it.

The spread of the idea will be based on the ‘Pay It Forward’ principle — instead of the recipient of the kind act saying “thank you” and moving on or doing something good in return to the initiator of the kind act, s/he will carry on the chain by doing an act of kindness to another person.

The app will gently trigger the recipient of the kind act to ‘pay it forward’ and thus continue the chain.

The app will not only record these acts of kindness but also track the spread of the same in terms of geography as well as timelines.

The Teenager Today will feature each month the initiatives which will cover the latest statistics, inspiring stories of kindness coming in through the app as well as updating readers on all the partner organizations that have come in through the month. This will also be done in greater depth on the website and social media channels of the magazine as also the other founding organizations.

The initiative is open to individuals as well as organizations to participate in.

No act of kindness will be deemed too small or insignificant. All participants are free to record as many acts of kindness as possible at whatever frequency. Organizations and companies are free to participate as a unit as well.

A number of recognitions are being planned for star individual performers, kindest organization, longest and broadest chains, individuals inviting the highest number of participants to join in and many other.

The campaign will kick off in March with the launch of the app. Please follow updates on the website and social media channels of The Teenager Today. Immediately after the app goes live, each one of you can register on the same and start recording your acts of kindness and share this with your contact sphere across the world. With all our efforts, this campaign can go viral globally in no time!

We are setting out on a historic mission here — a mission to create a kinder world that will be beneficial to every living and non-living being on this planet! Be an Ambassador of Kindness this year!

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