I just donated eight percent of my 2013 net income to GiveDirectly, a charity that directly transfers this money to some of the poorest people in the world.

I have learned about GiveDirectly the charity via GiveWell, a charity evaluation project founded by two people who wanted to donate heaps of money for good purposes, but didn't find good information on what best to invest in. I already donated a smaller amount to GiveDirectly twelve months ago. What I like about GiveDirectly that they are the first organisation who do a very simple and obviously good thing efficiently on a large scale: directly giving donations to people who need resources. By donating such a large amount to one single cause, I am not neglecting all the other important causes, but I am following GiveWell's detailed analysis which says basically that most of the really good causes and efficient charities already get a lot of funding and sometimes even have trouble absorbing and using more funding with their existing staff.

Recently I read a lot of interesting articles on "effective altruism", the science of doing the most good with the little money that each of us can spare:

• What is rational giving? (And why it is still emotional.)
• Video: Money can buy happiness. Michael Norton at TEDxCambridge 2011 
• Three Myths that block Progress for the Poor. 2014 letter from the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation. (If you read this after 2014, the content might be updated, but this PDF still original.)
• Video: The Giving Pledge - A new club for billionaires

So Warren Buffet gives away 99% percent of his wealth during his lifetime or in his will. In the meantime he talks to other billionaires to convince them to give away at least half of their wealth and it seems he's quite successful at that. 

There's also a more inclusive club for non-billionaires (like you and me) called Giving What We Can. All you need to do to become a member is commit to regularly donate 10% of your regular income to any good altruistic cause. 

Twice in a row, I have used my winter-holidays in January to decide on and make a yearly donation. This time I realized that I can make my giving much more social by doing it in the traditional holiday season. Then I can talk to others what and where they intend to give this year. This will be much more fun and probably also do more good. I am looking forward to a great year!

growing pains -or- purchasing utilons and warm fuzzies separately

It is a principle of modern organized altruism that the things which makes an altruistic person feel good (like giving money to a beggar, or volunteering at a child care center) are often just not the best uses of one's time and resources to accomplish a given goal (like reducing poverty or fostering education). But if a person takes a totally rational mindset and does the objectively most useful thing, then this might in fact go against their instincts and not give them the good feeling that altruistic behavior normally gives. That's why charity experts advise to purchase utilons (objective usefulness, utility towards a cause) and fuzzies (good feelings) separately.

Now, what's interesting is that this concept which was developed for charity and altruism also seems to apply wonderfully for optimizing my hedonism and egoism! I find that sometimes when I do things that I know are good and important in the long term, they still “feel wrong” in the moment and drain my self-control to a very tiring level. So in fact, every time I do such a thing, I should reward myself with some other short-term pleasure thing that gives me good feelings and let's me be very lazy so self-control gets replenished. Insofar it's quite sad that things which I enjoy most (being creative) always need a minimum in self-control; I just don't know how I can relax well by being lazy!

Gosh, I thought I had found something really fundamental, but now that I am thinking about it, it's just the old known principle about rewarding oneself for doing things that drain a lot of self-control. Bah, never worked for me anyways. Much better for me is to have people around who believe in the same values and give me feedback about what I do. Then, when I feel exhausted, I can get some applause. Don't need anything more....