I’m curious how you manage to maintain motivation in the face of uncertainty about the effectiveness of whatever giving you choose. It seems like the feedback loop of telling whether a donation made a difference in something like global poverty would be on the order of years, whereas the feedback loop of working directly with people in need might be on the order of minutes.
I’ve generally worked in areas where I can tell if I’m making progress at my job. I have long-term goals, quarterly goals, what I’m trying to do this week, the specific flaky test case I’m trying to fix. I find making that sort of progress very motivating, and while I think it would have been possible to do significantly better I’ve been happy/fulfilled leaving figuring out how to deploy my money to fund managers.
I’ve generally worked in areas where I can tell if I’m making progress at my job. I have long-term goals, quarterly goals, what I’m trying to do this week, the specific flaky test case I’m trying to fix. I find making that sort of progress very motivating, and while I think it would have been possible to do significantly better I’ve been happy/fulfilled leaving figuring out how to deploy my money to fund managers.