How to donate more to charity
How I did it: I set a goal for a set percentage of my income this year to be donated to charity, and so I sent out chunks through the year for various organizations.
The only real gotcha is that I am on so many snail mail pleading lists now, it makes me sort of sad because I can't give to everyone and I wish they would quit wasting their money mailing me. I give to everyone online anyways...their budgets would be better served if they had a ticky-box saying "do not snail mail me."
Lessons & tips: Charity Navigator is helpful for giving information on which organizations make more efficient use of donations than others.
Resources: Workplace charity matching! Every December our company does donation matching gifts, so anything I can contribute gets matched 100% by them. Everybody wins! Yay!
