Mentoring

Laurel Glocheski and TR Rosenberg are mentors.

Being a mentor is an ancient endeavor. The earliest reference to “mentor” is found in Homer’s Odyssey, written in 800 BCE. When King Odysseus of Ithaca left to fight in the Trojan War, he asked his trusted counselor, Mentor, to be the teacher and guardian of his son, Telemachus. When after ten years of war, Telemachus set out on a successful quest to find his father, Athena, goddess of wisdom and warfare, guided him in Mentor’s form. Over the centuries, the role of a mentor, a wise and trusted counselor, has been respected and utilized in many different businesses, schools, and trades. As mentors, we enjoy working primarily with intelligent startup adults who are struggling to gain a career, an education, and an independent sense of self.

Everyone needs to be seen and heard. Each of us needs to talk with someone trustworthy with whom we share empathy and awareness of who we are and what we experience. Empathy is the ability to understand and relate to someone else’s feelings. It is subtly but significantly different from sympathy, feeling sorry for someone. The key is feeling appreciation, and no one gets enough of that.

Being there for someone else, acknowledging another mind, another stream of consciousness, another emotion can be a difficult challenge, especially when that person has learned to distrust or at least be suspicious. Being present for another involves having skills in active listening and rapport building, but more than this, it requires being available to another person at the time when they most need help. We are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and the doctors and psychiatrists we know are shocked.

A physician friend recently asked, “Don’t your clients abuse your accessibility and call you all the time with their minor complaints?”

“We are never abused by our clients. More than that, they are grateful and respectful of our time and service,” I replied. “They understand we are helping them when it is most effective for them. On the most basic level, they feel connected and that someone genuinely cares. That can go a long way towards building the self-confidence and self-respect they need.”

In contrast, almost all “medically necessary” mental health treatment in the United States is determined by health insurance providers or government agencies based on what is cost-effective, and not by the licensed mental health professionals who provide it. Many of the startup adults we work with have serious emotional and educational challenges. In the past, they were often overmedicated while suffering inadequate hospitals, schools, and programs. Nothing else was offered. Treatment options presented scarcity and limitation more often than abundance and opportunity. Their families strained emotionally and financially, and felt increasing despair about the future. In our world, mentors can provide a unique and necessary human service.

What does it take to be an effective mentor? A good mentor:

• is skilled and interested in helping others,
• has experience with failure and success,
• has an optimistic, realistic, and positive outlook regarding life’s possibilities,
• is willing and able to learn about new situations and unique personal qualities in others,
• has time and energy to devote to another,
• can recognize and respond to the unique needs of a person in crisis,
• understands personal needs and responsibilities, and establishes clear boundaries to allow others to do the same,
• has a proven track record of effective service to others, and,
• is a good storyteller who can share valuable personal experiences to inspire and instruct.

Perhaps the most important quality a mentor can possess is the ability to communicate the belief that a person is capable of transcending present challenges and accomplishing great things in the future.

Where can a person find a mentor? There are wise men and women in every community who are willing and able to be mentors. They have not yet been asked. Finding a mentor is similar to finding an apprenticeship or asking someone older and more experienced to teach you a skill in which they have mastery. To find a good mentor, you must want to be a good protégé.

What does it take to be a good protégé? The startup adults with whom we work:

• have positive goals and a desire to improve themselves,
• are open and receptive to trying new ideas and new ways of learning,
• are willing to meet regularly,
• are able to accept feedback and advice,
• are willing to act on the advice they receive,
• are learning to be honest with themselves and others, and,
• know when to ask for help.

What makes mentoring a startup adult so satisfying?

Startup adults are challenged with completing their education, acquiring independence, beginning a career, and achieving adulthood. At the same time, they are attempting to understand and resolve their childhood miseries and traumas, and forgive themselves and others. They are trying to master modern consumer electronics, computer technology, automobiles, alcohol, recreational drugs, and sexual relations. They want to be in on what is in, establish their individual tastes and preferences in music, film, and television, have an active, exciting social life with their friends, and find a potential lifelong mate. They need to manage the requirements of their health and dietary needs, and develop daily living skills, as well as understand the obligations of citizenship and service to others. Startup adults are often more flexible, experimental, and open to change than older adults. They are also more misunderstood, stereotyped, and judged than other age groups. They are the adults who are most in need of guidance and direction from those who have already walked the pathways they are just beginning.

There is old wisdom and new research that indicates helping others may be the key to happiness. Do good, feel good. Helping others can reduce stress and anxiety, relieve mild depression, increase health and longevity, and bring joy and happiness to life. Mentoring can do all that and more. Mentors do what institutions and government cannot; a mentor responds to a person’s unique needs without fear or compromise. A mentor directly and effectively helps people to acquire self-knowledge, know their dreams, overcome obstacles, take healthy risks, and gain the confidence, serenity, and self-determination to embrace life and achieve long-term success.

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