Hello Family & welcome to the month of June 2019!! it’s Q2 already & I do hope you are moving along the set goals & targets for 2019.
It was my birthday on Monday 3rd June & I took the day off to spend time thinking on my life’s journey so far & to thank God for his mercies.
It was during this session that I was reminded of the phrase “On Giants Shoulders” which is attributed to Sir Issac Newton in 1675 when he said “If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants.”
I know there is an ongoing series on “Cultivating a Growth mindset” which I will still continue this month, but I just couldn’t help but dust up the draft of this post which I had done like 3 years ago.
God has blessed me with some natural gifts & talents, but I couldn’t have made it this far & be successful if not for the help & support of my mentors (Giants).
As children, everything we do in life comes with a coach, a teacher, or a parent directing us and helping us along the way.
Words of encouragement are plentiful, and there always seems to be someone looking out for our well-being.
But as adults, this relationship is much more difficult to establish. Wouldn’t it be nice to have someone assisting you in life and helping you find satisfaction across the various aspect of our lives?
Why Mentors?
The Journal of Applied Psychology found that people who are mentored and sponsored report having more career success, such as higher compensation, a greater number of promotions, more job satisfaction and a higher level of career commitment.
Mentors are crucial in helping individuals connect the dots between their abilities and their potential, their goals and their successes. They provide the advice, confidence, and the network that allows individuals find their avenue of success while avoiding the pitfalls & failures.
There is a saying “Experience is the best teacher“, but I’ve come to realize that with Mentors, “Other people’s experience is the best teacher“
Now there are different formats that mentorship can take, it can be formal or informal, local or remote, etc.
Looking back I’ve received mentorship from a lot of people over the years,some I was directly connected to while I’m yet to meet others, but I’ve read their books or studied their lives.
I have mentors that are older than me, same age as me & even younger than me. It doesn’t matter their age, as long as they have what I want or have accomplished what I’m looking to accomplish, I am open to their mentorship.
I am also constantly looking out for mentorship moments, these are times & situations where there is something to learn from someone in a moment.
It might just be the way they handled a crisis situation, or a comment they made in the face of trouble, etc. I learn how to do stuff & how not to do them when I am in such situations.
The concept is to constantly be aware of these learning moments in my day to day activities & interactions with people.
If you deeply check with those who are really successful consistently, you will notice that they always have mentors who helped & supported them.
Oprah Winfrey was mentored by celebrated author and poet, the late Maya Angelou.
Former Apple Inc.CEO the late Steve Jobs served as a mentor to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
Former Morehouse College President, Dr. Benjamin Mays was an outspoken critic of segregation before the rise of the modern civil rights movement and a mentor to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Usher saw the natural charisma in Justin Beiber & became a mentor to the young lad.
There are so many examples across various human endeavor.
Yes you can do well on your own, but your potential for greatness & significance can be effectively multiplied in bigger folds by you working with a mentor & looking out for mentorship moments.
To go fast go alone!! To go far, go with others!!
How to pick a Mentor?
In Dec 2017, while surfing the web, I came across a lady called Remi Owabokun & her book titled Mentorless. I was so intrigued by her story that I quickly bought the book online & devoured the 44 pages in minutes.
I have recommended the book to those that reach out to me for mentorship & the results have been awesome, below are extracts from her book.
More important than having a mentor is picking the right mentor for you. One way to pick the right mentor is knowing exactly what you want to learn and then finding the mentor who has accomplished that or has what it is you want.
At this point, you want to look at what the person does, what the person has visibly accomplished and not what the person says.
One mistake you can make is looking for a mentor when you don’t even know what you want out of life. You need to be as specific as possible, you need to know exactly what you want and the mentor has to know exactly what you want.
This way, you can both agree on what works best in terms of making sure you achieve your goals.
People make the mistake of going to mentors without any goal in mind. They just want to have a mentor, any mentor or have a certain mentor because it seems to be “en vogue” and everyone who has one seems to be making headway in their endeavors.
What they failed to realize is that these people probably knew exactly what they wanted and hence were able to apply the skills & knowledge gleaned from their mentors.
No mentor will take you seriously if you approach them and say “Please mentor me, I don’t know what I want out of life.”
The likelihood is that your request will be declined, not because they don’t want to help but because they genuinely can’t help you without knowing what you want.
It is not the mentor’s job to choose a life path for you, they can only guide and accelerate your process based on whatever it is you are doing. This means you must be on a journey. It does not have to be the full picture, but you do need to have something you are working to accomplish in whatever area of your life.
If you want to accomplish certain things in business, get a mentor who has accomplished that thing you want to achieve.
Don’t just pick a mentor for the sake of it and then pick someone you are not even sure you need, only to blame them later if you achieve nothing.
Exercise
- What do you want to learn right now? What do you want to achieve? In what area of your life? Financial, career, business, relationship?
- Write a list of people who have accomplished exactly what you hope to accomplish and have proof of this feat. They may be people you know or have connections with, they may be people you have never met and who probably live in a different part of the world. They just need to be people who have the results you want
- Now look for a way to reach out to them stating specifically what you want to learn from them & why you’ve chosen them.
Last year, I was nominated & accepted to join the Mentor Africa Project (MAP), Mentor Africa Project is a global village of mentors committed to grooming young African professionals and start-up entrepreneurs to become global leaders.
Apart from MAP, I personally mentor people on career growth & development, spirituality & excellence, marriage & relationships ( this I do with my wife), etc.
The interactions are usually broken down into time frames of 3,6 & 12 months depending on the specifics & I must tell you that it’s real work, but it’s the most rewarding work ever.
These projects are still ongoing & if you are interested, just let me know & we will get you on board.
This is my snippet…….. I AM SHALOMESQ
Shalomesq Snippet 