The Purpose Of: Mentoring
For me, probably like many leaders, mentoring holds a special place in my life and heart. I feel there’s such an incredible need for these types of leaders and people, probably now more than ever. What is it about a mentor that is so important for these times? I think that there’s a direct relation to the purpose of a mentor that speaks to the need for mentors.
There’s some debate to the difference between a coach and a mentor but at the end of the day they are very similar with very similar goals. Those goals are bettering others in whatever ways you can. All leaders bring something unique to the table and have something to offer those they lead that others do not. This doesn’t answer the question to what is the purpose of mentoring though.
According to a study by fatherhood.org from a 2021 census, 18.4 million children (that’s 1 in 4) are living without a father (biological, step, adoptive, foster). There are so many negative effects of children who grow up without a father figure in their lives. Some of these things are more likely to have behavior problems, 4x’s greater risk of poverty, 2x’s more likely to drop out of school, more likely to abuse drugs or alcohol, and really so many more. To say there’s a great need for father’s would be a massive understatement. I don’t have the stats on absent mothers but I’m confident that the effects, especially on our girls, is just as detrimental. For me, this is where coaching and mentoring part ways.
What I mean is, coaching is for a season or time frame and while mentoring could be, it’s typically for an extended period of time if not indefinitely. These statistics alone are enough to show both the purpose and the need for mentors. Let me share this in another way.
Male elephants, as adolescents, go through something called the musth cycle. During this time these elephants are super aggressive and even dangerous. One could even argue angry. That, by itself, sounds like teenage boys. In most cases, this musth cycle lasts a few days but in extreme cases it can last much longer. In one particular case two orphan elephants were in the musth cycle for a long time and eventually withdrew from the rest of the herd. A scientist introduced an older male elephant to these younger elephants. What happened next was absolutely amazing, they biochemically changed and came out of their extended musth cycle. At this point, the question has to be, if it’s this way with animals how much greater is this in people.
Plain and simple, the purpose of leadership is to take others on a journey towards their own good and filling gaps that may have occurred. My wife and I are work with preteen and teenagers, both vocationally as well as it’s our heart, plus we’ve been involved in foster care. We’ve seen these things first hand. I’ll take this a step further and argue even when children have great fathers there are still places others can speak into these children. I’m not by any means a perfect father but I think I’m a good father to my children and speak into them, pour into them, and equip them for life but I also know there are other adults that are and can speak things into them. I’m okay with others, especially those I trust, speaking into my kids. The need is great but that also means with great need means there’s a void. We need mentors, both official and unofficial, to step up and pour into these generations to come. It’s a fatherless generation and they need us.
Keep going! Pour into someone coming behind you! Stay the course! You have what it takes!