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Becca Stanley leads Blueprint58, a community-based mentoring program in the Adair Park and Pittsburgh neighborhoods of Atlanta, Georgia. Their mission is to empower youth to grow into community leaders through mutually transformational relationships. Learn more at https://blueprint58.org/
Show Notes
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WELCOME
You Can Mentor is a podcast about the power of building relationships. Every episode will help you overcome common mentoring obstacles and give you the confidence you need to invest in the lives of others.
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SHOW NOTES
Becca Stanley leads Blueprint58, a community-based mentoring program in the Adair Park and Pittsburgh neighborhoods of Atlanta, Georgia. Their mission is to empower youth to grow into community leaders through mutually transformational relationships.
- Learn more at: https://blueprint58.org/
- Contact Becca: rebecca@blueprint58.org
Creators and Guests
What is You Can Mentor: A Christian Youth Mentoring Podcast?
You Can Mentor is a network that equips and encourages mentors and mentoring leaders through resources and relationships to love God, love others, and make disciples in their own community. We want to see Christian mentors thrive.
We want to hear from you! Send any mentoring questions to hello@youcanmentor.com, and we'll answer them on our podcast. We want to help you become the best possible mentor you can be. Also, if you are a mentoring organization, church, or non-profit, connect with us to join our mentoring network or to be spotlighted on our show.
Please find out more at www.youcanmentor.com or find us on social media. You will find more resources on our website to help equip and encourage mentors. We have downloadable resources, cohort opportunities, and an opportunity to build relationships with other Christian mentoring leaders.
You can mentor is a podcast about the power of building relationships with kids from hard places in the name of Jesus. Every episode will help you overcome common mentoring obstacles and give you the confidence you need to invest in the lives of others. You can mentor.
Speaker 2:Welcome back to the You Can Mentor podcast. My name is Steven, and I have a very special guest with me coming all the way from Atlanta, Georgia over the internets. Her name is Becca Stanley, and she is the leader of Blueprint 58. How the heck are you, Becca?
Speaker 3:Good. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 2:I'm so glad you're here, and I'm glad that you're here 35 weeks pregnant.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And you look great. You look great. I mean, people won't see you over this because it's
Speaker 3:a podcast. To panic. I just showered.
Speaker 2:And you have a very, like, Joanna Gaines feel going on in your background right now. Yeah. I don't know if if that's intentional.
Speaker 3:This we made this headboard because I'm hiding in my bedroom for my children, but we made this headboard out of there used to be a carriage house behind this house, and I was like, do not throw away that door. So we saved it, turned it into a headboard. Here we are.
Speaker 2:Well done.
Speaker 3:I'm sure we're sleeping under lead paint, but it's fine.
Speaker 2:Just throw some shiplap over it, and and you're good to go. So that's awesome. Well, Becca, would you mind sharing a little bit about Blueprint 58, what your mission is, and what that what that name even means Yeah. Just so our listeners can get to know you. I would
Speaker 3:love to. So, Blueprint 58 is, a mentoring and community development program in Southwest Atlanta. We're based in the Adair Park neighborhood, which is where, our family lives. We moved in and started Blueprint 9 years ago. When I was in high school, I decided that Isaiah 5811 was gonna be like my life verse, which is, the Lord will guide you always.
Speaker 3:He will satisfy your needs in a sun scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You'll be like a well watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail. And that's like a beautiful promise, and then at some point I grew in my faith and realized before that it says, if you spend yourself on behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then
Speaker 2:Oh, snap.
Speaker 3:You will all of these beautiful promises will be a thing. And it goes on to say that you, will rebuild the ancient ruins and be called the repair of broken walls and the restorers of streets and dwellings. So blueprint 58 comes out of that call and promise in Isaiah 58. And also out of the fact that we think every neighborhood is really unique, and a blueprint is really specific to a specific location and environment and goal and purpose and all those things. So we think that building something based on this promise is gonna be really specific to where you are.
Speaker 3:Like, what our neighborhood needs is gonna be really different even from what your neighborhood needs. And so that has kind of the premise of Blueprint 58 and how we started and why we started what our heart is behind it. So That is so good. That just blew my mind.
Speaker 2:Like, Isaiah 58 is the blueprint for your ministry. Yeah. And I I love how if you read the Bible in context, it'll transform your context. Like Yeah. Totally.
Speaker 2:It'll do actually what it says, and the promise will come true. And so that's amazing. I love that. And, I you do Blueprint 58 with your husband. You have a a staff.
Speaker 2:Can you kinda share, yeah, just the tribe that you've kind of established in Blueprint 58, the people you're running with?
Speaker 3:Yeah. So we when we moved downtown, we my husband was running Blueprint 58. His name's Adam, and I was still working kind of in the corporate world, and my so actually we moved into our house on August 1, 2011, and my son, my second son was born August 3, 2011. He had, like, some pretty severe heart defects that we did not know about, and needed emergency open heart surgery, and everything was crazy, and he is doing good now. He's 8.
Speaker 3:He's had 2 heart surgeries, but that meant I could not leave my corporate job with health insurance. So my husband ran Blueprint for the first, 5 or 6 years, and then, students in the neighborhood kind of were telling us that they needed teachers, and at that point he went to go teach at the local high school in the neighborhood and I stepped in to be executive director. He still runs a lot of our sports stuff and does bible study with the boys at the high school, still super involved. And then, we have a mentor coordinator, Maddie, who is wonderful. She's been a mentor for, I think, 6 years now, and has been working with us for a few years.
Speaker 3:And then Takiyah runs our we have a young mom support group that she runs, and then she also does all of our, like, marketing and design stuff. She's a superhero. So, plus she has 4 boys, and the oldest is, like, 6. I'm like, I don't know how to do that.
Speaker 2:Oh, man. That's awesome.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So we have been in the neighborhood for 9 years. Takiya and I both live in the neighborhood, and Maddie lives just outside of the neighborhood. So
Speaker 2:Okay. It's awesome. So you're you're planted where you're serving. I love that. And I think it's it's super important to, to be neighbors to the people Yeah.
Speaker 2:You're loving and and and not not just be this outsider. I think I think that's super powerful.
Speaker 3:I think it makes a big difference. Right? If the things that affect our own kids and schools and all these things matters to us. I mean, it should matter to us either way, but it matters even more when we have some skin in the game. So
Speaker 2:Yeah. Oh, it's really good. Well, I'd I'd love for you to share that how you met Adam Mhmm. And how you guys were led into Blueprint 58. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like, just share share the kind of the backstory. Yeah. So I know you guys are, like, high school sweethearts.
Speaker 3:We are. So we met in high school in the suburbs of Atlanta. We went to a big suburban high school, stayed together through college, and then got married right after I graduated early from college, had a lot of AP credits. So, Stop.
Speaker 2:Are you bragging right now?
Speaker 3:Yeah. Because I like to say that then Adam took, like, extra long, you know, to make up for it. So we got married after, right after I graduated college. We lived in the suburbs, worked in the suburbs, you know, just living normal American dream. We had our starter home, and then our friend, well, a friend of mine, her dad started a summer camp, that was designed to be for what they called at risk youth.
Speaker 3:They were having trouble finding a head male counselor, and they were like, hey. Do you think Adam would come do it? We were newlyweds 20, 21, we were 21, and we were like, sure. We'll come to summer camp. And they put Adam in charge of discipline for 100 kids from the housing projects, so that was great.
Speaker 3:So we went to camp for 7 weeks that first summer, and we're like just fell in love with the kids. We were like, oh, is what we wanna do with our lives. Like, we love everything about these kids. And, also, I don't know that we can say that we're Christians and say that we believe Jesus when he says, love your neighbor as yourself and go home from this and not figure out a way to keep loving these neighbors because these people these kids live 30 minutes away from us, and we our minds are blown by their lives and their strength and the things that they have to walk through and are have overcome. And, so we started volunteering with a couple different ministries and working downtown, but living in the suburbs and going back and forth.
Speaker 3:And that was kind of our first entry into that. So I ended up taking a job part time for a nonprofit or a ministry called Metro Kids. So we did sidewalk Sunday School, and I was in charge of a housing of the kids in a certain housing project in downtown Atlanta. And we were spending 3, 4, 5 days a week down there doing sidewalk Sunday school, bringing kids to church, doing, like, visitation where we would just knock on every door and meet parents and all that. And out of that, we kind of started mentoring 2 boys.
Speaker 3:They were 8 9 years old at the time, and best friends lived right by each other. And we we didn't it wasn't formally mentoring. It was just I was in charge of 200 kids and couldn't go much deeper than surface level with most of them, but wanted to kind of dig in with these boys in particular. And so, they would come to our house in the suburbs and we got to know their families and, I mean, we still talk to at least one of them today, and he's 22 now. Mhmm.
Speaker 3:And he we're always like, whose life changed more from this? Like, here we are living downtown running a mentoring program. You you know, knowing him and get and meeting his family and knowing them has really been the, like, impetus for our whole journey, and our whole, like, love for mentoring and the fact that, like, it changed us, and hopefully, we have also had an impact on him and his life, and our kids call him their big brother, and now he has kids of his own, and it's just all Mhmm. We're family and and that changes things. So yeah.
Speaker 2:It's amazing. Yeah. It's so awesome. I love how it comes from I mean, I I know that that's a part of your mission to empower youth, like, through mutually transformational relationships. And I I imagine that's because it's been your experience that you've been changed.
Speaker 2:You've been transformed by jumping in to these relationships. I wonder is that why you guys went with that mission statement to empower youth to grow into community leaders through mutually transformational relationships? Because you felt it was kind of making you into community leaders, I guess, as you were doing it.
Speaker 3:First of all, we have made lots of mistakes, and we have, we are not experts, and I think the best thing that we have unlearned over the years is, the ways that we can't actually save anyone. And so our mission can't be, you guys are gonna save kids who are growing up in tough circumstances, but, like, you're gonna be saved, and Jesus is gonna transform both of you, when you enter into something where you're willing to learn from someone else. So we spend a lot of time when we're doing training with our mentors, talking about, like, you're coming here to be a support and to be a caring adult in the life of the child, but you're also here to learn and to listen. And if you're open, I honestly think most of our mentors will be more transformed than the students will. And like I said, hopefully, the students will also learn and be exposed to new opportunities and have resources they might not otherwise have and meet new people and have new experiences and all of those things.
Speaker 3:But I think really getting to know someone and walk in their shoes and walk alongside them is the thing that will really transform hearts on both sides of the equation. So, yeah, we we definitely have seen that in our own lives, and that's why that's what we built all of this on. You know, these 2 boys, they would come to our house in the suburbs, and we would drive to the housing projects and then go home. And we just, at some point, started feeling like, this feels wrong. Like, we're saying we love you.
Speaker 3:We care about you. Sorry that this is a hard place for you right now. We're gonna go home. And we were like, what would it look like for us to move closer and to move in and to be available, to more kids and more families as not a savior and not, you know, to fix anything, but just to say we're in this with you. So that's why we ended up moving downtown and moving into this particular neighborhood where we live.
Speaker 3:And then also we we really wanted to go deep instead of wide, and and in our neighborhood there's a lot of transients and kids move a lot, And we were like, either we follow kids all over the world or we pick a neighborhood and put down roots and say, this is where God's called us, and we will be faithful to serve, the people he brings alongside us here. So
Speaker 2:I just read a book by a guy. His name is Alan Briggs. I'll I'll send you the book. Yeah. Thank you.
Speaker 2:But he, he says the book is called Staying is the New Going.
Speaker 3:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:And he talks about casting a vision for being a faithful presence among the people that you're serving Yeah. And recognizing that there's a cost associated with doing that Mhmm. More so than just being on the outside and coming in every once in a while. Yeah. And that incarnational faithful presence in a community is is like where God is taking the church, that the church is gonna move to a place of greater impact as as she becomes more incarnational living among the people that you're building community with.
Speaker 2:And and so it sounds like that's, like, y'all's heartbeat of what you're doing. Yeah.
Speaker 3:It is. So I mean, it it's a hard tension always between holding loosely to our own plans and thoughts and and, you know, listening to our neighbors and continuing to evaluate, like, God, where are you calling us next? And, you know, with Adam going back to teach and trying to figure out how do we continue to serve the neighborhood even as the neighborhood changes around us, because that will happen. Yeah. I I just think it's it's a posture, right, of of openness and being willing to listen to where God's leading and where our neighbors are leading and what they need, and not our own, here's what you need, what we think you need, because we are not always the experts.
Speaker 2:And you you had mentioned kids in your community saying they needed teachers, and so Adam became a teacher.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Can
Speaker 2:you un unpack that story a little more?
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Because I I think that's super powerful.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So when we first moved in, we, said we weren't gonna start anything or do anything for at least 6 months. We were just gonna get to know our neighbors. We're gonna listen to them. We were going to build relationships.
Speaker 3:We knew we wanted to do mentoring in some capacity, but we wanted to, be patient with it and listen. So we did that and then got to know because we had these 2 boys who at this point were 13, who would come over and hang out with us, and they got to know other boys in the neighborhood. So we ended up building some pretty strong relationships with the with a lot of the, like, 14, 15, 16 year old boys in the neighborhood that eventually we ended up starting a flag football program because of that, but those boys who were starting once they were going into high school, they just kept telling us, hey, all of our teach like, 1 year they had 9 freshman teachers quit in the first, like, couple weeks of school. They had set up, like, and some of them would have, like, long term subs because they couldn't find anyone to fill that position, and, you know, we were like, look, if we're committed to loving our neighbors and listening to what they need, it sounds like maybe you should teach. Now, Adam was a teacher before we started doing ministry.
Speaker 2:Not just some Joe Schmeling.
Speaker 3:Just me, though. He's qualified. He's a chemistry teacher, actually. So, we he emailed the principal and heard back within 10 minutes. They asked when he could come in for an interview.
Speaker 3:So we were like, okay, god. We'll do this. So 3 years ago, he stepped in to teach at the local high school, and I stepped into the role of executive director. So yeah.
Speaker 2:Wow. What I I mean, I love 2 things about that story. 1 is y'all's side of saying we see the need, and we are qualified. Why not? And let's go.
Speaker 2:The other side is like these kids who recognize they have a need Yeah. For, like, relationships with people closest to them, and those are probably their parents and their teachers. Yeah. And when you have one of those that is transient and in and out like that has to mess mess you up inside like and and for them to say like we we want people who will stick around. Like, why are these teachers leaving?
Speaker 2:Yeah. Like, maybe they're taking that personally, and that's that's, like, a place of pain. So I just I love that they're able to communicate that.
Speaker 3:Yeah. So Yeah. They're, so yeah. They're great. Our boys our boys are the best.
Speaker 3:So
Speaker 2:Oh, man. Well, how was the flag football team? Did it did it pan out well? Or
Speaker 3:Yeah. Actually, that is also a crazy story. So about 7 or 8 months after we moved in, there were some kids who we knew a few of them really well, some of their cousins were kind of getting caught up in, like, a little neighborhood gang that was kind of escalating, and there was a 15 year old who we live in like a house right on a busy corner, and he got shot basically in our front yard, right on our corner, and he was shot in the leg so he was okay. He had to get a rod put in his leg, but while he was in the hospital we went to visit him, we learned he was, you know, sleeping on the floor and we're like, that seems uncomfortable when you just had a rod put in your leg. So we like got him a mattress and kind of just were there for him as best we could be, but once he got out of the hospital, him and a few of his friends and cousins came to us and said, can you start something to help us stay out of trouble?
Speaker 3:We were like, well, the answer is yes. For sure. What do you want us to what do you want to do? So, we they said, how about football? And we're like, well, we can probably do flag football, like we're not getting we don't exactly have football equipment, but we could try flag football.
Speaker 3:So we, like, found a little Christian league nearby that we could be a part of and we started a team. We had my husband tells the story better than I do, but I will do my best so we had like a cookout in our backyard and had all the boys over and said okay, here's the ground we don't really you guys don't bring your stolen cars to practice, don't, you know, like, try and stay out of trouble. If you guys wanna do this, we're here. We wanna do it with you.
Speaker 2:Don't bring your stolen what?
Speaker 3:Oh, cars. What? Well, but then so we had the meeting. We we were so excited. We had our first practice.
Speaker 3:Great. Time for the first game, and basically the entire team got arrested for stealing cars. So we were like, cool. So we had like 3 boys left and one of them was the one on crutches because he had a rod in his leg and we were like, okay, well, we'll still do this, but you guys are gonna have to like, invite your friends or something. And they were like, okay, okay.
Speaker 3:So by the next game, we had 21 boys show up, ages like 14 to 18, and of course, they were all quarterbacks and wide receivers
Speaker 2:Every one of them. Yeah.
Speaker 3:So so we were terrible and lost every game, but we were like, well, I guess they wanna do this and they wanna be a part of something and so, eventually, that turned into 2 flag football teams, and then, now we have our own league. So we play in the neighborhood park. We have 6 teams.
Speaker 2:Wow.
Speaker 3:And it's my favorite thing we do. It's so fun. And we never like, we are not athletes. Like, we did not set out to start a sports ministry, but we were like, if you guys wanna do this and we can be a part of it, we're in. So that has been a really cool part of what we do and and how we build relationships.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Wow, Becca. I I just love how much control you give to the kids that that you're you're living on of, like, well, if you don't wanna get in trouble, what do you want to do? Like, I think that that probably creates an environment of, like, we wanna be with these people. We wanna be mentored by by these guys. Like, because they're they're letting us not just jump into what they're doing.
Speaker 2:They're letting us kind of define and create the environment that they wanna be in and know that they wanna be with you guys in doing it. And so at least that's what I hear when you share that. If a kid came up to me and said, hey, can we do something so I can stay out of trouble? I'd be like, sure. Let's go read the Bible.
Speaker 2:And, like, he would probably be disinterested within, like and so I just think it's really wise to be like, okay. What what do you wanna do? Yeah. And to, like, to trust that that kid actually has a good intention. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And that he wants to belong to something and the things that he'll come up with aren't going to be these evil, unproductive, unattainable things. He's just gonna be like, can we go play catch? Yeah. Can we go throw a football? Yeah.
Speaker 2:Like, I I just think that that's that's really beautiful.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. I think we have a tendency to overcomplicate things. And, you know, I tell that to, especially new mentors too, who feel really intimidated. I'm like, just, you know, build a relationship, be normal.
Speaker 3:And you're gonna have to have a million conversations about things that don't feel like they matter to have a conversation about something that really does matter, because you have to build that trust and they have to know that you're there and you care about them and not that they're a project and not that they're someone or something you think needs to be fixed. So I think that that's really important and I think it helps a lot in in any relationship and in especially when you want to be loving Jesus well and and sharing him. We think that relationship and just living your life is the best way to do that. So
Speaker 2:And there's a difference between showing up in a community and saying, we're starting a flag football league. Yeah. And showing up in a community, living there for 6 or 7 months, and then, I guess, building trust with your community to the point that a kid would come to you and pitch that idea.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I feel like mentors usually, I don't know, don't have that 6 to 7 months kind of perspective. Mhmm. And so can you unpack kind of what was going on in that that process of building trust, building relationships, and kind of surveying the the community for for needs and just what your your spot in the community was supposed to be.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Well, I think, you know, those 2 boys that I told you that we first started mentoring, I think they've always been our best teachers. And I would say that one of those 2 boys, it took us 2 years, at least, of being in a relationship with him before, like, maybe he was he really trusted us. And I think because we had that perspective and knew why that took so long for him, we knew his story, we knew his family, we knew how strong they were and resilient they were, but also, like, how much they'd overcome. That made us realize, like, this is probably gonna take longer than we think it should to like, for our neighbors to trust us.
Speaker 3:And, because really, right now, we're just the random white family moving into a neighborhood that they're like, why the heck are you living in this drug house that you bought? And my husband and his dad renovated the house themselves. It was like a crack house on the corner that was falling apart, and they did it. And I think just the prep the fact that they were there for 9 months renovating it themselves even made a difference and that they were gonna live there. And we weren't investors.
Speaker 3:We weren't flipping the house. We weren't Mhmm. We didn't have any other motive other than that we're moving in. There's, we have a kid from the neighborhood who's living with us now, and he always tells us, he's like, man, I was so skeptical of y'all when we first when you first moved in. He's like, but then you stuck around.
Speaker 3:So and we're like, yeah. We're still here. But, yeah, I think having that long term perspective came from the relationships we had already built and the things we had already the mistakes we had already made and trying to rush things and trying to have answers that we didn't actually have. So yeah.
Speaker 2:It just sounds like kids are a lot more perceptive than I would ever think they are Yeah. Of, like, having long term subs and being like, you're not gonna stick around Mhmm. To having new neighbors show up and be like, you're not gonna stick around Mhmm. Or it just it sounds like kids have a lot more going on through their heads of, like, trust issues and do I really believe, like, I don't know, you're gonna stick around. And that's I think that's definitely something that you see in a mental relationship.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:But hearing it from a community perspective, like, these kids see people in their community and you're like, well, they're they'll probably move out in a few months. Like Yeah. That's that's just really interesting to me to Mhmm. To know that kids are kids are more perceptive than we would ever care to give them credit for. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. That we affect them. Yeah. What was my question? I was gonna ask you oh, so for other flag football teams out there that lose 70% of their team because of car theft, what encouragement do
Speaker 3:you need
Speaker 2:to do?
Speaker 3:You know? Yeah. I mean
Speaker 2:Is there any recruiting advice? I mean, it sounded like you're you're a couple guys, like, found some more people for the team.
Speaker 3:I mean, we always every so the way we do our flagpole league is we have one team that's from of kids from our neighborhood, but then we partner with other churches and nonprofits in, like, the surrounding neighborhood for the other 6 people. And sometimes we'll be like, look. The first game we always call the first game, like, a season like, a soft opening. I I'm saying the wrong words. I'm not a sports person.
Speaker 3:But but because we're like, you'll have, like, 3 boys or 4 boys the first game, but then they'll tell their friends because it was fun, and then you'll be fine from then on out. So, we we leave a lot of, like, control and and wisdom in their hands more than ours. Like, they're gonna be better recruiters than we are. Mhmm. So and it and, you know, it's been really cool because our team of boys from our neighborhood, that's kind of been the group that then Adam and I have really poured into.
Speaker 3:And, like, we take them to the beach for a week in the summer, which is my actual favorite thing we do ever. It's that week at the beach with, these 8 high school boys who haven't seen the ocean before. It's it's so fun. But we we see football as a starting point for relationships. It's as a tool to to build trust and to build to that relationship that then we can build on and go from there.
Speaker 3:So, yeah, it's fun. It's a good sports are a really good tool, especially with boys, but girls too. We actually had 1 girl in our league last year who played, and I was like, you were my hero. Like, you are so brave. Because it's 14 to 18 year old boys, so some of them are
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:Not small. But, yeah, it it's a good finding a an easy, safe starting place to build a relationship. So
Speaker 2:Yeah. What would be what would be your advice, I guess, to other entrepreneurs, people that are wanting to start a nonprofit and do something like this.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And because I I kind of get the sense that we're really good at, like, coming up with ideas and things to do and casting a vision, but it doesn't matter if it's not what our communities need and what they're asking for. And I I think that y'all's approach is is very, refreshing to hear that we didn't just show up with a with a blueprint. Well, you did show up with a blueprint. You wanted to to left people and but you didn't show up with everything planned out because if you had, you wouldn't be doing flag football because that's not your
Speaker 3:It would not have.
Speaker 2:Your thing.
Speaker 3:But, you know, I think 2 things I would say is if you I would say to really listen to what's already going on. You know, you're nobody's bringing Jesus to a neighborhood where he is not already, and try and find the ways he's already at work and the people who are already doing something, and figure out how you can join in with what's already happening or, okay, that's not happening, and here's a need that's not being met, but not just starting something because you think I should be the one to start something. You know, I actually wish we would have done more work finding out, like, who are the people who have already been doing work in this neighborhood and how can we come alongside them, and we would have landed in some of the places. We eventually landed a lot faster if we would have sought out that wise advice. I, like to tell this story.
Speaker 3:So my husband, he's really the, like, gardener and also the cook in our family. So but we
Speaker 2:The gardener, the cook, the renovator
Speaker 3:The
Speaker 2:the the chemist.
Speaker 3:The chemistry teacher. I mean, he's right. So but there's this, like, gorgeous rose that always grows on our back fence. And one time I was like, man, it is so cool that this beautiful rose just grows here every year and we don't even have to do anything. It just, like, comes back.
Speaker 3:And he was like, you don't do anything. He's like, I fertilize it, I prune it, I water it. And I think this idea that, like, somebody's already doing that work. Right? Somebody is fertilizing and digging and in the soil, and they maybe want someone to come alongside them.
Speaker 3:Or they say, well, this is what we're doing, but here's another need. You know, and I think just listening and and having our eyes and ears open, and being humble to the fact that, like, it's not we're not always the answer for every problem. And maybe I don't need to start something, and maybe I do, but that won't be clear unless we're listening really carefully, to the Lord, but also to the people that we want to serve.
Speaker 2:That's so good. And the the partnerships deal, I I do feel like nonprofits feel like very the tendency is to be insulated and well, we're fulfilling our vision. Your vision is there. Like, so we're just gonna run here. Y'all run there.
Speaker 2:But it sounds like you created partnerships with churches and envisioned, like, other communities and organizations to jump into this flag football team Yeah. Like, deal. Can you share a little more about how that how those partnerships kind of developed? And because I I do think that that's that's very helpful for people to to hear.
Speaker 3:Yeah. I mean, I think, again, being planted here and living here has helped us to be able to see who the other people are who are doing the work in the neighborhood and who we can learn from and come alongside and say, like, we're a mentoring program, we don't do tutoring, our kids really need tutoring, and here's this program that does tutoring, so let's figure out how to plug kids in our mentoring program into their tutoring program, and we're not and not see it as competing for kids or competing for money or support, but as, like, how are how can we be better together and how can we serve and love better together. You know, and that's not always easy to not feel competitive and to not I feel like there's something very natural about wanting to, like, get what you can because it feels like if someone else gets something, you'll get less. And I think that's a really conscious decision to, like, believe in God's abundance and believe in Mhmm. The fact that he wants what's best for the kids and families in our neighborhood, and he can provide that in abundance with or without our help.
Speaker 3:So that has been a learning curve, I think, for us. But again, I think it's that listening piece and staying humble and staying open to what God has called us to and the lane that He has called us to run-in, and that that, we need other people to come alongside us and and meet other needs and Mhmm. And play other roles.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So it kinda plays back into the mutually transformational relationships because it's like your organizations can benefit and give you more perspective and and change the way you see things. So Right.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Well and it helps us not be spread too thin and not lose sight of our vision. Yeah. When we say, well, they're doing this really well, and they can meet that need, and we can meet this need, and we don't need to try and do everything ourselves. So
Speaker 2:Yeah. Gosh, Becca. You're so wise. I don't know about that.
Speaker 3:About to have my 4th kid. In the middle of the pandemic. It's fine.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Wow. Oh my gosh. Well, I I'd love for you to, I mean, share anything. Is there anything from this past season that that you've learned from from the families you serve that is highlighted to you just in light of that mutually transformational relationships?
Speaker 2:What is the Lord teaching you in this season?
Speaker 3:Yeah. I mean, I I think seeing the, like, resilience of our community is always really humbling and eye opening for us. You know, we have 3 kids at home that we are trying to help teach and that's really hard and we're both my husband and I are both here and we both still have jobs and we our kids have enough food to eat and all of those things and it's still hard. And I think seeing the ways that our neighbors are being even more disproportionately affected because maybe they're an essential worker and still have to go to work at the grocery store while their kid has to figure out how to learn at home. You know, I think being really like, in awe of the things that they're carrying and the ways that they're carrying them teaches us a lot about how to be humble and to, and be grateful for what we have.
Speaker 3:Yeah. You know, but also just the, like, reality of relationships that actually go both ways, like that is always the biggest reward for us is, like, our neighbors who check on us and see how we're doing and bring us diapers for the new baby or, so we have like I said, there's a young man from the neighborhood who's living with us right now, and he, like, gives our kids basketball lessons in the backyard every day. We're like, oh, thank goodness. Take them away for an hour outside. You know, like, and they love it, and he is a gift to our family and not just, like, oh, we could give him a place to live.
Speaker 3:Like, no. We just are family and get to meet each other's needs, and that means he sometimes meets our needs, and sometimes we meet his needs. And, I think that's a really good picture of how the body of Christ and the kingdom of God can really work when we let it.
Speaker 2:Yeah. That's super good. Mentoring is made into this, like, huge sacrifice. Like, you're you're giving everything and getting nothing in return and don't expect fruit for 10 years and, like, I I just feel like that that thought kind of challenges Mhmm. A lot of those conceptions or, like, preconceived notions of what mentoring is.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Not to discount. There will be times when that's the case, but I I I think it it's necessary for us to come into the perspective of there are rewards in building relationships with kids from hard places that you will never receive if if you don't jump into these relationships. And Absolutely. And it it doesn't necessary it won't necessarily look like basketball lessons in your backyard, but it could, and that's amazing.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think it's always a balance, right, between, like, having good expectations and being committed regardless of outcomes and
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:Recognizing that we have a lot to learn from each other. So
Speaker 2:Yeah. We had a Haitian guy living with us who we helped him apply for asylum, and he he worked through his life. He lived with us for about a year, and he got a new place, and he moved out this last year. And when our baby came, he went I mean, he works 2 jobs. He's, like, working 80 hours a week, but we hear us knock on our door, and he brought us, like, a a bag full of diapers.
Speaker 2:And he just, like, came to say congratulations. And it was, like, so beautiful. He had, like, taken a bus Yeah. Like, hauled a to get to our house, knocked on our door, gave us the diapers, and was, like, okay. I gotta go back to work.
Speaker 3:Yes. And it means lunch, and it's when you are, like, oh, this is a real relationship. This isn't just
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Us helping you. Right? Like, this is like this goes both ways, and that's what builds a real friendship and a real relationship and not like a one way Yeah. Helper, help e.
Speaker 2:Yeah. It's like you give people the honor of serving you. You give them the honor of being in a relationship with you.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And, you know, I think that's one of the best lessons we learned with our son who needed heart surgery. We learned really quickly that, like, we could live in the safest neighborhood and do everything right and still have a baby born with a heart that didn't work. So that surrender piece, but then also that receiving piece of, like, we need help and, like, we have to be able to receive help and not just be the givers. And I feel like God really established that posture in our lives from, you know, the day we moved in.
Speaker 3:Sometimes we have to learn lessons the hard way, I guess
Speaker 2:Yeah. Unfortunately. That's awesome. Yeah. I wonder if we could be extremely clear and paint a picture of a non mutually transformational mentor relationship.
Speaker 2:Like, what do you think that would look like?
Speaker 3:Yeah. I think, you know, I think a lot of times people see mentoring as this one way relationship. Right? Like, I am the expert and I have especially, like, in the business world. Right?
Speaker 3:But your mentor is someone who's teaching you about things you don't know in positions that they're ahead of you in the journey. And I think when you enter into this relationship thinking, I have so much to teach this kid because I have all the answers, or I am successful, or I can, you know, make them more like me, that is not dignifying, and and and and it might I don't know. Like, it's like the world works like that sometimes, and it and it feels like, well, yeah. Then we have good numbers because we're being successful, and we're teaching kids to be successful, and but there's not that, like, real heart level transformation that is able to occur. You know, we always say we don't want to make little Adam and Becca's.
Speaker 3:Like, we're not trying to make anyone more like us. We want to, like, provide space for Ashton and Zach and these boys that we love to become who God made them to be. And if that's the only thing we can do is hold space for that and and support for that, then then they will step into their own flourishing, in their own gifts and in their own the ways that their experience have shaped them and the things that they've learned along the way. Yeah. I mean, I think and I think too, one thing that Adam and I ask ourselves all the time is, like, is this right versus wrong, or is this just not how we would do it?
Speaker 3:You know, like, we come from, like, middle class white upbringing, And so because of that, we think things are done a certain way, and we have certain values or, ways we've always done things. And so, like, learning to let go of that as the right way necessarily and and recognizing that, like, just because someone parents differently or, makes different choices, it doesn't necessarily mean their way is not just as good as our way. And and we've changed some of our parenting and some of our ways of doing things as a result of things we've learned. But that's not easy. Right?
Speaker 3:Like, we're pretty, like, indoctrinated from, like, our way is the right way, especially when we're white middle class folks. So I think that takes humility and unlearning and and really questioning and and asking the Lord what is right and what is wrong? What is your way and what is what is just our preference? So
Speaker 2:Mhmm. Yeah. Well, so good, Becca. Any any encouragements or cautions on someone who would follow in your footsteps and move to the inner city and want want to start an organization, like Blueprint 58? What if they started Blueprint 57?
Speaker 2:Or I don't know. I don't know what Isaiah 57 says.
Speaker 3:I don't know. It might
Speaker 2:it might not be good.
Speaker 3:I don't know.
Speaker 2:It might just be a big, what was me? You know?
Speaker 3:Yeah. I mean, I think like I said, I would be really cautious to make to see what's already what who's already doing the work, and not to step into a space unless there's a real need, and you can't do that unless you're listening and unless you're present and you know people and you have those relationships. And and then I would also say, like, it sound I can make it sound really good right now. And and, like, Adam and I, we really love our lives. Like, we love our neighborhood.
Speaker 3:We love our jobs. We love our neighbors and these kids that we get to know and work with and live with. But but that doesn't mean there's not also really hard times that we just kind of have to say that was hard and this was a loss and this didn't turn out how we thought and we just have to keep walking faithfully, to what God's called us to. And then sometimes I wish that was clearer. Right?
Speaker 3:Like like, that's easy to say. This is what God has called us to. But sometimes it gets hard to discern that, and sometimes you have to spend a lot more time getting quiet and listening and and figuring that out. And sometimes you have to take the next right step when you're not even really sure what God is saying in it. And I think faithfulness and humility are probably the the things you'll need the most, to do that.
Speaker 3:So
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:Gosh, we learn so much more from our failures than we do from our successes. So 100% of the kids we've mentored, well, the 2 the boys we started mentoring have been to jail, so we're doing good. Right? Like, our outcomes are excellent. But I think we we have learned the hard way that good intentions, don't preclude us from having a negative impact sometimes, and that just because we meant well by something doesn't mean it it doesn't it it can't be offensive or be not what that kid or their family needed.
Speaker 3:And we have had relationships that ended because we thought we were doing something that helped and we weren't. You know, and a lot of that is those differences I was saying before about, like, culture and upbringing and the way we think things should be done and the way someone else thinks things should be done, and the things we value.
Speaker 2:But this isn't like folding laundry differently.
Speaker 3:No. Well, and and it's and it's in the beginning, we undervalued people's people's dignity and letting them own their own stories, and I think because of that we don't have a relationship with one of the boys that we first originally started mentoring. And I think that's a loss that I really think about every single day because I wanted to help someone and I ended up hurting them And I mourn that and I want to fix it and sometimes things can't be fixed by us and we have to be patient and let Jesus do his slow work that we wish was faster most of the time. But again, like I I think I told you earlier, like, those 2 boys are still our best teachers. And even in loss and even in mistakes, they are the ones who have taught us more about what it means to let people own their own voices and own their own stories and be their own humans and not be who we think they should be, has just been, a really big piece of our own journeys and our own growth as people and as believers and in our relationships with Jesus.
Speaker 3:So yeah.
Speaker 2:Can maybe we'll just finish up with this last question of just if if someone was interested in becoming a mentor, what what are, like, the first steps that you would recommend for them as they're they're wanting to jump into one of those mutually transformational relationships that they don't wanna be that guy that's just teaching everything and well, you know, a better way to do that is
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 2:Yada yada. Like, they don't wanna be that mentor, but don't feel like, well, what what do I do then if I'm if I can't be that guy? Yeah. Like, what what would you recommend for them?
Speaker 3:1st of all, spending a lot of time letting Jesus work in your own heart and being available is really important, and consistency is really important, and listening is really important. And I think, like I said earlier, like, just recognizing, like, you're gonna have to have thousands of conversations about things that you feel like are not that important before you will have the chance to have a a conversation that really does matter and can have even eternal impact on this kid that you're building a relationship with. So I think we always try and tell our mentors, like, how do you build relationships with your friends? Like, you spend time together, you do things you both enjoy, you learn things, you let them teach you things, then you teach them things. Like, it goes both ways.
Speaker 3:Like, try new things together. Don't always be in your environment or don't always be in their environment. Try and do a mixture of both. Yeah. I I think it's harder in some ways.
Speaker 3:Right? Building a real relationship rather than just trying to teach someone things. But also, ultimately, I think the reward is worth it. Right? And that that transformation of your own heart.
Speaker 2:I think maybe what you just said, like, probably is the reason that mentor relationships can feel uncomfortable.
Speaker 3:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:It's because we don't treat them like all of our other relationships.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 3:We're like, just be normal humans. Come on.
Speaker 2:So you feel so much pressure Yeah. With this relationship when every other one, you're just like, hey. What's
Speaker 3:that? Right. Right. Yeah. Well, we're the number of times in mentor training, we're like, don't overcomplicate it.
Speaker 3:Like, spending time with your student can be like, we go to the grocery store together and make dinner, or like, it does it needs to be the same way you build any relationship. Right? And you build trust by being consistent and being a person of your word and so all those things that are really important, but also shouldn't be foreign or, like, different necessarily just because this is a mentoring relationship. It's, like, easier and harder. Right?
Speaker 3:Yeah. Or maybe simpler, but harder. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Which that's the way of Jesus.
Speaker 3:Right. Exactly.
Speaker 2:Becca, thank you so much for jumping on the podcast and sharing your story. How can our listeners connect with you guys after listening to this episode if they have questions or just wanna see more of what Blueprint 58 is doing.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Our, website is blueprint 58.org, and all of our, like, social media and everything you can get to from there. So, yeah, we're we didn't even talk about that. We're building a community center in our neighborhood. What the heck?
Speaker 3:Yeah. We bought a building, like, half a mile from our house. It's, like, 3 stories, and our family is gonna live upstairs. The downstairs Oh. Community space, and then the 3rd floor is gonna be 2, 1 bedroom apartments for, like, neighborhood kids.
Speaker 3:We've had 7 kids live with us, and we and we currently live in a 1400 square foot bungalow. So
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 3:And there's 5 of us, 1 neighborhood kid, and one on the way. So Wow. But yeah. So we're excited about that. It's, still in the neighborhood.
Speaker 3:It's just more space. When we sat down with architects, we were like, we want our house, but, like, bigger so we can invite more people in.
Speaker 2:That's very clear.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. They were like, okay.
Speaker 2:We'll put your website and your contact information in the show notes. If you're willing for people to email you.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And yeah, just thank you so much until Adam, we said, Hey,
Speaker 3:thanks for having me.