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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 into the lives of others. Find out more at youcanmentor.com or find us on social media. You can mentor. What up, mentors?
Speaker 1:Hey. I'm here to talk to you about the Mentoring Leadership Summit, April 21 through the twenty fourth in Colorado Springs, Colorado. This summit is designed for mentoring leaders, people who might feel stretched thin, isolated, unsure of what to do with staff, volunteers, fundraising, all that stuff. We designed this summit for you. It's not just a conference, but it's a time for you to be surrounded with mentoring leaders, people who love Jesus, love mentoring.
Speaker 1:You step away from the daily grind. You get refreshed so that you can go back to your community and you can pour out. More importantly, the whole event is created to help you build relationships with other mentoring leaders so that you can learn, you can figure out how to have long term impact, and stay encouraged and equipped so you can mentor for the long haul. You'll experience deep connection with other mentoring leaders through shared meals, intentional conversations. We have a lot of downtime built into the schedule where you can just hang out with other mentoring people.
Speaker 1:We got breakout sessions led by experienced mentoring executives and ministry leaders, and they will equip you with best practices, new ideas, and things that you can take home to become a better mentoring leader. We've got worship and prayer. We've got hikes up in the mountains of Colorado. Easy ones. Don't worry.
Speaker 1:They're easy. But we want you to leave reconnected with God, spiritually renewed, and connected to other people. Guys, it's really hard to do this mentoring thing alone. And at the summit, you will gain new friends, you'll gain support, you'll gain clarity and confidence as you get new ideas, and it's our goal for you to walk away with a renewed passion and energy to continue mentoring kids from hard places in the name of Jesus. So sign up today.
Speaker 1:Go to our website, youcanmentor.com, and check out the summit, April in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Bring your directors, program leaders, your staff members. Let's do it. You can mentor. Come to the summit.
Speaker 1:Guys, it's in Colorado. Come on. Come on now. You can mentor. Sign up today.
Speaker 1:Bring a friend. Tell your friends. Let's do it. What up, mentors? On today's episode, I'm with my man, Sire of Restore OKC.
Speaker 1:We're talking about the slow crawl of curiosity and why pace matters when building mentoring relationships. We're talking about all sorts of things, connection. We're talking about expectations. Why focusing on you, not the success or advancement of your mentee is really the way to go. We're talking about selfless mentoring, humble mentoring.
Speaker 1:We're talking about why PACE matters and how to fertilize a mentoring relationship whenever your main job is just to toss seeds. We talk about the importance of consistency, building a safe, low judgment environment where your mentee feels comfortable and where trust can be established. We talk a tad bit about Chinese bamboo. I know that's crazy. And then we talk a little bit about crawling and why that is important in regards to mentoring.
Speaker 1:Lastly, we conclude with microwave versus crock pot mentoring. We're talking about modeling after the model, after Jesus Christ, and why Jesus was all about slow and long term development as opposed to fast and short term growth. So check out this podcast. Share it with your mentoring friends. If you're in a mentoring organization, use it as an organization to train, support, encourage, equip your mentors.
Speaker 1:Remember, we're not here to fix. We're just here to love a kid and to show them the person of Jesus Christ. And we do that when we show up consistently, whenever we encourage them, and whenever we love them with the unconditional love of Jesus. We love you. You can mentor and share it with your friends.
Speaker 1:Give us that five star. We need it. Come on, guys. You can mentor. Welcome to the You Can Mentor Podcast.
Speaker 1:This is Zach, and I'm with Derrick. Derrick, say hi.
Speaker 2:What up? What up? What up?
Speaker 1:What up? Derrick and I were just talking about our hair. I know. My his is curly, but
Speaker 2:mine has like a tighter curl to it.
Speaker 1:Mine's curly. Like, people who don't know me so, like, here's a fun fact. Like, people who aren't white see me, and they know I'm not white, but they don't know what I am. And so they're like It's, like, culturally ingenuous. Yeah.
Speaker 1:They're like, are you are you black? Are you half are are you Metz are you from like, they they don't know where I'm from. Yep. But but they're like, your hair and your nose, they give it's something. You
Speaker 2:know what saying? Thing that I love about people with that kind of curiosity is, like, they they it's like, their observation like, their observation is over here, and the information that they want is over here, and they don't know how to navigate their curiosity and their observation to the information that they want to get and so they're like, so, it's like, where are you from? That note is not even right here. So, it's so funny to see the wheels turning, but it's in mud. They can't get any traction.
Speaker 2:And then some of them are bold enough to be like, you know what, put mouth, just forgive me. What are you?
Speaker 1:Yes. Your nose is wide. What's you can't be white. I'm like, yeah. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1:Man, so one of my best friends is black, and he thought I was half black for, like, our first like, we had been friends for, like, six months. And he's like, woah. Wait. You're not? I'm like, no.
Speaker 1:I'm Mexican. And he's like, that's the only reason why we're friends. I thought you were half black. I was like, no. My last name's Garza.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Oh, man. I know.
Speaker 1:It's so funny, man. Oh, man. But that's not what we came to talk about. We didn't cut a lot of my nose. You know?
Speaker 2:Or your hair.
Speaker 1:Or my hair. You didn't come talk about me. We came to talk about mentoring, Derrick.
Speaker 2:Let's do it. We should probably do
Speaker 1:that. Okay. Okay. So today, we're talking about PACE. And, Derrick, this was your topic.
Speaker 1:So tell us about pace. Tell us the heart behind why you think this is important for us to talk about.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. So I was trying to capture this idea of pace and this slow crawl of curiosity and why pace matters when building relationships. When I say pace, it's the amount of time that we go from one place to the other, like, don't know that you would just arrive at relationship, right, that's not how you start. Well, very few people start there, right? I think the natural progression of the conversation of establishing and building relationship, there's a pace to it, there's a pace to it.
Speaker 2:And pace is really, really, really important when thinking about building a relationship, one that sustains, one that lasts, one that has roots, one that is significant, that is evident, that we put a lot of time and effort and intentionality, that we've allowed curiosity to kinda lead the way, and I think sometimes there's the urgency to go really, really fast because we wanna see these immediate results. And so today, I just want us to kinda unfold what PACE looks like and why that's important.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And why I think this is such a such a valuable topic. And, honestly, it's one that we we have never really spoken on PACE before, but it is kinda woven in and out of our books and our podcast and everything. But, I mean, my story is, like, I am I'm a very strategic, analytical, objective, like, I want to fixate it. Like, I want to see fruit.
Speaker 1:And Yeah. I'll tell you why I wanna see fruit. It's because it's birthed out of insecurity. It's birthed out of fear. It is it is I want to see this kid succeed because I want to be secure that I am a person who has something to offer someone else that will make him better.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. I want to see fruit in this kid's life because I am terrified that if I don't fix this kid as soon as possible, then he will go to jail. He will get a girl pregnant. He will right? And so Yeah.
Speaker 1:There are I, if I'm being honest with you, I want to fix this kid because I want to look successful. I I want them to say, man, Zach, that kid was so lost, but then he met you, and now he's straight a's, starting quarterback, beat theater, playing the trombone in the band, going to Harvard. You know? And and early on in my mentoring days I mean, for years, Derrick, I I based my value off of the success of a 15 year old. Mhmm.
Speaker 1:And I literally saw it as a business. Hey. A plus b. If I show up and I tell them how to get a job and I tell them how to and then they're gonna change in six months. And when Yeah.
Speaker 1:When they didn't change in six months or when they went backwards after six months. Because we all know that kids will for the first six months, everything's cool, but then they'll start showing you to to test you to say, oh, if if I start showing them the real me, will they leave? Yeah. If I don't see fruit after six months, I'm out because this is a waste of my time. And a plus b does not equal c in mid 20 it's patience.
Speaker 1:It's grace. It is this slowness. It is the ministry of Jesus.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So, you know, the truth the truth about that also is, like, you know, even even if we do the the planting, if we do the sowing, and we do the watering, if we go back to our fundamentals, like, the growth goes back to the Holy Spirit, it goes back to God. And so, temptation is that if that kid does well, it's because of me, and if that kid fails, it's because the temptation to absorb that, right, then it almost like it removes the god part of it, it removes that intangibles of our co labor and our participation with heaven, right? If we believe that in partnership, that we do this good work, God has given us access, He's given us gifts and talents to do the thing, if we believe that we save people, and if we don't go do the thing, then people go to hell, or if we do well, or if we embrace that, here's the temptation, is that we then closely associate those things with our identity, and I become a failure or success based on how other people respond or engage with what we do, and that is dangerous, Zach.
Speaker 2:As a mentor, that is is so dangerous to attach our identity and our faith and all those different things to the success or failure of a kid. We have to that's part of our training. We gotta make sure that we emphasize that when these new mentors come out, and even for the old mentors. Because here's the thing, as a seasoned mentor, it's very easy to say, I show up, I'm consistent, I'm open, I'm nonjudgmental, I follow these steps, and I've seen it happen enough to where I'm willing to bank that the next kid that comes up if I do that, that'll happen, and we all know that's not true. There's so many parents that have done everything that they could do possibly within their wheelhouse for a kid and that kid did not turn out well.
Speaker 2:And then there's their parents that did nothing. They probably actively went against the well-being of that kid and that kid turned out great. Right? So it's like, we have to acknowledge the limitation of our participation and we gotta start giving more space and more acknowledgement to the Holy Spirit and Heaven in the part that they play as well.
Speaker 1:Man, I think it's so fascinating. I was talking to someone the other day, and I mean, please don't misunderstand what I'm saying here. Like, yeah, as parents, we are godly. We teach them the ways. You know, teach your son the way they should go, and when they're old, they will not.
Speaker 1:But in the Bible, king David, you know, was a godly man. He had Solomon, the Yeah. The wisest man out there. Look at Solomon's kids. The wisest man out there, his kids were not the wisest people out there.
Speaker 1:On the other hand, look at Saul. Look at Saul, one of those evil kings out there. Look at his son, Jonathan, one of the most godly guys out there. And so I'm all for as parents, I'm all for as mentors, hey, we're we're gonna do everything we can to invest into this kid, to help this kid know the ways of God. Yeah.
Speaker 1:But at the end of the day, their gods, not ours. And we have to mentor and parent with open hands. Yep. Say, God, I am I am going to steward this relationship with as much responsibility and intentionality and prayer. But at the end of the day, I am letting go of expectations, and I'm putting trust in you, God, that you love this kid more than I do and that you have a plan for their life.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And so so this is what's so crazy. In most mentoring relationships, the average mentoring relationship, I think, is under two years. Well Why
Speaker 2:did I know that?
Speaker 1:Yeah. That's the thing. It's one one point eight, I think. Yeah. But the name of the game with young people is slow and long term.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. But most of the time, in Mentoring, we are focused on fast and short term. Yeah. But we toss the seeds, and that is our responsibility. We toss seeds.
Speaker 1:And sometimes, we water as well, and sometimes, we see growth. But all the times, we toss seeds, someone else comes and waters, and someone else sees the growth. Yeah. So I was talking to someone about this yesterday about, like, do we preach lifelong mentorship? Like, man, you're gonna start with this kid in eighth grade, and whenever you pass away, they're gonna speak at your funeral, and they're gonna you know?
Speaker 1:And, hey, I I am all about that. Let's make that happen in the name of Jesus. But odds are odds are Mhmm. That's not gonna happen. Odds are somewhere along the way, your kid's gonna leave you or you're gonna leave the kid or life's gonna happen.
Speaker 1:You're gonna change jobs. You're gonna move. They're gonna Yeah. And so let's don't see that as a failure. Yeah.
Speaker 1:But let's instead of seeing it as this is my kid, and I need to fix them, and I it is my responsibility, let's say, no. No. No. This is God's kid. It's God's responsibility, and let's mentor out of faith open handedly knowing that we do have a role.
Speaker 1:Yeah. But that role might be six months. That role might be six years. That role might be sixty years. But let's be open handedly.
Speaker 1:Let's hold it open handedly and know that God's always up to something, even when it looks like it's not.
Speaker 2:So You know, I know we talked about we talked about God, holy spirit, heaven. We've also talked about the the mentor. We have to also calculate the mentee as well, that has their own ideas and their own thoughts, and they're navigating their own decisions as well. And, you know, I've done everything that I could possibly do, and a mentee has gone against those things. Right?
Speaker 2:And so, there's lots of moving pieces when you think about success. I often think about somebody I heard an interesting statistic. I've heard it a while back, but I've heard it several times again about the number of babies that are not born. We just overshoot and oversimplify the miracle of birth, just in life, like, what has to happen in order for a human to make it into the earth? Somebody was throwing out some ridiculous statistics, and I was like, I did not know getting pregnant and having first of all, getting pregnant, and then that baby making it through the gestation cycle, and then coming into I did not know it was that difficult, but it makes sense the more I deal with kids.
Speaker 2:It makes sense when I think about everything that has to happen from a mentor's perspective, everything that has to happen in a school and in relationship, in the environment in which you connect, in the information you give them, and they have to be in a season and place in their life for it to receive. And not only receive, but it to land, not only for the receive and land, but take root, and then it has to have time to grow and make sense. Like, everything that has to happen for a mentee to grab something, it land and register, and then for them to apply it and see enough fruit based on the trust and relationship that it like, all these moving components, then success is a miracle. When you think about progress and advancement, that's a miracle. When you think about all of the things that have to conspire, as I heard Pharrell give in the interview, he talked about every all the things that had to work for him to succeed, it's it's phenomenal that he's even where he is today.
Speaker 2:I think about that when a kid succeeds, when everything that takes place has like, it's an absolute miracle when success happens. And I think for us to oversimplify what it takes in order for an idea to take place in order for a kid to succeed, I think we have to be realistic about that as well.
Speaker 1:There's a couple of things that I'm thinking, and then we will stop this rant and get on to our actual questions. Number one, as mentors, let us not take offense. Yeah. Man, we cannot get offended when our kids don't behave the way that we think that they see. We we have to be grace filled.
Speaker 1:Number two, the power of prayer. There are things that our kids need to overcome that there's no way that we can make that happen in our own strength. We need God to move. Yeah. And thank God that he loves these kids so much more than we do.
Speaker 1:Yes. And then the third thing is thankfulness and encouragement. Man, when you see a kid doing something right, even the smallest thing, the smallest thing, let us as mentors champion the mess out of them. Like, let's encourage. Let's, like, throw them a party, man, because there are so many things that our kids have to overcome.
Speaker 1:There are so many battles. You talk about a miracle, and all those things are, and it's in the midst of trying to learn how to stay off their phone. It's in the midst of trying to learn how to make money. It's in the midst of trying to learn how to have dinner. I mean, it's just all these things are are are warring against them.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And so for them to reach their their full potential in the midst of this chaos really is a miracle. But let's encourage them. If we can do one thing as mentors, let's champion, let's love, let's encourage, let's spur them on, let's be people of encouragement.
Speaker 2:Youth had the organs, You need a organ behind you, brother. Don't you?
Speaker 1:You are hot today. I'm just. I don't know if it's that I I don't know. I don't know what it is.
Speaker 2:But let's get into these questions. Let's go.
Speaker 1:Come on. Okay. So, Derrick, how long does connection take in this whole concept of pace and Yeah. Slow and long term versus fast and short term? Let's talk about connection.
Speaker 2:Yep. You know, I think I hesitate to even throw out a time frame or a number of weeks or months because, you know, the mentor is different, the mentee is different, the environment and the circumstances are different, the commitment levels are different, but I think that there are some things we have to consider. I know in a previous podcast, we talked about this evolution of relationship and a mentoring relationship. You know, we say, first thing you do is get into their space, right? We gotta be curious about them.
Speaker 2:The next thing is shared space, where they engage with other people, I have access to it, they have access to it. We talked about getting them in our space as mentors, you know, even thinking about their space and the layers in their space of their family and their community and their background and their history. And so, I think, when we're talking about the movement and the pace of building a relationship, when the question is asked how long does connection take, I wanna say connection takes as long as it takes to connect. And that is so ambiguous, but I think that for sometimes, for me, when I meet someone and I'm genuinely interested in them and I'm fascinated with the work that they do, and I walk away from that person and somebody was like, who is that? And I'm like, oh, and I can't remember their name, and it's like, man, that was a great conversation, I talked to them for thirty minutes, I can't remember their name.
Speaker 2:The fact that I can't remember their name isn't indicative of my interest or the value of the conversation, it's like, I just let that detail slip. And so for me, what I've noticed about kids that I mentor, that sometimes it takes a while for some of those details to stick on my end and it takes a while for those details to stick on their end. And some of those details, some of those components in those conversations are really important because you can't get to the next level or to the next spot until those components and those variables fit. And so, how long does connection take? I think connection takes as long as it takes to connect.
Speaker 2:I wanna consistently and predictably connect with this human and I wanna build on top of those things because I don't get access to one space until I've mastered the other, right, until I've shown up to the community center, until I've shown up for McDonald's meal, until I've shown up to the football game, until I've shown up to the after school program, until I've shown up to these places consistently, I don't get access to the next level, which could be their friends and their family and their home and their neighborhood and their churches, I don't get access to it. So, how long does it take? It takes as long as it takes to connect and I want mentors to be intuitive and open and patient enough to let those connections take place so that they can build on those connections and get access to the next level.
Speaker 1:Man, there's a couple of things that are going through my mind. Go with the flow, not force. Yeah. So, like, you can't force it. And there are some kids that I've connected with deep in six weeks, and then there's some kids that I have not connected with at all in two years.
Speaker 1:And yes, you know, it's it's their personality. It's their story. It's what's going on in their life right now. It's He You know, all the things that that they've experienced. But for and I would honestly say for the majority, it's just gonna take longer.
Speaker 1:And if they've experienced hurt, that's only gonna create obstacles. And so and I, like, love the story about about the, it's called a Chinese bamboo plant. I don't know if you've heard about this. Have you ever heard about this? Gonna hear about it today.
Speaker 1:Okay. So allow me to nerd out on bamboo for a second. Okay? So the Chinese bamboo, you plant this little seed of bamboo in the ground, and you water it, and you nurture it, and you make sure it's getting enough sunlight, and you're doing all of these things. And it seems to do nothing.
Speaker 1:There's nothing going on. Mhmm. Okay? For year one, nothing going on. Year two, nothing going on.
Speaker 1:Year three, nothing going on. But what it's doing is it's actually developing a massive underground root system that you can't see. Mhmm. Somewhere around year five, six, seven. Yeah.
Speaker 1:It shoots up incredibly fast, sometimes 80 feet in a couple weeks. Wow. And this shows that unseen effort builds the foundation for sudden explosive growth. Okay? Excuse me.
Speaker 1:Let me see. I want to it's a metaphor for life, for personal growth, for mentoring because it looks like nothing's happening so often in your mentoring relationship. Mhmm. But just you have to trust that something is happening. And if there's one thing that I want in my own mentoring relationship, in my own marriage, and with my kids, with my walk with God, it's patience.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Like, man, we have to be patient, and that is a fruit of the Holy Spirit. We actually can't be patient if we're not walking with the Holy Spirit. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1:So let us yeah. So let us as mentors be patient in connecting with our mentees.
Speaker 2:Yeah. You know, we how much you're thinking about, you know, even some of the the bible verses that talk about this growth process. You know, book of Matthew talks about this, you know, casting the seed and how some of that information gets taken up quickly, the birds come and get it, and some of it, you know, never makes it into the soil, some has shallow roots, but the one that is able to produce fruit and then grow are the ones that covered up by the soil, the roots go deep. And I love the metaphor in the bible and I dare not speak for intent, but four seeds were cast, one grew. Right, you think about the ratio of the amount of information in relationship that will succeed, four was thrown, one grew.
Speaker 2:And I think about as much information that we throw at our mentees and some of that information is not even covert, right, it's like some of the information that we're throwing is showing up. So while I sit down with them and I'm like, hey, if I want you to take away one thing from our connection today, it is God loves you and that you're strong, and that mentee may let that just go in one ear and out the other, but what they did catch was that you showed up on time again and you can come next time with another lesson and they engage in the conversation, it's like, but what they caught was you showed up again on time. And they may not take away any of these things, you know, it may not register immediately, maybe until later, but what they're holding onto which allows them to to receive all the other information is, this dude is consistent, he's reliable, he's predictable, he keeps his word, and because of that, all this underground work that's being done, that when I start giving that information later, then they catch it and they grab ahold onto it because all the roots have been laid because I showed up consistently on time, again and again and again.
Speaker 2:So, I think for us, part of that patience and part of that pace is we don't know what's happening on the inside of that mentee. We don't know what root system is being laid, what relationship, what trust, what safety is being established, we don't know what our presence and our conversation is doing in their minds and their hearts. We should gotta trust that we do our part, God does his part, the Holy Spirit does his part, and that when it's time for that relationship to take off and those lessons to reach fruit, that we've done our part, and that the Lord will do the rest.
Speaker 1:So much more Scott than Todd, man. So a little more Scott than Todd. Love a good cliche. I do. I do too.
Speaker 1:I'm just I am so cheesy. Like, people who know me well, they're like, you say the same thing all the time. That's all you say. And I'm like, yeah. I know.
Speaker 2:Yeah. But are you are you catching it, though? Because that's important.
Speaker 1:Because I've only got, like, nine phrases. But okay. So so you talked about some of these things about showing up, but, like Yep. In in this realm of connection, of tossing seeds. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Let's talk about some of the things that we can do to fertilize these seeds to help create the environment where connection is more likely to happen.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, part of part of my training when I work with mentors is, you know, I think a lot of organizations, they wanna come in, they wanna have this one hour training, they wanna have this two hour training, this four hour training, it's all day training, they don't wanna train again until the next year because they really wanna get their mentors out in the field and doing the work.
Speaker 2:And I admire the urgency behind getting caring adults with kids, I also understand the need of getting them out there quickly, but I think more than getting them out there and getting them out there quickly, is getting them out there equipped. And I think when we get them out there equipped, later on down the line, this will prevent burnout, this will I'm sure eventually you and I will talk about the reasons that mentors quit and fade out and all that stuff, that's probably on the conversation list. But when I think about how do we equip them in order to fertilize and and how do we get them to create environments that are conducive for connection and relationship development, I think one of the things at the top of the list, I I gotta believe at the top of the list, is gonna be consistency. I think you gotta you gotta show up, man, and you gotta do what you say you're gonna do. I think that screams louder than anything else, like, you gonna show up, you know, number one, but are you gonna show up again, and then again, and then again?
Speaker 2:Are you gonna be somebody that is predictable in your behavior? Are you gonna be somebody that does what they said they're gonna do and then you're just gonna do it? Not to say that we aren't gonna show up late every now and again or have to reschedule a meeting, but that should be the rare occurrence. What should happen consistently is that we show up and we do what we say we're gonna do. I got about five more, but what do you think about that consistency piece as far as setting the environment and watering and tending to the seeds that we're trying to plant as it pertains to Russian development.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I think it's the most important thing. And so showing up consistently Yeah. And making sure that they leave encouraged Yeah. And doing all of that in the context of a safe environment, which I say consistency is the most important thing. Well, obviously, safety is the most important thing.
Speaker 1:Mhmm. But but how can we create this environment of the mentor feels safe, the mentor feels the the mentee feels safe, the mentee feels comfortable, they know what to expect, and that's where trust can build. Are you showing up trying to teach them things? Yeah. I know for me, I'm, you know, so judgmental.
Speaker 1:Like, I'm I'm just like, man, I like to show up and I'm like, well, he's not. You know? These are the six things he's not doing right. And I'm like, man, you gotta kill that. And but I'm just like, those are my, like, show up, don't judge, but instead be encouraging.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And that's gonna create the environment where trust can happen on its own timetable. You know, when I do when I
Speaker 2:do these trainings with these these mentors, I have something called this these table tent ladders. And, you know, for those of you listening, feel free to use this. I think this is a great tool to try to figure out what's important or or what mentors prioritize as it pertains to relationship development. So I give them these two table tents and one has trust and the other has safety on it, and I'm like, alright, and I'll pair them up so they can have this discussion. I'm like, alright, as it pertains to developing a relationship, which one of these matters most?
Speaker 2:And you'll see people all the time, it'll be like, safety, because without safety you can't establish trust. And then another group is like, but how do you have safety without trust? So trust comes first, right? They do this, and then I throw in a third one, which is consistency, and then they're like, wait, wait, wait, so in order like, safety can't happen one time, safety is something that you have to consist of, so consistency comes before, say, anyhow, by the time I get at the bottom of this activity, I got 10 table tents and there's chaos in the room, you know, everybody is like, your order's wrong, my order's right, and I'm like, alright, everybody settle down, everybody settle down. Here's the right order, when it pertains to developing relationship, as a mentor, this is the right order, and everybody's got their pencils out, and I'm like, number one, there is no right order, there's chaos in the ruler.
Speaker 2:And I think one of the reasons it's important to bring that, to establish that, is because what's important to me is not always be important to the person that I mentor, but I have to figure out what's important to them so that I can match that energy and understand how to engage them. Because, if I'm coming in with advice, and I'm gonna provide advice consistently, and they're gonna see how consistently I provide that advice, which makes me a safe place, which then establishes trust, but they are so preoccupied by being safe that they can't even receive my advice or they won't let me be consistent because they're pushing me away because they don't feel safe, then we're gonna miss each other every single time, right? And so it's really, really important for us, when we're talking about creating this environment that's conducive for relationship development and growth, we have to understand that while all of these are on the table, consistency, trust, safety, being nonjudgmental, like, all these different things, that what's important to me is not gonna be important to the next person. So I gotta figure out what they prioritize and let that be the avenue through which we establish
Speaker 1:Jeez. That's really good, Derrick. That's that's really good. I man, I feel like one of our jobs is mentoring leaders, mentoring organizations as we train, as we things like that. It's I'm gonna be honest.
Speaker 1:Early on in my mentoring career, I didn't really take training seriously. I didn't really even take safety seriously, which god help me. But I was like, let's let's just get these mentors with the kids as fast as possible. Yeah. And what I found is, man, we we actually need to probably do more training and equipping than we think.
Speaker 1:Yes. And, yes, it's gonna make the mentor mad. You know? Well, I didn't sign up to do this. I've got four kids who go to college.
Speaker 1:I don't need your help. I'm like, oh, you might have you might be an expert with your parents or with your kids. Yeah. But you're not an expert with this kid. Mm-mm.
Speaker 1:The best mentors are humble mentors. Yeah. They're willing to come in as learners. They're willing to be curious. They're willing to be taught.
Speaker 1:They're willing to learn how to deal with kids that we knew with. Yeah. So, man, we and I for so long, I was like, well, an okay mentor is good enough. And I'm like, would I I want someone saying that when they're dealing with my kid? Like, oh, like, my kid is only like, they just need an average mentor.
Speaker 1:I'm like, no. Like, I wanna see every kid that I mentor like my own child, and I want my own child to have the best mentor. And so man, may may we as organizational leaders be serious about instilling and finding humility in our mentors. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. And can can we make sure that they are humble enough to be equipped and to learn to be learners? Because the best mentors are humble mentors. And if they like oh, go ahead.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah. Please. No. No.
Speaker 1:Please. No. Go ahead. Okay. So, A.
Speaker 1:M, they come in with your perspective. Hey. I don't have the answers, but I'm gonna be patient. I'm gonna listen. I'm gonna observe.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna use my brain. I'm gonna hear from the Holy Spirit, and I'm gonna figure out, God, what does this kid need and give me the tools to help give them what they need.
Speaker 2:So that goes into exactly what I was gonna say. When we talk about how do we create an environment where a great mentorship can take place, a relationship, healthy, functioning, strategic relationship is developed, as a mentor, I have to remind myself that it's all about them. And so when I want to cut corners and I wanna skip training, that ee doesn't get the best version of me or doesn't get the best opportunity to experience the best mentorship. This is a it's like what's the I don't know who who said this, but it's like, if I had, you know, four hours to chop down a tree, I'm gonna spend three of it sharpening my axe or whatever the analogy is, I think that the more that we can equip our mentors on the front end, then they can provide the best mentorship on the back end. I can't tell you how many times I've been a part of an organization and they come in, they give their mentor a one hour training and they give them a certificate of completion and then they send them out, right?
Speaker 2:And then they spent the majority of that mentor's life with that kid answering phone calls, cleaning up messes, you know, it's like, they got that goal behind them and do things and talk about things and have conversations that could have easily been had if they would have taken an additional six to eight hours of training on the front end. You're a mandatory reporter, this is how you come into schools, this is when you can meet them, this is who the contact for that school is, this is, you know, like, all these different things that people wanna rush through, and I'm like, man, we have to consistently go backwards in order to go forward. Our mentees don't get the best mentorship experience. I also think part of the humility is that anytime anybody comes in and they don't want to go through the process that an organization has established for their mentors, to me, that is a lack of humility and it speaks more to the arrogant. If you are as good of a mentor as you say you are, go through the process.
Speaker 2:Hear it again. Do it again, take the quiz again, like, go through the process every single time because I often need a refresher as well. I'm like, oh, yeah, I was helping facilitate a strategic planning session yesterday here in Oklahoma City in the metro and there's a lady that came in that co facilitated with me on a different topic though and I sat in on her session. The guy that was over the the workshop was like, or over the strategic planning session was like, hey, man, you don't have to sit through this. I was like, no, actually, want to.
Speaker 2:Like, it's been a while since I've sat in on stuff like this, and at the end, I showed her all my notes. I was like, I knew that I knew this stuff before you got in, but you said something that either I didn't know or reminded me of a practice that I had not prioritized in my professional development strategies for a really long time. And so thank you for letting me sit in, thank you for that refresher. Our mentors need that as well, because we need to keep those very important things, those priorities, in the front of our mentoring minds when dealing with these kids.
Speaker 1:Man, it really does remind me of Jesus. I mean, for three years, he taught his disciples, and he didn't give them a one hour. He said, here's three years, and I'm gonna take long walks, I'm gonna give you grace, I'm gonna be patient, and then they were released to change the world, and change the world they did.
Speaker 2:Wait, Yeah. Wait, wait, Zach, you cannot drop that and we skip past that, hold on real quick. Because here's the thing, even because I call Jesus the greatest mentor of all time, the number of personalities that he had to deal with, and the way that he had to, you know, part of the thing about being a good mentor is that I tell people being a mentor is speaking from the future. I'm back I'm back from the future. I've done it and I'm telling you, I'm telling you, Peter, you're gonna deny me.
Speaker 2:I know you bro, I know you and you're like, no, I'm not, no, I'm not. Okay. Listen, you're gonna do it. Peter, get thee behind me, like, but don't get too far behind, like, keep coming with me. I'm just saying, like, in this moment, like, okay, Peter, I know who you are.
Speaker 2:Are you gonna feed my sheep? God, I'm Okay. No, Peter, listen. You're answering too quickly. Are you gonna feed my sheep?
Speaker 2:Peter, stop talking, just listen to me. Are you gonna feed my Jesus was the greatest mentor and he had all these different personalities that he was handling, and he was so patient, he was so kind, and I know for us, in order to be that way, if we model ourselves after the greatest model, if we self proclaim that Jesus is our model, not only as a human, as a person, but in mentorship, we gotta look at the the techniques that that he used. For people that have done the thing over and over and over again, he says, hey, let's go back out to the same spot, toss to the other side of the boat. They're like, Jesus, we've out there. We've been out there, man.
Speaker 2:No, no, listen, let's go to the same spot. I'm a go out there with you. I'm a go out there with you, toss to the other side. And then our mentees do it, and they hear us and they see us and we're consistent over time, I think it's really, really important for us to to note how patient he was and how he walked alongside and the grace that he extended, and he gave them room to mess up. And when they did, he didn't cast them.
Speaker 2:He really brought them in closer, and I think that's really important for us to know.
Speaker 1:He's definitely the greatest mentor. That's for sure. Come on. The goat. I mean, he he he sent them out two by two.
Speaker 1:He was I mean, he didn't give up on him. Like, man, I would have given up on Peter. That guy's Bro. Peter, shut up.
Speaker 2:You wanna hear chopping people's ears on him. Go sit down, bro.
Speaker 1:One of my favorite things is whenever he's like, you're not gonna wash my feet? And and then he's like, yeah. I am. And he's like, alright. Fine.
Speaker 1:Wash my whole body. I'm just like, Peter, chill, bro. Like, you need to
Speaker 2:Damn, man.
Speaker 1:Alright, man. This will be the last thing that we talk about. But talk a little bit about crawling in Mentoring. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean, you know,
Speaker 2:we talked about this this pace earlier, and snail's pace, you know, I would I would encourage anybody to start to slow and to be very intentional or methodical in their approach. But, you know, one of the greatest quotes that I've that I've ever heard as it pertains to mentorship is actually from the greats, Martin Luther King Junior, and he talks about, you know, if you can't fly, then run, if you can't run, then walk, you can't walk, then crawl, but no matter what, you gotta keep pushing forward, keep pushing forward. And I know our mentors, man, they are coming in with this energy and this ambition and they really, really, really wanna fly. But I really encourage people when you think about any great runner or sprinter or any car that takes off fast or any plane that goes Mach three or whatever it is, they start from a very still position and then they have this progress about them, this process about them, this matriculation about them, and I just really wanna encourage anybody that is going about this mentoring relationship that we will eventually fly. I do not doubt that anybody that gets into this profession, that they don't wanna see their mentee fly, they wanna see them soar, they wanna see them do really great things, they wanna see them run, they wanna see them walk things out, but all of that stuff, it starts with a crawl.
Speaker 2:This is the pace that we're talking about. It starts with, you know, remembering their favorite colors, and their birthdays, and their names, and their grades, and their personal interests, and their aspirations, and their friends' names, and their teachers' names, and their parents' names, these little quirks and their personalities, it starts with these little bitty details, and if we try to fly, if we try to run before, it comes off less about relationship development and more about interrogation. And a lot of the kids that I deal with have been interrogated, and they associate interrogation with law enforcement, police officers, getting in trouble, and I don't want our mentors to start off in a relationship that way. I really want them to be organic and to share information and build that relationship, and a lot of times it feels like crawling. But if I can encourage anybody with the late, the great Doctor.
Speaker 2:Martin Luther King, he says, you'll get there, you'll get there, you'll eventually fly, you'll eventually run, you'll eventually walk, but everything, no matter how fast somebody goes at one point, they all started with crawling. I'm gonna encourage all of our mentors to pay attention to that crawl pace because you're laying down some very important relationship development components, some very important foundational pieces that will allow us to move from level to level at the pace of our mentee.
Speaker 1:Malin, this isn't microwave mentoring. This is crowd pot mentoring. You know what saying? Not me.
Speaker 2:What? Leave it and forget it, baby. Set it and forget it.
Speaker 1:It's just this consistent showing up, creating safe environments, not judging. Short and short and fast is not the way of the mentoring. It's slow. It's long term. This is not fixing a kid.
Speaker 1:This is not a plus b equals c. Yeah. It is showing up. It's just like Jesus. It's showing up day after day.
Speaker 1:It's being patient. It's being filled with grace. It's championing them. Yeah. It's it's guiding them, it's shepherding, it's these long walks, it's these slow conversations, and we just cannot have our timetable.
Speaker 1:We can't have expectations because God's in charge. It's His timetable. And when He is ready, and when his kid's ready, then he will do his thing. He is faithful. He is faithful.
Speaker 1:He is not in a hurry. He's not freaking out like me. You know? He loves this kid. He has a plan for them, and how kind of him to let us in on this journey, to watch him be who he is in the life of this amazing kid.
Speaker 1:So Period.
Speaker 2:I got nothing else to add. Great color. Way way to
Speaker 1:wrap that up, man. It's almost like I do this as a job. Or a list. I mean, let's be real. I don't really do it for a job because it's only, like, seven people actually listen.
Speaker 1:But as We're playing with you. Alright. Hey. Look, guys. We hope that this encourages y'all to be good mentors, to keep showing up, to keep focusing in on Jesus, keep focusing in on them, not you, to mentor with humility, with selflessness, with patience, with grace.
Speaker 1:And just remember, God is up to something. I promise you, he's up to something. So keep on showing up. You can mentor and share this with your friends. Share it with your organization.
Speaker 1:We love you. See you. Thanks for tuning in to the You Can Mentor Podcast. Our vision is to raise up and invest in mentoring leaders who will launch and grow thriving mentoring ministries. We do that by equipping and encouraging faith based leaders through relational connection, Christ centered resources, and collaborative gatherings.
Speaker 1:Check out our books, come to the National Christian Mentoring Gathering, and engage with our network and cohorts. You can find all this at youcanmentor.com or on social media. Please share this episode with a mentoring friend and leave us that five star review. Thank you. You can mentor.