This is the final week of the boundaries series. This week, Beth and Stephen dig into why and when of a mentoring relationship needing to end. They also discuss how to end it well when a mentoring relationship does need to end.
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
Speaker 2:and give
Speaker 1: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. I'm Beth Winter with my co host, Stephen Murray.
Speaker 3:We are ending the Boundary series.
Speaker 2:Oh, wow. You really just came out the gate with that.
Speaker 3:On a doozy.
Speaker 2:It is.
Speaker 3:What are we talking about today, Beth?
Speaker 2:Today, we are ending our series with so we've talked about boundaries. We've talked about red flags for when there's boundary issues. We've talked about how to be proactive in establishing healthy boundaries. But sometimes, in the season of life you're in or maybe in this particular relationship, it's just it's not working out right now. And so when that happens, sometimes a mentorship has to come to an end.
Speaker 2:And so today, we are talking about when a mentorship ends, end it well, and how do we do that?
Speaker 3:The the notion that ending a mentor relationship is always negative is wrong. And so we understand that there are many situations where this is not what we want Mhmm. And it stinks. But it doesn't have to always be negative. And so when we look at mentor match endings, we wanna do our best to end them well.
Speaker 3:Even if the circumstances are not favorable, you can still end a mentor relationship well. And so that's why we wanna talk about this today. And it's it's kind of the the marking of a boundary of there's a beginning to your mentor relationship, and there's an end to your mentor relationship. Every mentor relationship has some form of ending and beginning. Even if your relationship subsists, it might not be with the expectations placed on you with a a formal mentor relationship with a mentoring program.
Speaker 3:Mhmm. We have mentor relationships that have progressed because a child graduates from high school and goes to college. That's my situation right now. I am not meeting with my mentee twice a month because he's in Oklahoma. That would be very difficult for me.
Speaker 3:And so us ending our mentor relationship as it stood within the expectations we had in the organization
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:They're now completely different. Doesn't mean we don't still text or have relationship. It's just different.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:That's an example.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Which I think is good to start out because I'm even thinking of in the last week or so, we've had a couple mentorships that have had to end. And I think there's been a conversation I've been having with our mentor coordinator of how do we set this up and frame this as it doesn't mean that your relationship with this kid has to be like, we don't know each other anymore. We don't talk anymore at all. But it's the formal relationship with the expressed commitments has come to a close.
Speaker 2:And and that's really what it is, and it doesn't have to be this big, like, falling out situation. That's not really we hope that's not the case. So it's it's more a release of because of the things going on, because of the circumstances, this formal relationship with these set expectations are off the table.
Speaker 3:Beth, can you tell us some mentoring research related to mentor match endings? I'm sure somebody has studied the effects of ending mentor matches. When you talk about kids from hard places, naturally, your mind goes to failed relationships. And so the thought of ending a mentor match feels like a failure just naturally, but it's not necessarily. It can be, and I wanna be clear that sometimes ending a mentor match as a mentoring organization, we are doing that because we have some thought about the health, the intentionality.
Speaker 3:Maybe some expectations are going unmet. But I I wonder if you could speak to the research behind mentor match endings.
Speaker 2:The things that I've seen is exactly like what you're talking about where what I'm thinking of is I think it could be easy for a mentor to just kind of fall off their radar because they don't wanna have, like, this resolute conversation of closing it, and they'd rather just kind of nonchalantly fall off on their commitments versus making it this hard and fast, like, okay, this is done. But it's actually more beneficial for the kid to have closure and clarity that what I thought I could expect that is changing. And it is hard. Like most of the kids who are in mentoring relationships, in youth mentoring and adolescent mentoring, there's gonna be some sort of relational reason that they're in that. And so there you can imagine there's relational trauma or just relational hardship of some sort.
Speaker 2:They may have dealt with abandonment or confusion about past relationships. And so not ending those well, not ending those with clarity and closure just reinvites those things to grow in the child, like, for them to become even more cemented of this is what I can expect of adults. They are going to leave, and they're not gonna tell me why. And I'm left with all these questions. Was it something I did?
Speaker 2:Was it something I didn't do? And so by not sitting down and having what might be a hard conversation with some emotions that come up, it's it's leaving your mentee to figure all of that out by himself, and that's really not fair to him or her.
Speaker 3:Wow. You always finish a sentence with a period. You always finish a mentor relationship with some form of resolution of giving closure. And if not, you leave a kid to run on with life with more questions than answers. Run on was a pun on sentences that keep going.
Speaker 2:Technically, some sentences end with exclamation marks.
Speaker 3:And Yeah. I guess so. But I think that's so good. And I I want to leave my mentees I mean, you just think about your own relationships and the ones that faded into the cosmic microwave background of the universe Mhmm. Where it's just like, I don't really know where it went wrong or what went wrong or if we're good.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And you just carry those things and, like, that can induce anxiety.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:And especially for a a mentor relationship to not end with clarity, I think can be, on one side, devastating. On another side, just always leave you with questions.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:And, yeah, we want we wanna resolve those things well.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Especially if it's like this kid has really shared pieces of their life and their story that are hard. It could just be really all the progress that you could have made with this kid and trusting people and opening up could be regressed if they get really hurt of it not ending well with clarity, because all of a sudden they're like, well, I'm never telling anybody anything about myself again because what was the point of all of that if this guy doesn't even care about me now? So the responsibility for the mentor isn't to to take on the emotional processing that that kid might go through with the closure of the mentorship, but the responsibility is to do everything you can with the best interest of the kid to end it well with clarity, to specifically and verbally actually say, like, this is not about you. Like and I care about you, and this is what this is what's going on.
Speaker 2:And answer the questions that might be popping up in their head of it it's me. Like, it's something I did or whatever it is. So
Speaker 3:Can you list situations where a mentor relationship should end? Moving. That makes sense. You've been to Oklahoma, game over Mhmm. Unless you live in Oklahoma.
Speaker 2:If a parent is
Speaker 3:So situations where you're not able to fulfill your commitment
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 3:Which would be moving.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:Are there others that fall into that category? Illness?
Speaker 2:Possibly. I mean, if it's like an ongoing thing. Yeah. I I was gonna list, like, you and the parent can't get on the same page. I think if that's an ongoing pattern, it might not be a viable relationship.
Speaker 2:And the other thing I was thinking of is like, if you're going through a major life change of your own, whether it's a traumatic event or just a huge life change, like having a baby or
Speaker 3:Starting a business.
Speaker 2:Starting a business, like really big things where all of a sudden you don't have the capacity that you had before, that might be and maybe it's maybe it's just taking a break. Maybe it's not ending the the relationship, but it might be. So those could be things.
Speaker 3:Any other? So that's if you're not able to fulfill the commitment. Other situations may be
Speaker 2:It might be on their end as well. Like, it might be the parent taking on a new level of responsibility. It might be a like, if you're in a mentorship, that's like, here at 4 Inter Mentoring, our our process is that we're matching kids who don't have a father figure in the home. And so mom's relationship status may change, and a stepdad or someone else may come into the picture, or maybe we've even had dad come back into the picture. And so we don't wanna overstep our boundaries there, and so that might be a a way that a relationship comes to an end.
Speaker 3:And it I I guess you can make a distinction between, like, being unable to fulfill your commitment and, like, an I don't wanna say unwilling, but maybe maybe that is a part of it. It's like some I I imagine that there are some mentor relationships where you can become unwilling to fulfill your commitment through the choices that you're making or the choices that family's making. And so maybe that's a good way to frame it. You're either unable or you're unwilling to fulfill your commitment, and the mentor relationship needs to end Mhmm. Because of those things.
Speaker 3:And that's always a judgment call. I I know for a fact the reasons mentors are most likely to quit are because they don't feel equipped or they don't have clear expectations of what we expect of them. And because of that, they feel discouraged that they're not doing enough, that they're not making a difference. And so without those things, many times, you can run into mentors bailing on their commitment because they don't see the point. They don't see the progress.
Speaker 3:And it is so easy in life to find things where you can see progress. You can plant something and see it grow. You can start learning Spanish and start speaking Spanish. It's really easy to see the pro the progression of the things that you invest in when they're inanimate objects or or whatever. But when it comes to a mental relationship, if you don't see the progress, it can become difficult to care unless you have perspective and you know what you signed up for.
Speaker 3:And and and so those kind of things, navigating it to the point where you're not just saying, okay. You didn't you didn't show up this week. Maybe this relationship needs to end. That's not what we're talking about.
Speaker 2:Yeah. No.
Speaker 3:We're talking about an ongoing issue Mhmm. For months where a mentor is unable or unwilling to fulfill their commitment or vice versa.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:Is that a fair way to put it? Yeah. So, Beth, what do mentors need to know about when their mentor matches are ending?
Speaker 2:The first person I think you should talk to about that, if you're in a formal mentor organization, is whoever oversees you. They're probably going to have some specific guidelines or policies or processes that they're gonna walk through with you. And I think the the key thing here is to trust the process on that. I think it it can be I think within this whole boundary conversation, there's a lot of opportunity for us to think, well, my my relationship's the exception. Trust me.
Speaker 2:I've been with this kid for this long. I know what he needs in this scenario. And I think that can really pop up in ending a match because maybe we feel that, or maybe there's a little bit of a desire to take an easier route out or whatever it is. Maybe you just you don't have the time or the capacity to wanna go through that process fully, so you wanna kind of do a simpler route and just text mom and be out. But whatever the process is, we just ask that you would trust that the mentoring organization has put a lot of thought into how to do this well.
Speaker 2:They've they've seen matches end well. They've seen them end bad. They're learning from those things. They're adjusting their advice because of what they've seen. And at the end of the day, they have your best interest and the kids' best interest and the mom's best interest at heart, and they're trying to lead you in a path that's gonna be good for everybody involved.
Speaker 2:So
Speaker 3:Let's be honest, though. We do have the kids' best interest in mind, primarily.
Speaker 2:Totally.
Speaker 3:But we do also have the mentor's best interest in mind as well. If I'm seeing a mentor who is struggling with life's challenges in their own personal life that are preventing them from fulfilling their commitment. I am I'm thinking about how the kid is affected Yeah. By that. But, also, I I think when when I've seen mentors piling on shame and guilt about not being able to fulfill their commitment or not holding realistic expectations of their own capacity to manage their family, their work, and their volunteering, Me being able to speak into that and say, hey.
Speaker 3:It doesn't seem like this is the right season for you to be committing to this. Yeah. That can make a way for a new mentor relationship to flourish for that kid. Mhmm. But it can also unburden a mentor Mhmm.
Speaker 3:Who's feeling all these expectations that they can't meet and is just shoveling shame and guilt over their their life and causing them, I mean, stress and anxiety
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:When we could just alleviate that by saying, you know what? It's it's just not working out, and that's fine.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:We need to move in a different direction.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Which knowing that that's gonna happen at some point because we talked about in one of the earlier episodes that most I mean, most mentorships, you're not replacing family here. And so it's not necessarily this lifelong relationship. And so the boundaries in place are helping a healthy relationship while it's going on, but also leading up to a healthy closure whenever it is time for that. And so, yeah, I think the boundaries are helpful, especially in the a mentor who maybe is needing to take a step back, but maybe feels a pressure of, I'm gonna fail this kid entirely if I if I do that.
Speaker 2:But we wanna take the pressure off of saying, like, that's okay. We've gotta we we understand that this happens. This is part of the process. To you gotta do what's, best for the kid, which might mean you saying, I can't do this right now. And that's also part of the trust the process Yep.
Speaker 2:Is you might not be a part of the process for that kid in this season anymore.
Speaker 3:And that that is hard because I think most most mentors, when they're signing up, at least the ones that I've seen, they're signing up for a lifelong relationship, and it's hard to hedge on that and be like, hey. I know that's what you're signing up for. Historically, most of our mentor relationships last for our formal mentor relationships last for 3 years. And so that's because of a multitude of reasons, one of which is just the transiency of life. Our mentors move.
Speaker 3:Our mentees move.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:Things life happens. Yeah. And we have to be okay with those transitions. Really, I I see our just volunteering in general. Like, everyone's everyone in the church has experienced being put on the welcome team or some team.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:And it's like, if you're if you get onto that team once
Speaker 2:You're never leaving.
Speaker 3:The expectation, you never had it of, like, being on the welcome team forever, but there's this feeling of, like, well, now that I'm on the welcome team, there's an expectation that I'm always on the welcome team.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:And that can be something that organizations, nonprofits, anywhere where there's volunteering, where you have to set clear boundaries and say, hey. I'm asking you to commit to this for a year. I'm asking you to commit to this for 2 years, 3 years, what whatever whatever that is. Even if our mentors have their own personal expectations of they want a lifelong relationship with a kid they're mentoring, I always tell them, I want you to sign up again every year to the commitment that you're making. And so every single year, they have an off ramp Mhmm.
Speaker 3:To say, you know what? I don't think I can fulfill my commitment. I think I need to take a year off or I need to step down. I think you have to create those off ramps
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:In order for you to just give opportunities to maintain health Yeah. For your mentor relationships and not expect people just to always be a mentor Mhmm. For the kid in your program.
Speaker 2:And that even provides, like, maybe a space for if a mentor is like, I am struggling with my relationship with I am frustrated. But in this season of relooking at what it means to be a mentor, that might give them room to talk to mom or kid about maybe, hey. I'm excited to step back in as your mentor this year. I wanna get on the same page about some things that would really help me mentor better in the season and maybe reaffirm some boundaries that were an issue in the last Yeah.
Speaker 3:So it helps you reinitiate, reengage at a new level. Yeah. Recommit. And and so the I think the distinction between unable and unwilling, the unwilling side is because of frustration, because of discouragement, because of some life challenges that you're facing that are preventing you from taking your mentor relationship to the next level. That is the area we're focused on, getting reengaged, getting recommitment, getting encouragement, getting training.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 3:And I think the unable side is like, there's nothing I can do about your mentee moving to Oklahoma. I cannot help you Yeah. Mentor this kid. I can give you encouragement on how to leave voice mails, but you're not gonna meet up with them twice a month. Not gonna happen unless your grandma lives up there, and you're mowing her lawn every once in a while like a good grandson would do.
Speaker 2:So specific.
Speaker 3:I'm not doing that.
Speaker 2:My grandma live in Oklahoma?
Speaker 3:She does. 15 minutes from where z goes to school. Wow. So I'm a little I'm talking about myself now. But yeah.
Speaker 3:And so in in essence, yes, we are talking about matches need to end. Some of them, you could reengage and reinitiate and work to reestablish that commitment, and that is a part of the process. The next point is just owning it of being clear. Even if it if it's your fault that the mentor relationship needs to end, how about you just come out and say it and not beat around the bush? And then for a mentoring organization, if there's a reason this mentor relationship needs to end, I think you can be clear in communicating what that thing is and not just put a silver lining around it, which is a temptation across the board that we all feel because we want there to be a rational, pleasant reason for a transition, but it doesn't always happen.
Speaker 3:And you don't need to feel the pressure to just sugarcoat transitions that aren't what you wanted, if that makes sense. So you don't have to make it, pretty. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And I think maybe I'm just putting myself in the shoes, and it might be hard to just come out and say, like, hey. I I need out of this thing. And so it might be easier to say something like, I think I need to take a step back for a little bit. And, like, those euphemisms are not clear.
Speaker 2:And so I think, especially if you're being overseen by, like, a mentor coordinator in an organization, absolute clarity with them is super helpful because the more clear you are with them, the more they can help you in ending that relationship well. But it just doesn't add to it adds ambiguity if you're just saying, I'm taking a step back for a season, but then as things go on, you never took a step back in, and now we're like, what is going on here? And so it's just clear as kind.
Speaker 3:And I've experienced that even as someone who led the mentoring program. Sometimes I was not clear about what I expected of others. And, like, the the concept of playing it by ear is something that is a constant temptation of, oh, you know what? Your your mentor relationship is having issues. Let's play it by ear.
Speaker 3:Let's let's work it out. And what that inevitably leads to is just being passive about issues that a mentor relationship is facing. If I'm not actively seeking or finding a a way to navigate through those issues, and I'm just saying, well, let's just see what happens, that might not necessarily be what the mentor relationship needs. See something, say something. And in in this aspect, being clear is not just the mentor's responsibility.
Speaker 3:It's the mentoring organization's responsibility. What I am seeing, I'm saying something about. I'm not just playing it by ear or saying, well, you know what? Let's let's talk about this 3 months from now and see if anything else has changed. That might not be the best way to to approach it.
Speaker 3:Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Yeah. The next bigger piece is don't make promises that you can't keep. I think this is super hard, especially in a face to face, like, conversation with your kid. It'll be so tempting.
Speaker 3:That's how people usually build relationships is you make a bunch of promises that you can't keep.
Speaker 2:What?
Speaker 3:I feel like that's how people like, they build trust. Like what? Like, you say a bunch of things that
Speaker 2:Call me anytime.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Like, exact exactly. That's a perfect example. Or, I mean, like, if you need anything, let me know. And
Speaker 2:Which is just to soften, yeah, the blow in that relationship. But
Speaker 3:I'm always gonna be here for you no matter what. Mhmm.
Speaker 2:Or I I know some promises may be like, oh, yeah. I'm still gonna come to your games, or you can still yeah. We'll still have you over to swim this summer some you know, something that just is giving them it's not that you're never gonna see me again where there's gonna be another point in contact, which I would just say, if there is, great. Do it. But if there's not, don't say that.
Speaker 3:It's like you're ending the relationship, but you're making these promises about how it's not ending to soften the blow Yes. Of its ending. Yes. And that's not helpful.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah. I think some helpful things could be you can well, hopefully, you can honestly say this to the kid. But if you can, definitely do. But you can say, like, I I care about you, and I will always care about you, and and things like that.
Speaker 2:You can't necessarily say, I am always gonna be on call for you, because that's maybe not true anymore. And our kids hold on to those things. Like, kids remember everything. It is actually startling how much they will hold on to and remember and and bring back up, and and they care about what you say. They they are listening to the words that you say, and they mean something.
Speaker 2:And so mean what you say to your mentee.
Speaker 3:That's good. The next thing when it comes to mentor match endings that we wanna talk about is whether, as a mentor, you should consider being rematched. Some situations, a mentor relationship will happen that's not working out for varied reasons. It could be that a kid has moved away. In that situation, maybe it's not just, okay.
Speaker 3:Now I'm gonna step away, and I fulfilled my commitment. So check it off the list. You may be feeling, you know what? Well, I wanna I wanna jump in again. And so we highly encourage mentors who who have gone through the process of mentoring a kid to consider being rematched after a match ends.
Speaker 3:If you're in a good season to make that commitment, if, I mean, just personally, from my experience, the predominant reason mentor matches have ended is because somebody has moved. And in our context, both mentors and mentees move. When a mentee moves and the mentor is still here, I I see those guys as the ones I want to rematch first because they have experience. They understand what we're about. I don't have to retrain them in everything that they've learned up to this point, and so they are my first thought when it comes to matching them with a new boy in our program.
Speaker 3:And so for for anyone whose mentor relationship has ended, I know that that's an emotional hit when when a mentor relationship ends. You may need space to process losing that connection that you had with a kid. But I I always want to ask those guys to reconsider, and I keep them on my list to ask, hey. Is now a right a good time for you to jump back into a new mentor relationship? And many of them have said yes.
Speaker 2:I think what you said about leaving a little bit of space is good though in kind of just honoring and reflecting on the mentorship that ended before jumping right back in. I think that's a really good part of the process.
Speaker 3:Some of that some of that is just practical. We've had we've had families move away, but say, we're only gonna be gone for 6 months. And so Yeah. In some way, there's there's kind of this hope of reconnection. And so you kinda have to make a judgment call.
Speaker 3:Do we wait the 6 months before we rematch this guy with a new kid? Do we bank on that happening? And it and it's not that families lie in that moment. It's it's actually, like, a true reality of, hey. We are not planning on being gone for longer than this time.
Speaker 3:And so in that moment, there's if it doesn't happen, it doesn't mean they lied. It just means that the situation changed. And so we've had we've had guys sit and wait for families to come back who haven't come back. And then in other situations, we just decided, you know what? If they come back, we will match them with another mentor.
Speaker 3:And Mhmm. That's the judgment call that we've made.
Speaker 2:And that's happened with mentors moving too and planning to come back. And, yeah, it's been both sides.
Speaker 3:And that's just life. Mhmm. Life is unpredictable. We can we can say we'll do something 6 months from now. I think in the Bible, it says, if the Lord wills, we will do this or that.
Speaker 3:That's probably more true than making promises we can't keep. It's a
Speaker 2:good word.
Speaker 3:I will leave in the show notes some practical questions to bring to a mentor match ending. We recommend, as a practice, to have the organization so the the mentoring program you're connected with facilitate a mentor match ending. I've usually done it over a meal or just some kind of relational connection where you come into the room, you establish what's happening, what's changing, and then gather feedback from the mentor relationship. What went great? What was difficult?
Speaker 3:What would you change? And what are the expectations of connection? Are are you guys gonna stay in touch, or are we shaking hands and going our separate ways? Sometimes if a mentor relationship ends poorly, you don't have the opportunity to have everybody in the room to have that conversation. But even still, if it ends poorly, I wanna have that conversation separately with those people if possible.
Speaker 3:I wanna get feedback from the caregiver. I wanna get feedback from the mentee. Yeah. I wanna get feedback from the mentor. And and so we can ascertain what went wrong, what happened, and make adjustments in the future to to not let that happen again.
Speaker 3:And it's not always that there's this some clear takeaway of why the mentor relationship ended poorly, but I I think the opportunity is not only to retain information and data or it like, to gather insight as a mentoring program, but also to help the mentor, the mentee, the caregiver recognizing recognize the good that happened because of this mentor relationship. That even though it it's ending, it doesn't mean we can't reflect and see something positive from the match. And I think that that's always a beautiful moment when mentees share the impact of having their mentor in their life that maybe they hadn't communicated if we didn't have that conversation in a very practical way.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And I know that not everybody listening is mentoring with a formal mentor organization. And so, you might feel like you don't have a resource to call upon for guidance on those things or resolution on those things, but that is why we are here. So if we can provide you with a resource to kind of give those questions or anything of that sort, you don't have to figure it out all by yourself.
Speaker 3:That's good.
Speaker 2:Last thing I would wanna just reiterate is, in an earlier episode, we talked about part of the boundaries for you to have is to only carry what's yours to carry. And I think it's it's pretty realistic that your kid's gonna have some sad emotions about a match ending, and that's okay for them to have sad emotions, and it's good that they cared about you that much to have those. Again, it is your job to end well. It's not your job to fix how they're feeling about it. And so take a responsibility to do everything you can do to give closure, to give clarity, to do it kindly.
Speaker 2:But I think it's also an opportunity to exercise and trusting that God cares about this kid more than you do and to just own the humility of, there are other ways that God can meet his needs or her needs outside of you and walking and trusting that.
Speaker 3:It's really good, Beth. So mentors, guideline, mentor matches end. It's okay. It's natural.
Speaker 2:Everything ends, but end it well.
Speaker 3:Good. Mentors, we hope you enjoyed this series on boundaries, creating healthy boundaries, seeing signs, that you may have boundary issues, your responsibility to create boundaries in your mentoring relationships, and your acknowledgment of when to end and end it well. So if you have any questions, we would love to hear any issues that you're facing when it comes to boundaries in your relationships. Maybe we could do a follow-up q and a episode. Beth, would you be open to that?
Speaker 2:Absolutely. Come
Speaker 3:on. Well, mentors, we believe in you, and it is important for you to establish healthy boundaries. You may be one of the only relationships mentees have had where an adult has established boundaries with them and showed them the, I I guess, the value of healthy relationships. So we commend you and encourage you even if they end to establish healthy boundaries to the end. We love you.
Speaker 3:We believe in you.
Speaker 2:You may not be able to mentor in this season, but in a future date, we still believe it's gonna happen for you because we believe you can mentor.