Mentoring is the new goldmine towards youth empowerment

‘We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future” — Franklin D. Roosevelt

Benjamin Disraeli, a former prime minister of the United Kingdom (UK), said: “The greatest good you can do for another is not just share your riches, but to reveal to him his own.” The greatest problem of youths is not money, but mentoring, which is the new goldmine for youths.

Youths should stop looking for money and look for mentorship. You would need people that believe in you; people that invest in your dreams and goals, people that would bring the best and not the stress out of you in life, people that would help you make informed decisions and choices towards your destination in life.

Mark Twain said: “Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great. When you are seeking to bring big plans to fruition, it is important with whom you regularly associate.”

Any concrete talk on youth empowerment is not complete until mentoring is fully integrated; hence any youth empowerment programme that does not design mentoring into its process has already failed before take off. When youths don’t have models and mentors to look up to, they tend to go in different destructive directions.

Mentoring is the most monitored, measurable and sustainable way of ensuring youth empowerment. The Oxford Advanced Learner’s dictionary defined a mentor as “an experienced person who advises and helps somebody with less experience over a period of time.” The pertinent question to ask is this: What is the older generation doing to model the youth?

Zig Ziglar said: “A lot of people have gone further than they thought they could because someone else thought they could.” The youths of a country are a deep reflection of the values passed down from the older generation. The mistake of the youth is actually a result of the failure of the older generation.

According to Isaac Newton: “If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulders of giants.” Behind every successful person, there is a mentor that helped him/her along the way. Some of the most influential people in history were encouraged to succeed by some of the well-known people of their time.

Socrates mentored Plato; Plato mentored Aristotle and Aristotle mentored Alexander the Great. Alexander the Great actually broke the loop because when he was supposed to be mentoring youths and building people, he was busy building empires. He died without investing into others and his legacies also died with him.

A mentor is an embodiment of six notable qualities derived from the word ‘MENTOR.’ He or she Motivates, Encourages, Nurtures, Trains, Organises, and help youths Reach their potentials.
Motivates

Norman Ralph Augustine said: “Motivation will almost always beat mere talent.” You can be motivated and have no talent and get far, but without motivation, the talented won’t get off their couch to show the world what they have got.

There are many youths out there that are talented, but lack motivation.

Encourages
Plato said: “Never discourage anyone who continually makes progress, no matter how slow.” Your words of encouragement could be the spark that pushes a person forward. Encouragement energises and empowers.

Shawn Hitchcock said: “A mentor empowers a person to see a possible future and believe it can be obtained.”

Nurtures
A real mentor helps in discovering and nurturing the gift and potentials in others. Choosing a mentor is the most critical step to success in life, be it in business, career, relationship or politics.

A mentor challenges and stimulates you to be the best at all times.

Trains
A mentor would train you and not drain you. The people around you would either fuel you or drain you. So, choose them wisely. I repeat, choose them wisely!

When people have encounters with you, do you leave them drained or blessed, exhausted or fuelled? I made up my mind long time ago to always leave people more inspired than I met them.

Organises
A mentor reduces the degree of disorderliness in the mentee. Youths that refuse to get organised would eventually agonise.

The first step to getting organised is to get your priorities right. A mentor would help you prioritise your priorities.

Reach Your Potential
Mentors stretch their mentees beyond their comfort zones to reach their potentials and achieve great things. A mentor helps you look within yourself to fire up your hidden potentials.

Mentoring is not about making everybody else the same as you. Any man that encourages you to be someone else has already despised your purpose of existence. A real mentor understands the fact that you can never be at your best when you try to be someone else.

The greatest platform that a mentor can ever give to you is to help you be yourself and express yourself. Don’t make people the best version of yourself; make them the best version of themselves. If you are not inspiring youths, then you are helping them to expire. Mentor someone, instead of casting people down and finding faults in others.

Kenneth H. Blanchard, in his best-selling book, The One Minute Manager,’ said: “People who feel good about themselves produce good results.” How you make others feel about themselves is very important. Do you make people feel better or bitter? Mentees actually need models and not critics. They, most times, need their efforts to be acknowledged.

If all the entrepreneurs, business moguls, celebrities, politicians, artistes, philanthropists, technocrats and professionals can reach out to mentor youths in their circle of influence, then the world would change for the better. Successful people should go back to their communities to mentor youths. I have often said it over times that if you are not a mentor, then you are a tormentor.

A mentor is someone who builds you up and has your best interest at heart. Even in the midst of your own personal doubt, a mentor would never give-up on you. He or she inspires you through his or her deep and tenacious belief in you. Positivity fuels productivity. Don’t expect to see positive changes in your life if you surround yourself with negative people. Try spending more time around people that infuse positivity into you and affirm your worth.

As a youth, reach out to someone that is already where you want to get to in life. Book an appointment with them, buy their books and listen to their messages. Someone already has the experience you desire, locate him or her and glean from his or her wealth of experience.

According to Mike Murdock: “Pay any price to stay in the presence of extraordinary people.”