Grey Hair And Well Earned Lines

I want someone with the longevity of exposure to life’s harsh elements to feed their wisdom and beauty into my soul, so I to can withstand the seasons.

Have you ever stopped and asked an old woman how she got to be so old. It’s not a trick question. Her journey has been navigated. No Tardis involved, no magic wands to get her where she is. She lived, loved and learned lessons that gave her the insight to live a long and adventurous life. The trouble is we look at the lined face through youthful idealistic eyes and we have no idea how she earned each line and each grey hair. But we what need to do is sit down with her and ask her how we get here too.

I Love Mentoring.

I love the idea of it, the practice of it and the result of it.

I believe wholeheartedly that every leader must be engaged in mentoring regardless of your age and experience.  There is always someone who has walked the walk longer than you and someone who has just stepped out onto the path for the first time. Western tradition has all but lost the art of story and will hardly sit still enough to learn from history, yet personal history can teach us so much and help us avoid much pain and dislocation. I sit and eat donuts and drink coffee with a leader who has been leading as a pioneer in his profession for over 40 years. He probably has no idea how valuable are those hours we just talk together and those times are the highlights of my day as I glean from his experiences.

 

My mentoring model is what I call the Robin Hood method. Simply steal from the wealthy and give to the poor. Regardless of what you think you know, I have found this to be profoundly true, “That you don’t know what you know until you are talking to someone who doesn’t know”

Stay one page ahead in the book, and you can mentor anybody.

Ask yourself, who feeds me and who can I feed? Adventure awaits you.