Mentoring Minutes. Robin Cox
a positive future, or a positive outcome; be hopeful.
Mentoring tip: Turn every mentoring experience into a learning opportunity.
Day 3: Strategies to develop resilient mentees
Effective mentors have the responsible role to develop resilient mentees.
Here are some proven strategies to consider during the mentoring journey, all of which I have used at different times with a variety of adolescent mentees.
•Encourage your mentees to have diverse friendship groups and, wherever possible, to have at least one circle of friends outside of their school, workplace, or training institution.
•Encourage your mentees to join a youth club, sports club, or another club that caters for their interests.
•Encourage your mentees to link up with another caring, trustworthy adult from outside the immediate family, or extended family who they respect—a teacher, youth leader, work colleague, or sports coach.
•Encourage and coach your mentees to appreciate how thoughts influence feelings and behavior. In other words, nurture problem solving skills. Your mentees recognize that their conditional thinking—You’re stupid, or too thin, or a loser—is a lie. They remove blocks to their innate resilience as they learn how to build their sense of competency in this way.
•Encourage your mentees to read, as cognitive competence has been identified as a hallmark of resiliency.
•Encourage your mentees to develop a close relationship with at least one parent (preferably both) where there is tension between parents—divorce, or separation.
•Encourage your mentees to contribute to daily life at home, for example by doing household chores, babysitting, or helping siblings.
•Encourage your mentees to be accountable for their choices. Demonstrate the importance of responsibility, and include your mentees in decision making, goal getting, and boundary setting.
Nourish your own resilience and wellbeing, so you can be an exemplary role model at all times.
Mentoring tip: A reliable and consistent mentor commits for the long haul.
Day 4: The universal capacity for resiliency
Resiliency expert Tony Newman21 wrote: “A resilient young person can resist adversity, cope with uncertainty, and recover more successfully from traumatic events or episodes.”
Everyone has strengths and an inborn capacity for self-righting, for transformation and change.
Bonnie Benard22, one of the foremost authorities on resiliency in the world, has pointed out that all people are born with innate resiliency. That is, everyone has the capacity to develop four traits which are common among resilient survivors.
1.Social competence—the ability to form relationships, which includes responsiveness, cultural flexibility, empathy, caring, communication skills, and a sense of humor.
2.Metacognition—the ability to solve problems, which includes planning, help-seeking, and critical and creative thinking.
3.Autonomy—the ability to develop a sense of identity, self-efficacy, self-awareness, task mastery, and adaptive distancing from negative messages and conditions.
4.A sense of purpose and belief in a bright future—the ability to plan and hope, which includes goal direction, educational aspirations, optimism, faith, and spiritual connectedness.
Resilience is unlikely where a young person faces continuous and extreme adversity, which is not moderated by external factors. Conversely, the presence of a nurturing climate draws out the above traits and encourages their expression.
The link to nurturing is good news for mentors. It allows you to enter a mentoring relationship with the knowledge that, when you connect with your mentee, the two of you journey forward together with an optimistic and motivating attitude. “You” have the power to tip the scales from risk to resilience.
Mentoring tip: Effective mentors are encouragers and non-judgmental cheerleaders, not critics.
Mentoring moments
Pieter van der Bijl was my junior school principal. He was a former international cricketer who was highly respected by the students. He was a tall, imposing man who walked with a limp as a result of an injury he sustained in the North African campaign during the second World War.
Pieter wrote to my father before one of my major cancer operations to let him know that our family was in his thoughts and prayers. During my recovery, I missed a few months of school, yet Pieter continued to check up on my wellbeing.
One Saturday morning he arrived at our home to collect me and take me to watch school sport. Two of my peers accompanied him. We remained in the car to watch the sport, as it was a cold, wet and overcast day, and Pieter knew I was self-conscious as a result of my surgery.
Pieter was caring, compassionate, empathetic, and a wonderful encouragement. For a young boy recovering from major operations, it was comforting to know that my school principal watched over me, not only at that time, but also in the years that followed.
When I was appointed school captain (head student) for my final year of school, I received a letter from Pieter congratulating me on my achievements. He had retired by then and, sadly died a year later. Pieter’s letter remains a treasured memoir from a man I respected and admired, and who sowed the seeds of mentoring in my life at a young age. I suspected, too, that he continually spoke to the potential he saw in me, which I did not see for quite some time after my surgery.
Mentoring tip: Always strive to build up youth with whom you connect. Encourage, correct, stretch, and sustain them every step of your mentoring journey.
20. Henderson, Resiliency in Action, 12.
21. Newman, Promoting Resilience.
22. Benard, Fostering Resiliency.
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