Sunday, January 30, 2005
My Dad and mom as mentors
As I continue to contemplate mentoring and my mentoring project I realize the depth involved.
During one of our discussions in Blackboard, we named mentors. I named my dad and not my mom which I didn't exactly realize at the time. Later I felt guilty about it since both of my parents have really been great mentors to me. One reason I think my dad came on to my list right away is because I spend so much time thinking about him and all of our conversations since he recently died. This is a much more prevelent thought in my life right now. During all of these thoughts, I have spent a great deal reflecting on what I have learned from him and the many things I can take from his life. This makes me think more deeply about what mentoring is defined as. My mom always supportive and loving and there for me, my dad's role was different some how. Again, as I write this I feel defensive about my relationship with my mom, an odd feeling. I am so close to my mom and I model myself as a mother and a wife after her, I totally respect and admire her in so many way. I think I do think of my mom as a mentor but still for some reason, not as much as my dad. My dad I guess I always felt empowered me, I sincerely always felt I could do anything with my life. I felt so lucky I felt like I could go to an ivy league school or be a powerful executive or an awesome teacher, or a great mother or whatever. I felt no boundried. When I try to pin that down to things he said or did that made me feel that way, I can't. The one thing there was as there is with most parents is unconditional love and support. But it was more than that.
When I had an idea I would talk to him and he would ask questions and be genuinely interested. I always was excited to talk to him about my ideas. He always seemed like such an expert at everything. He would somehow know someone or have read something specific to whatever I was talking about. I also felt like when I was sharing with him that I was educating him and that he was learning from me at the same exact time that I was learning from myself by talking and listening to what he knew about a particular subject.
The things I take from this, I clearly can't be the kind of mentor to a group or even to an individual for that matter that my dad was to me since there was a parent /child bond there but some charactersitics jump out.
1 - unconditional support
2 - Listening whole heartedly
3 - Sharing what you know and what you don't know about the subject of interest
4 - Learning along side the person from what they are saying and learning
During one of our discussions in Blackboard, we named mentors. I named my dad and not my mom which I didn't exactly realize at the time. Later I felt guilty about it since both of my parents have really been great mentors to me. One reason I think my dad came on to my list right away is because I spend so much time thinking about him and all of our conversations since he recently died. This is a much more prevelent thought in my life right now. During all of these thoughts, I have spent a great deal reflecting on what I have learned from him and the many things I can take from his life. This makes me think more deeply about what mentoring is defined as. My mom always supportive and loving and there for me, my dad's role was different some how. Again, as I write this I feel defensive about my relationship with my mom, an odd feeling. I am so close to my mom and I model myself as a mother and a wife after her, I totally respect and admire her in so many way. I think I do think of my mom as a mentor but still for some reason, not as much as my dad. My dad I guess I always felt empowered me, I sincerely always felt I could do anything with my life. I felt so lucky I felt like I could go to an ivy league school or be a powerful executive or an awesome teacher, or a great mother or whatever. I felt no boundried. When I try to pin that down to things he said or did that made me feel that way, I can't. The one thing there was as there is with most parents is unconditional love and support. But it was more than that.
When I had an idea I would talk to him and he would ask questions and be genuinely interested. I always was excited to talk to him about my ideas. He always seemed like such an expert at everything. He would somehow know someone or have read something specific to whatever I was talking about. I also felt like when I was sharing with him that I was educating him and that he was learning from me at the same exact time that I was learning from myself by talking and listening to what he knew about a particular subject.
The things I take from this, I clearly can't be the kind of mentor to a group or even to an individual for that matter that my dad was to me since there was a parent /child bond there but some charactersitics jump out.
1 - unconditional support
2 - Listening whole heartedly
3 - Sharing what you know and what you don't know about the subject of interest
4 - Learning along side the person from what they are saying and learning
# posted by Kari Hoien @ 7:43 PM 
