Becoming a Mentor: Prison Mentorship
The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines a Mentor as someone who teaches or gives help and advice to a less experienced and often younger person.
What is Mentoring?
Mentoring is a process performed by an individual with a lot of experience in a particular subject to inspire and empower another. Unlike a coach, the Mentor shares the person following the mentoring their example, opinion, and the best path for success and positive results. Why? Because he has already achieved success that way, he will recommend actions that work in theory and practice so that the mentee can also be successful.
However, it is useless for the Mentor to have enormous knowledge and impressive results, if the Mentee does not do his part. It is also meaningless for the Mentor to have the resources of information and wisdom without knowing how to apply and transmit his knowledge.
Therefore, mentoring is only effective when there is a mutual relationship and trust between the two.
Mentor: Why should I have one?
A true mentor helps us be a better person and find meaning, not only in our challenges but also in our spiritual life. First of all, it is important to clarify exactly what a mentor is: a Mentor is someone who supports and encourages the other person.
They can help them manage their own learning, maximize their potential, develop their skills, improve their performance, and become the best person they can become.
In other words, a real mentor helps a person to be better and to find meaning in their life. They are people who, directly or indirectly, give us visions, dreams, ideas, principles, values, attitudes, knowledge, and wisdom. Mentors are our modern “Gurus.” If you didn’t know, the term “Guru” means “the teacher” in Sanskrit and means “one who dispels the darkness.”
Our Mentors can be our inner heroes. Those we look up to, who become our role models and whose expectations (real or supposed) we try to meet throughout our lives, even if they are no longer with us. Originally, the term mentor came from the Greek and referred to the mythical figure of Mentor, friend, and advisor to Telemachus, who supported him while his father was away in the Trojan war. Wisdom, experience, and knowledge with less experienced colleagues.
A mentor can be your father, a teacher, a colleague, a guide, a poet, a philosopher, or even an author of a book that inspired you.
Why Should you volunteer to mentor an Inmate?
Becoming a mentor can be one of the most rewarding experiences you can find. Many Inmates feel they were abandoned by their friends and families. Regardless of what has happened, they look forward to finding ways to restore their faith in themselves and trail the path of rehabilitation.
Many of them have spiritual interests. They crave ancient and humanistic knowledge that goes beyond the religious aspects and standard literature. To clinch the thirst of these souls that can’t access important information is a privilege and an honor.
Think how you would be blessing someone by helping someone to open up a new pathway in their lives. The Buddhist definition of Blessings is “the light that can shift one’s mind”.