Here is a quote – Always be yourself, express yourself, have faith in yourself, do not go out and look for a successful personality and duplicate it.
—Bruce Lee
One might waste a great deal of time and effort in finding a mentor for themselves, with no assurance of getting the one who actually deserves the title. Thus, instead of going out and looking for someone successful who could serve as a role model and guide your path to success, be yourself and inspire yourself to achieve that which you always wanted to achieve.
So basically, we need to strategize our self-mentoring process to get high yields from our endeavors. Kathryn P Gordon, MHS, RN, and Sherri Melrose, Ph.D., RN, conducted well-regarded research on self-mentoring for long-term care staff22, which has insights for others as well. The duo discusses some amazing points on why one should consider educating and inspiring their own self to achieve greater feats in life. They came up with five strategies to help individuals mentor themselves positively.
First, one needs to reflect regularly on their past actions and present endeavors to combat isolation, discouragement, and uneasiness. Second, in order to become a reflective, autonomous and self-mentoring individual, one has to continuously learn from people, experiences and new ideas. Next, once they get a clear picture of existing barriers, rifts in relationships, and financial issues, they should make careful plans to combat these hurdles. The fourth point that they emphasize is volunteering for something that allows their creative, philanthropic or adventurous sides to get the kind of exposure that they always craved. Finally, people should communicate their feelings, emotions, thoughts, and words effectively to gain the kind of confidence that would eliminate the need for a mentor.
Discover your potential to aim big
At some point in their lives, each one of us requires mentoring, guidance and counsel to get better clarity on our vision, passions, goals, and life in general. However, we cannot and should not be habituated to this practice. Occasional pieces of advice and motivational words of wisdom are always welcome, but to surrender our existence to outer influences will simply not work out for any self-respecting individual. By thinking that we cannot take even a small step without others’ guidance, we are doing gross injustice to our capable self. Thus, to avoid being a diffident, contrite and regretful personality, we should work hard to explore our true potential and take a cue from our abilities to exploit available opportunities.
Self-mentoring helps you de-clutter your thoughts
The entire process of self-mentoring, as discussed above, can be broken down further into setting expectations, establishing viable goals, creating workable strategies, identifying a support system, executing strategies and, of course, assessing progress from time to time. Thus, the process aims to bring a sort of poise and equilibrium to an otherwise encumbering or cluttered state of affairs. When following the steps mentioned above, it becomes easier for an individual to focus on what they are right now and what they wish to be in some months or years. Self-mentoring, hence, makes one confident about their capabilities and accordingly, allows one to believe that they can achieve any milestones without the need for external mentoring.
Believe you can…
When you develop the belief that you can, you’ll find yourself halfway there. You can also enroll in a continuing education program to develop self-belief that will eventually ensure that you don’t need any mentors as such.
Self-mentoring, thus, is advisable for individuals who love the idea of growing, nurturing and building their life without any outside influence. Moreover, self-mentoring helps them make the necessary withdrawals from life’s unwarranted issues and gain self-confidence, thus allowing such individuals to carve their lives by bringing their self-leadership and self-mentoring qualities to the fore.
