Two decades of my life
passed – shopping for the future. I am not the only one to shop for future. Everyone
does. ‘Shopping for future’, C.L.R. James, a socialist theorist calls “the
struggle for happiness”. This is the term that I recently learned in my
pedagogy class.
Pedagogy talking about
shopping!
What a juxtaposition?
But it is the reality,
isn’t it? We have been going to schools and colleges just for the sake of
achieving degrees which will someday be useful to buy our happiness.
Why did you join M.Phil
classes?
Is
it important?
If you want you can
directly apply for Ph.D., why are you taking extra burden?
These
are some of the questions that I have been answering now days.
Yes,
they are right.
But,
I decided to board this ship realizing that even after such long years of
formal schooling, I feel like I lacked so many possessions as a student. I lacked
someone with whom I could share. I lacked someone who would trigger my thought
process with some brilliant questions. I longed for that someone who would drag
me to reflect whatever I am doing. Cutting the long story short, I desired a
mentor.
Again,
I am not the only one who wished she had a mentor. In our times of quandary, we
secretly wish, if we had one person; just to share our feelings, just to give us
some attention, just to help us overcome our fear. If not all these, just to
listen to us that we had a bad day. Sometimes, we want a brother in our friend
and sometimes vice versa. I think what we want is a mentor. Sagar Satyal
wished the same. But what Satyal did after he realized this is amazing.
Yes,
he is mentoring undergrads at King’s College these days. And a bunch of
students have already benefited from him and some are in the process.
 |
| Photo Credit: Bipulesh Poudel |
I
find his act is gaining success. Arushi Thapa, one of his mentees is happy these
days as she has been able to communicate with her father very well which she
had always desired. Being an army officer, she wasn’t fortunate enough to spend
much time with her father. Whenever, they would be together, they both wanted
to communicate but since, they wouldn’t find any common issues to talk about,
their communication would not progress. But amazingly these days, she finds it
strange that they have so many things to talk about. She has discovered that
even her father has the love of learning foreign language. This transformation
wouldn’t have been possible if she hadn’t realized that it wasn’t because of
the difference, rather it was because she hesitated to share about herself with
her father.
Thus, she initiated sharing her daily schedule with him and now
they have so many things to share and laugh at. The man behind her self-
realization was her mentor Sagar who had asked her to reflect upon her daily
actions so that she could improve on her part. She did the same and started
writing and sending it to her father so that even if they were apart he would
always know about her and when they would meet they would have so many things
to talk about.
Arushi
shares, “I had joined his mentorship just to build my confidence, as he is a
very good speaker, but I must say, I have achieved more than that.” Arushi is
just an instance. I observed one of his mentorship sessions and realized how
wonderfully Bishmita was reflecting upon her own behavior. Amrit confidently
was sharing that he lacked preparation which he would definitely do the next
time. Avinash and Prazwal were contented about their improvement and during their
break, Bipulesh was happy to teach Sagar some of his dance moves. All in all,
all of them were sharing whatever they were good at.
When
Sagar was triggering his mentees so much to reflect on themselves, I was
inquisitive about his self-reflection as a mentor. Sagar reflects, “Mentees
just need to be cared for and given a platform to express themselves. They are
capable and profound in their own ways; they just need a little push. And as
for the mentor, there’s so much to learn about oneself in the process of
helping mentees connecting with their inner self.”
Many
of us feel that mentoring is coaching, thus learning things primarily through
experience and observation instead of coaching is far better. But, I feel mentoring
is more than coaching. It’s also about dealing with frustration of your mentee,
giving constructive criticism, handling disappointment, behaving with humility
and compassion, and much more. Being a good mentor is a difficult thing. It
takes an emotional commitment. But when someone finds that committed mentor
his/her life changes.
According
to Sagar, mentoring achieves four fundamental values that govern his life:
1. Consciousness:
It helps both the mentors and the mentees become more mindful of who they are
and what they want to be and therefore, expend their time, energy, and effort
accordingly.
2. Compassion:
When everyone’s comfortable sharing their inner stories that they might have
otherwise kept hidden, it develops a sense of understanding that everyone has
their own suffering and brings the world together.
3. Creativity and Fun:
Mentorship programs provide a platform for mentors and mentees to do something creative
and fun together in the course of spreading love and wisdom.
4. Community and friendship:
It helps instill the idea that the universe is one and we all should live with
love and harmony by helping each other.
These
4Cs say it all. Adding on to it, although mentors may just be the visitors in
the lives of their mentees, a good mentor has the quality to shape the mentee’s
future, touch their lives and initiate their transformation into great future
leaders.
Hat’s
off to Sagar.
Appreciation
to all other mentors whom I haven’t even heard of but are working hard to
change the lives of their mentees in their best possible way.
For you before you end this reading, reflect on and be wary as you too may be
just shopping for your future.
