3 Reasons Why You Don’t Need A Mentor

C’mon, you know what you’re doing.

All of the greats have had mentors.

Lebron James had Dwayne Wade. Michael Jordan had Howard White. Brandy had Whitney Houston. Micheal Jackson had Berry Gordy.

The list goes on and on.

And every other day I see article after article of people talking about the benefits of a mentor. While that’s all fine and dandy…I’ve never had a real mentor before…and I think I’m doing just fine.

It’s not because I’m cocky or too good for one. It’s because I simply don’t see a need for a mentor to improve my life. I think I’m already on a great path. Plus I’ve tried mentors before — they’re not my style.

Here are three reasons why you don’t need a life mentor.

You’ve just scratched the surface of what you want to accomplish in your life.

There is such a thing as being too young for a mentor.

You know as well I as I do that no one that’s 22 or younger wants to listen to anyone older than them. They want to live life, drink, go to a few parties, and get stoned man. Finding out what you want to do for the rest of your life is hard enough.

Most of the time, people have mentors for a specific purpose to help them achieve [X] goal. If you don’t know your passion, you don’t know what [X] goal is.

I’ve attempted to have some mentors in my life. If I didn’t lose contact with them early on, I probably would’ve asked them to hit the road sooner or later.

I just don’t like wasting anyone’s time.

I’d rather find my path first and then get someone to mold me into a juggernaut. It’s easier for the mentor to have something to work with at first than putting in that extra work of finding a passion. The first rule of a mentor/mentee relationship is that it should be mutually beneficial.

You can get a terrible mentor if you aren’t careful.

I’ll never forget being invested in entrepreneurship to the max.

I was willing to try anything to make the big bucks. I made a LinkedIn and started connecting with a bunch of random people. I did this in part to get my WordPress blog off the ground and chat with new faces.

I got a message from this guy, we’ll call him Peter.

Peter was such a cool guy and asked if I’d be interested in making a successful life for myself as an entrepreneur. This didn’t seem like some false pipedream that strangers spread on social media. It seemed like a genuine reach-out.

So I told him I was interested and we scheduled a Zoom call.

We had a good meeting and he told me about some programs (that I won’t mention because it’s a scam). Long story short, I went all-in on this program. He’d give me “homework” to listen to a bunch of podcasts and read articles and tell him what I thought — but college started catching up with me.

So I told him I didn’t have enough time to listen to all of his podcasts and after that situation, he dropped me like a dead carcass in the desert. He wasted no time cutting off all communication with me. Now I realize that that program was a lowkey cult.

My point here is that you shouldn’t get a mentor unless you have a legitimate way to find one.

Don’t go off on social media mind tricks and false promises. Make sure that person has your best interest at heart. Please stay away from cults.

Your personalities aren’t compatible.

I always think of Star Wars when this comes to mind.

If you don’t know, Ahsoka Tano was Anakin Skywalker’s (Darth Vader’s) padawan. She trained under him ever since she was fourteen and left about three years later. They were wary of each other at first, but over time they developed a strong brother/sister relationship.

How?

Well, their personalities were almost exact matches. They were both impulsive, quirky, and emotional (even though it’s forbidden for a Jedi to show attachment). Ahsoka gave Anakin someone to relate to in the Jedi Order because the other Jedi around him were…shmucks (i.e. Mace Windu).

Anakin’s training made Ahsoka stronger than she ever could’ve imagined.

It’s that bond between a Master/Padawan that’s needed in a mentor/mentee relationship. You shouldn’t be business associates or acquaintances. You should be close friends.

I lost contact with one of my other former mentors. I wanted to be a lawyer so bad that I went networking and connected with him at an event. He’d teach me stuff about the LSAT, but our personalities simply weren’t aligning. So we called it quits early on.

A strong bond=a strong mentor/mentee relationship.

Final Thoughts

Mentors are a complicated subject.

While I think many benefits come with having a mentor, not everyone needs one. You need to have some inkling of your passion, be careful on social media and have personalities that gel to have a great mentor. I’ve had none of that which is why none of my previous mentor relationships worked out.

But remember, stay vigilant if you need one.

And may the force guide you, my young padawan.

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