I asked, tentatively, some of the lads I mentor if there was anything they’d learned from our relationship that I could write about. I told them about this book. I told them that mostly this book is about my mentors but that mentorship is a line, a thread upon which we are hung, and it runs through us and beyond us and that there is some comfort in that. There’s a trio of lads I work with in London, who I know through support groups for people with addiction. They all work in the city in various capacities but are more from the barra’ boy, chancer gang than the pinstriped variety. They are all mates. I’m not using their real names, for reasons that will become obvious.
The first one that I began to mentor, let’s call him Max, was someone I’d liked a good while before we connected. A soulful and solid, doe-eyed individual with the bolshie pluck you need to survive in EC1 and young offenders institutions. He’d been clean a while then relapsed, primarily due to his unbelievably unhealthy and insane co-dependent relationship. Listening to him describe the circumstances of his relapse was laugh-out-loud crazy and involved crack and violence, and I could almost hear the screeching of tyres and sirens as he spoke. Characteristically for an addict, the lashing insanity of the story was greatly at odds with the sweetness of the person reciting it. I told him if he wanted help, I was happy to help him. We started to work together, mostly we focused on the nature of his co-dependent relationship and how it would, unless radically altered, ultimately lead to drug use and other unhealthy behaviour. We noted how without the distraction of a co-dependent partner other problematic behaviours escalated. This we did using the 4 column method common to 12 Step abstinence programs. This technique helps you to identify patterns in your behaviour and the emotional and psychological problems that underwrite them. Once the patterns and problems are identified, it is easier to elect to use different strategies to deal with life. Much of this centres on the surrender of self will, letting go of what you think is right, and becoming teachable.
Through Max I met his mate Stan, a giant, charismatic and adorable man who I instinctively liken to Omar, one of the four Caliphs to succeed The Prophet. A bountiful and warm soul with a great strength, yet to be refined. I asked Stan: ‘Is there any way I have helped you that I might be able to use in a book about mentoring to illustrate how the principles work?’ He said: ‘Mate. The other day when that bloke knocked me for that money, you said that I should not look at the people of the world as resources there to serve me but at myself as someone who can help others. To accept that everything won’t go my way all the time and when I am disappointed to talk through those feelings before acting on them. In a situation like that in the past I would’ve acted differently, aggressively, and tried to solve the problem through intimidation, which would’ve led to complications because this bloke is part of that world. Instead I went round there and politely explained my side of the situation and offered to help find a mutually beneficial solution. This is because you have taught me that I am valuable and I do not need to resort to bad behaviour to get what I want, that I am enough and do not need money to prove that I am a man. I no longer unthinkingly get into conflict with my wife because I am stressed about work-related things, without recognizing it. The other day she asked me to do the washing up because I’d agreed to and I just did it. In the past there would’ve been an argument, especially if I was fearful around work. This is because you have shown me how to behave towards my wife and given me safe outlets for my feelings.’ Hearing this made me feel valuable and useful. The gratitude of others, is a good way to build self-esteem. If you regularly help others the tendency to think of yourself as worthless or not good enough diminishes.
The third of this little triptych is Marco, a flash and blushingly handsome lad who experienced a lot of loss in his childhood and is trying to compensate through excess as a young adult. His sex addiction was a gift to me because he is where I was ten years ago. Sex addiction, if your tastes are socially sanctioned, can take a long time to address. It takes a long time to admit that it is a problem when much of the behaviour is lauded and lionized. When addressing it we have to identify whether it is causing suffering to any party involved. Whether it requires dishonesty or is selfish. In talking to a younger man about sex addiction I get to reaffirm the distance I’ve been granted from that life and am able to recall the pain that accompanied it, rather than nostalgically yearning for a life that was unhealthy because my memories are biased and my addictive tendency wants me to return to destructive patterns. Marco told me that our relationship had helped him to view his behaviour differently and had awoken in him the possibility of a different life focused on artistic, as opposed to carnal, creativity. He said he feels accepted as who he is and never feels judged or condemned and always comes off the phone feeling better about himself.
In their accounts I see how mentorship is a bilateral arrangement that creates space for a difficult to define third component. In relating to them I am able to register my own progress, because I no longer see the world in the way I used to, when I reach back into my past in order to connect to them, I see how different I have become. Their gratitude heals me. The counsel I offer them, coming as it does down the line from my own mentors and from methods that are proven, is obviously still required in my life, so when I hear myself cite it I think, ‘You need to do that yourself, Russell.’
There is nothing negative about being a mentor. Even the fact that it requires me to give my time to others is hugely positive for a person like me whose tendency unguided can be towards the selfish and self-obsessed. If I can be the figure I am in the lives of these young men, then I am better set to be a good husband to my wife and a good father to my daughters. It is the remedy to having lived a life where I’d only hear my own voice whining or screaming, now I hear it calmly offering solutions to sometimes very difficult problems. I am no longer the person I used to be. I am in a state of becoming, guided by principles that are timeless and beautiful, not by the truculent grunts of my endlessly hungry guts or the bloodshot roaming of my greedy eyes. Intention and attention, they say. Where your attention goes, so shall you become. As you intend to be, so shall you be. These relationships, built on selfless love, freely giving what was freely given to me, become a ritual of self-actualization that I would not be granted anywhere in a world built around superficial success and fragile and transient transactions.
The mentor remains conscious when we elide into the old realms, blinded by the old motivations. My podcast is a sanctuary for me and a symposium. Many great educators have joined me, Naomi Klein, Kehinde Andrews, Adam Curtis, Brad Evans, Yanis Varaofakis. Stirred and captivated by the rise of right-wing populism I began to think I’d like to talk to prominent figures from that movement on my podcast. I enquired, made contact and went as far as making an appointment to record an interview with one high-profile activist. The truth behind my motivation is complex, because I am often fuelled by multiple intentions. I do believe that a dialogue between people with different perspectives is vital if we are to change the world. I also feel that the global rise of populism is a legitimate reaction to the failure of the political class to represent the interests of ordinary people. Much of the right-wing rhetoric now is centred on the failure of Neo-liberal politicians to take the financial industry to task and their complicity in the bail-outs. The cost of these actions was borne by ordinary people. Of course, I don’t agree with the marginalisation or condemnation of any ethnic or social group as a response to austerity but I am so intrigued to learn if a populist alliance could ever reconfigure democracy that I wanted to focus on the similarities, not the differences.
In addition though to this genuine curiosity, slinking unseen in the shadows of my mind is my ongoing tendency to create chaos, disruption and destruction in my life. I began to feel anxious about it and having consulted a few philosophers and film makers about the way I should approach the interview, I mentioned my anxiety to my wife. She asked if I had spoken to Jimmy or Meredith about it, which I hadn’t. When I did, by text, both promptly sent almost identical responses: do not do it, you will create unnecessary tension and conflict in your life. This may not be earth-shattering for you, but for me it is. I actually did what they suggested, I indefinitely delayed the interview. I forewent my own way of thinking and followed suggestion.
As soon as I read their messages I immediately saw that part of my motivation had been my unconscious desire to create conflict in my peaceful life, not to mention my messianic belief that I can stitch together diverse political and social beliefs to create a utopian tapestry. Not really the kind of thinking you want guiding important life choices. In the past I would not have asked, if I had I may have still ignored the advice. By being open to suggestion, by letting go of my will in favour of the will of others, I begin to change. You can’t think your way into acting differently, but you can act your way into thinking differently. I felt relieved to hand my autonomy over. This doesn’t mean that in the future I won’t engage with complicated political conversations, but by the time I do, I will be clearer about my own motivations and the likely consequences of my actions. A mentor will show you where you are on the path of your life and how to proceed along it. If you learn how to listen to your fear, how to recognize your uncertainty, you can then invite the superior consciousness of a mentor into your life. If you are unawakened, you will blithely stroll into more habitual anguish.