042 🧠 Guidance

The neverending search for a mentor

Welcome to my email newsletter 'Never not [thinking about] running' - a weekly newsletter about running and mental health. If you haven't subscribed yet and you're not sure whether you really want to receive an e-mail from me on every Thursday, have a look at the archive. Today I’m talking about finding a guide or a mentor in your life and how I failed up to this point and how I deal with it.

The one-year anniversary here in the newsletter is also more or less a one-year anniversary in therapy. I don't think I've ever been so regular and productive in that department. This makes me doubt my old therapist, who was always very relaxed when it came to making appointments and also tended to take the approach that I just tell him something and then we'll see where it leads. Well. It's different this time. I go to therapy every 1-2 weeks - even if we jump around thematically from time to time, you can recognise a line and I have the feeling that I'm making progress. Baby steps, but steps.

Imposter syndrom?

The other day it was about friends and orientation in life. I don't have that many friends, especially not that many friends with whom I talk about everything. Not so much because I'm afraid to talk about feelings or problems, but more because I'm picky about who I tell what to (except to you guys out there on the internet 😂), because I often feel like what I'm telling might not be that exciting and because I'm actually often looking for someone who has a certain amount of experience and can give me something from that wealth of experience. Of course, that doesn't always make it so easy.

We then delved deeper into the topic of mentors because my therapist asked who had served as a role model for me in the past and who had given me values and who I could ask when I needed help. Some of them were my parents, of course, but I didn't really have anyone in the area where I would have liked it most. My parents let me do a lot, which is also a gift, but on the other hand not enough when you ask yourself whether studying is the right thing for you or whether you should quit your job, for example. There wasn't much help to be expected, apart from ‘You'll do it!’ or ‘Well, maybe that's not necessarily the right path!’.

Where to go? Where to look?

But what is the right way? I always looked for people to tell me that and found them here and there. My first class teacher at secondary school was someone like that. Someone who had travelled a lot, who stood up for you, who could tell you stories and who listened to you, even if you were only a fifth grader. That was good. After that came the accident and I thought I would always have to sort everything out on my own anyway, so the feeling that I needed and could find someone like that just flared up here and there.

I remember meeting a relatively well-known sports journalist 10-15 years ago as part of a project. It was really nice with him, we went out to dinner with him at the end and I immediately had the feeling that he was interested in you, someone who could give you advice on problems and with whom you could have a really nice chat. And that in both a personal and professional sense. Someone you can learn from. Sadly he died in 2022.

Still searching

I'm still on this quest because I know that it relaxes me. I often bury my head in the sand when I can't make a decision, when I perhaps want to develop professionally or the things I've produced aren't what I want them to be and the I need someone to tell me what to do next. Let's see if I'm successful at some point.

On the other hand, I also try to fulfil this role for others, precisely because I am aware of its importance. I try to give my children the space they need to develop, but I also want to give them support when they need it. Whether they then accept it is another story and I try to show them ways in a professional context, either with colleagues or with my students, that they might not have found otherwise.

Maybe that's also a way to find some peace when it comes to mentoring.

Leaving opportunities by the wayside

Funnily enough, it would be easy to find such a person for running, because if you go to a running club, there is usually a coach there too. And anyone who has been reading here for a while knows that I occasionally lose my way and fail. It would be easy to accept the help of a coach. But I don't really do that either. But that's another topic.

Running update

I ran yesterday for the first time since the 14th of October. I had something in my bones. Runningwise the last months were more or less not good. I ran around 450k in the last four months, which is pretty less for this time of the year, but it was necessary and felt like a good break. Back to yesterday. I really loved the run, even if I was looking for the end of it very soon after starting. It’s so relaxing for my brain - it was nearly overwhelming. So I took a lot of motivation from that run and am now looking for the next one.

The end

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