For me, this article is about mentoring younger people and benefits it provides. I mentor a young brilliant programmer who I used to work with. I maintained a relationship with him after I retired. He called me up last night frantic about some issues. I know he drinks too much and that he has mental health issues, so I was able to talk him through it. We talked about solutions for his drinking problem. He thanked me later for helping him. He calls me about 3 times a year with these freak outs. Helping him makes me feel useful and doing some good. I have a similar relationship with my son, so this programmer is like an adopted son, which I encourage because my philosophy is we are not alone in the world, but have people around us that care about us and are willing to help if we can put down our pride and ask for help. I wouldn't be alive today if I hadn't asked for help and then let people help me.
Thank you. I think most healthy people have this goodness in them but the modern world puts more emphasis satisfying the self. I discovered the benefits of practicing kindness when someone was kind to me.
I feel we're not exposed much to that kind of positive behaviour while growing up. Busier and busier parents and grandparents, overwhelmed teachers, goal-oriented sports coaches. I can locate a few forks-in-the-road in my formative years, and they have to do with someone noticing I was hurting and being a little shit not to hurt others but out of despair, boredom, frustration, etc. and taking the time and energy to steer me towards creating, investing in doing rather than thinking (high school librarians), or to make me think on myself and what I was bringing to the teacher/student relation (later high school librarian) and helping prepare me for university.
I just feel it's almost impossible to learn mentoring and 'giving back' when you haven't been either the target of it, or been witness to it.
