Caterwauling

I’ve found myself in a strange position lately: a mentor to anyone who needs me.

It’s weird how, when your life kind of falls apart, you suddenly get a clear vision of just why you were put on this earth and what you love to do. My strength, my gift, my calling is to be a mentor — the proverbial helping hand, the gift horse, the sage, the traveler who is 10 steps ahead of you who has just been where you are right now.

The life lesson that I can share is that when it rains, it pours. In four days, I left my job, broke my phone, got my car dented by some moron, had a first date cancel on me and more stuff I’m not planning to post here. 🙂 Same thing is going on elsewhere — my former core staff of three is temporarily a staff of one. In fact, I just got a desperate call from that lone wolf, and I am glad to say that I knew how to solve the problem immediately. I know, I’m almost off the payroll, but if there is one thing I have learned, it is how to spot the opportunity in every crisis, and it’s the least I can do to share my wisdom with the next generation.

That’s actually the first logical step forward — after you’ve accepted that life is unfair, your next conquest is to defuse the situation and move out of crisis mode. After the urgency of the situation is removed, then everyone can think clearly.

I was talking to one of my dear online friends, who noted that she learns a life lesson every time I leave a comment on her site. That kind of made me giggle out loud — as I mentioned to her, there’s a moment when you realize you truly do know (or have experienced) enough to become a mentor. You realize you have dispensed solid advice, and you wonder to yourself, “When the hell did I become the grown-up?” Because, let’s face it, we all have our own mentors, and it’s unnerving to realize we have joined their ranks. But in a good way.

So again, I’ve not earned any money in my freelance business today, but my heart grew three sizes that day. 😉

On iTunes: Mary Chapin Carpenter, “Grand Central Station”

This entry was posted on Friday, September 10th, 2004 at 11:19 AM and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.