Order of Man - February 24, 2017


FFN 044： Finding a Mentor


Episode Stats

Length

11 minutes

Words per Minute

206.3833

Word Count

2,274

Sentence Count

162


Summary

In this episode, Ryan talks about the importance of mentorship and how it can help you become a better man. He discusses the benefits of finding a mentor and how you can leverage the power of other people's experience in your life.


Transcript

00:00:00.000 You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears and boldly chart your own path.
00:00:06.020 When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time. Every time.
00:00:10.440 You are not easily deterred or defeated. Rugged. Resilient. Strong.
00:00:15.500 This is your life. This is who you are. This is who you will become.
00:00:19.760 At the end of the day, and after all is said and done, you can call yourself a man.
00:00:25.120 Men, what is going on today? My name is Ryan Michler and I am the host and the founder of Order of Man.
00:00:29.560 I've got to say, first and foremost, guys, that I am blown away by the growth that we're seeing over the past several months.
00:00:34.400 In fact, I just looked at the numbers. We are hitting and approaching 2 million podcast downloads.
00:00:39.700 I think we're actually going to hit that next month.
00:00:41.160 I never would have imagined that things would grow as fast as they have and the reach that we have.
00:00:46.060 But it's a testament to the power of the message that we're sharing when it comes to being a better man.
00:00:51.040 It is inspiring to see the emails and the notes and the reviews that I get from you guys listening in or reading the blog or even engaging in our Facebook community.
00:00:59.100 So I want to thank you for making the order what it is today.
00:01:02.220 I hope all is going well with you today.
00:01:03.840 I've got a busy weekend planned this weekend.
00:01:05.560 I'm actually in the process of packing today for a trip that I'm taking to Salt Lake City to meet with one of my mentors and about 100 other people who are on a very similar journey as I am.
00:01:14.940 And it got me thinking of this whole concept of mentors.
00:01:18.580 Now, I know a lot of you have questions about finding a mentor, reaching out to one, developing a relationship.
00:01:23.760 So I figured I would just take this time and address and give you some insights of my thoughts on the power of mentorship and how to actually make this work in your life because I know it's worked for me.
00:01:32.660 Now, before I get into my thoughts on that, if you're tuning into this show for the very first time, this is our Friday Field Note show.
00:01:39.260 So you're going to basically hear some of my thoughts from throughout the week and some things that have been on my mind.
00:01:43.300 And if you don't already know, we also have an interview show.
00:01:45.920 I want to make you aware of that.
00:01:47.120 And we have some incredible guests on, over 100 guests now.
00:01:50.520 So make sure you subscribe wherever you're listening to this, whether that's iTunes or Stitcher, wherever you listen so you can catch both of our weekly shows.
00:01:57.320 All right, so let's talk about mentorship.
00:01:59.040 Personally, I have spent a lot of time wandering around in my life trying to figure things out on my own, whether that was my business or my relationship, my health, my fitness, all of it.
00:02:08.600 And I think this has actually become more common.
00:02:11.100 There's a lot of guys singling themselves out and going at it alone since the advent of the internet.
00:02:16.500 Google is an amazing tool, gentlemen.
00:02:18.300 You know that.
00:02:18.860 But at the same time, it's difficult now not to get the information, but to decipher, to decipher which information is actually going to be the best for you.
00:02:28.360 I've thought for a long time that if I could figure out the answers to whatever ailed me at any given time on my own, that I'd be able to save some money over hiring a mentor, over hiring a coach, somebody to help me figure this stuff out.
00:02:39.100 But I want to give you a little bit of insight here.
00:02:40.760 Figuring it, whatever it happens to be for you out on your own is significantly more expensive than hiring somebody to teach you what they already know.
00:02:51.140 You might save a couple of dollars.
00:02:52.800 You might save a little bit of money.
00:02:54.080 But that time spent researching and experimenting and running through trial and error and messing up, is that really worth it to you?
00:03:01.920 Time is a finite resource, guys.
00:03:04.220 The only one that we can't get back.
00:03:05.820 So I've learned to harness the power of other people's time, other people's experience in my own life.
00:03:11.180 And that's exactly what mentorship does for you.
00:03:13.380 It's a leveraging tool.
00:03:14.640 So you don't have to spend as much time and energy and money and other resources figuring out what somebody already knows.
00:03:21.160 As I prepare my tax returns for 2016, it actually looks like that I'm going to spend in the ballpark of $25,000 to $30,000 on some form of mentoring or another.
00:03:32.300 Now, some of you may hear that and think, that's ridiculous.
00:03:34.520 That's a ton of money.
00:03:35.200 But it's not a coincidence that I've made more money in 2016, and I will make more money in 2017 than the year before, than I ever have.
00:03:43.560 It is an investment in myself, which means that when I hire a mentor, a qualified mentor, I'm going to talk a little bit about that, that it will pay dividends.
00:03:53.480 So there's a lot of confusion about what mentorship even is, what it looks like.
00:03:58.660 And I personally think that there's two types of general mentorship, if we were to place these in two different camps.
00:04:04.880 There's direct mentorship and there's indirect.
00:04:07.160 I want to talk about indirect mentorship first.
00:04:09.400 This comes in the form of gaining knowledge, information, insight, without somebody physically teaching you.
00:04:16.500 And it's typically the least expensive mentorship, and in some cases, it's actually free.
00:04:20.620 So this could come in the form of books, it could be courses, conferences, seminars, events, podcasts like this one, blogs.
00:04:27.040 Basically, any form of gaining new insights without speaking directly with a coach or a mentor.
00:04:34.220 There's value to this, although I would consider it to be the first, the stepping stone, the first tier of mentorship.
00:04:39.860 My podcast guest actually this week earlier, Tom Bilyeu, talked about the concept of cultivating your identity.
00:04:46.440 When you become deliberate and intentional about the information that you're consuming in the form of indirect mentorship,
00:04:52.360 you are cultivating, you're curating who you want to become.
00:04:56.400 So that's indirect mentorship.
00:04:58.140 Now, on the other side of this, we have direct mentorship, and this is what I consider to be a higher, a second tier of mentorship.
00:05:03.920 This comes in the form of somebody directly teaching you, whether that's in a group setting or a mastermind group like our group, the Iron Council, or even individual one-on-one coaching.
00:05:15.140 This is going to cost you more money typically than indirect mentorship,
00:05:17.740 but you're probably going to get some sort of customized plan and some accountability that comes with that.
00:05:25.240 So I think you need a healthy mix of both.
00:05:26.880 I read a ton of books.
00:05:28.220 I belong to three different mastermind groups.
00:05:30.640 I currently have individual coaches that help me with my business, my fitness, my life.
00:05:34.540 So I see value in both of these things.
00:05:36.560 So I want to talk with you about how to find a mentor, what you should be looking into, and how you can actually identify somebody.
00:05:43.420 Very simply, the answer is that a mentor should be someone who is already experiencing the results that you're after.
00:05:50.540 They are already experiencing the results that you're after.
00:05:52.980 If they're not already experiencing those results you're looking for, there is no way for you to know if this is someone who can even duplicate results for you.
00:06:01.500 And that's what you need.
00:06:02.340 That's what you're looking for.
00:06:03.400 So look for results.
00:06:05.100 I know that this can be a challenge.
00:06:06.460 I know this can be difficult, especially in the internet age, because it's very easy to fake people into believing that you have it all figured out.
00:06:13.960 Everything is so curated and it's so filtered that it's hard for us to know what's real and what isn't.
00:06:21.480 And this is where you might look for some sort of third-party reference.
00:06:25.920 You can ask a friend, ask somebody who's already working with this person, look for a testimonial from other people, not from that mentor, because those can be crafted.
00:06:33.280 But if you're looking for fitness advice, you're not going to ask the guy who's been sitting on his parents' couch eating Cheetos and frozen burritos for the last decade.
00:06:41.600 Nothing against frozen burritos.
00:06:43.340 If you're looking for business advice, you're not going to want to ask the guy who's been an employee of a company for his entire life.
00:06:49.180 Not that that's bad, but he's just not going to know how to get to that next level that you're looking for.
00:06:54.060 If you're looking for money advice, you're not going to ask the guy who just filed bankruptcy on how you should handle your money.
00:07:00.620 In other words, that very first step in finding a mentor is to qualify the source.
00:07:05.580 And the second step is to connect, is to connect and lead with value.
00:07:09.520 That value that you are going to provide for a potential mentor could actually mean that you're going to pay somebody for his advice.
00:07:16.160 It could be that you make a meaningful connection for that person.
00:07:19.840 It could be that you promote his work to your circle of influence.
00:07:23.300 There's a thousand things that you can do to lead with value from helping that person out to paying them money.
00:07:29.360 And each relationship is going to be different.
00:07:31.500 So I've got to throw this disclaimer.
00:07:32.820 It's a word of caution.
00:07:34.280 And I've talked about this before on the podcast.
00:07:35.960 Reaching out to a would-be mentor and asking the question, how can I help?
00:07:41.860 Gentlemen, I know that sounds like you're leading with value, but you are not leading with value.
00:07:48.860 You're actually adding workload to that potential mentor.
00:07:52.420 Do some homework and get creative in providing actual value.
00:07:57.240 Not asking how I can provide value, but just going out and doing it.
00:08:00.920 And step three is to think in terms of building a relationship with this mentor.
00:08:07.340 You didn't ask your wife to marry you on the first date.
00:08:09.680 Well, at least I don't think that you did.
00:08:12.240 It's the same thing with a mentor.
00:08:14.900 You want to be in this thing for the long haul.
00:08:17.200 So don't rush into thinking that you and your mentor are going to be best buddies the minute that you start working together.
00:08:23.780 You may not even like your mentor.
00:08:26.020 He or she may not even like you.
00:08:27.760 So take it easy.
00:08:29.200 Learn what you can over time and continue to provide that value so you can build a solid relationship that's going to last an extremely long time for you.
00:08:37.560 I know I've oversimplified this.
00:08:39.080 This three-step process.
00:08:40.260 But it really doesn't have to be all that complicated or even difficult to do.
00:08:44.640 I think we have a tendency to complicate things as an excuse not to do what we already know we need to do.
00:08:52.000 Again, it's very simple.
00:08:53.780 Qualify your mentor through the results they are experiencing.
00:08:58.780 Connect by leading with value.
00:09:02.040 Be creative.
00:09:03.060 Find a way that you can be valuable.
00:09:04.660 Whether that's your time, energy, resources, connections, or even money.
00:09:09.740 And third, develop a relationship for the long haul by continuing to provide that value.
00:09:16.400 And this is a big one.
00:09:17.280 Actually implementing the advice your mentor is sharing with you.
00:09:20.840 I can't tell you how many times I've given somebody advice because that's what they've asked for.
00:09:25.020 And yet they refuse to implement the advice that I've shared.
00:09:29.320 You are not reinventing the wheel here.
00:09:31.900 This is the point.
00:09:32.720 You are leveraging the experience of somebody else.
00:09:35.800 Somebody who already has this figured out.
00:09:37.700 Who's already making it work in their life.
00:09:39.660 And you're using that knowledge to work for you.
00:09:42.120 So if a mentor tells you to do something.
00:09:44.360 And you've followed these steps by qualifying the source and adding value and building the relationship.
00:09:48.620 Then do that thing and have some faith that it'll work.
00:09:52.920 So guys, if you want some more formalized mentoring in a group setting, which we talked about.
00:09:57.580 That's more of that tier two type mentoring.
00:09:59.360 I would encourage you to join our mastermind, the Iron Council.
00:10:03.040 This is a group of 230 guys.
00:10:05.600 We're all working together to get the most out of our relationships, our business, our health, our lives.
00:10:11.600 You're going to be able to work with me.
00:10:13.020 I'm there.
00:10:13.540 I'm very active.
00:10:14.320 But you're also going to have access to the other 230 guys who have some incredibly valuable insight to share with you about what it takes to succeed as a man.
00:10:22.960 And of course, you're going to have the accountability that comes along with that.
00:10:25.340 So if you want to learn more about what we're up to inside the Iron Council, head to orderaman.com slash Iron Council.
00:10:30.900 I hope to see you there.
00:10:31.780 But in the meantime, gentlemen, identify those mentors, qualify those mentors, lead with value, and develop a long-term relationship.
00:10:40.100 And above all, take action on what they tell you to do and become the man.
00:10:44.320 You were meant to be.
00:10:45.580 Thank you for listening to the Order of Man podcast.
00:10:48.480 If you're ready to take charge of your life and be more of the man you were meant to be, we invite you to join the order at orderofman.com.
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