Why does our society believe a new generation can be built the same way toasters are made—with standardized processes and mass production?

That’s called manufacturing. To manufacture means to make by manual labor; to fabricate; to produce mechanically; to work up into form for use; to reproduce without inspiration or originality.

We need a new metaphor that reflects more than a new method—one that reflects an actual change of heart and recognizes that dysfunctional processes are not fixed by increased efficiency.

How about the metaphor of cultivating? Cultivation implies nurturing and fostering. To cultivate is to seek the goodwill of; to improve, tend; to promote the growth of; to form, refine; to prepare to bear fruit.

Or is cultivation just a throwback to a previous age? To cultivate something requires you to get your hands dirty, to sweat, to pull weeds, to swat mosquitos. And in the end, the outcome is out of your control.

But hasn’t it always been that way? At some level, all true influence involves tending, not assembling.  It involves nurturing, not engineering.

In relationships this concept is referred to as “mentoring.” The word “mentor” originated with Homer’s classic work The Odyssey, about a king named Odysseus who disappeared in battle. The men of the town started pursuing his wife, Penelope, who was very beautiful. Her son, Telemachus, tried to fight them off, but he was just a boy. There was only one solution: he set off to find his father, accompanied by a guiding friend and advisor named Mentor.

Without Mentor, the boy would never have completed his quest. With him, Telemachus became wise and strong. Now we use the word “mentor” to describe someone who acts as a guiding friend and advisor to another person.

It’s not rocket science. It doesn’t require graduate-level training. It’s just a relationship—investing in someone one-on-one and being intentional about it. A cup of coffee. A breakfast. Sunday lunch. An afternoon of fishing or baking or just watching football.

It’s living life together in a way that creates trust and a space for showing someone how to live out vision and values in relationships, at school, and at work.

The idea of life-on-life mentoring has become so foreign, though, that many young adults have no idea what it means. Imagine a person who wants to be a neurosurgeon.  Can he learn his craft through books and lectures alone? Would you let him operate on YOUR brain?

Just as apprenticeship has been the key to learning vocational trades through the centuries, life-on-life mentoring is the key to passing on life skills and wisdom.  The Hebrews combined these two concepts, defining wisdom as “life lived skillfully.”

If you think about it, you’ve seen mentoring everywhere, but you may not have realized that’s what it was.  If it works in medicine, if it works in the trades, if it works in business, couldn’t it work for you?

In reality, mentoring simply works:

• Teachers who mentor significantly increase students’ motivation, academic resilience, engagement and pro-social behavior.
• In business, whether a person had a mentor is key to whether he gets a job, keeps that job, and moves ahead in that job.
• Spiritually, young adults with a mentor are significantly more likely to apply their faith to life decisions, live with God-given purpose, and avoid destructive behaviors. In fact, the number one factor explaining whether a young person is spiritually vibrant in his twenties is whether he had a mentor when he was in high school.

One study showed that simply having an adult role model saved at-risk students from destruction.  Young adults struggle with life purpose. But so do older adults. It’s as if life purpose is a parabola—lowest toward the beginning and toward the end. But research is showing that older adults who invest personally in youth have lower rates of depression and live an average of five years longer than their peers. What if the two ends could meet? Mentoring can save young lives. But apparently it saves the lives of older adults too.