Hey Reader Friends!! I’ve gotten behind on #31Days since company came in over the weekend! It’s been hard to catch up!! But I will! So please check back! It’s day 24 of the series 31 Days of Lessons Learned from My 20’s. If you want to read all the posts in this series, you can find every post listed here. If you want to have all the posts delivered to your email inbox, subscribe here.
The other day I was talking to a friend of mine. She’s about my age, she has three kids, and her husband’s a pastor of young adults at their church. She mentioned that one of her best friends is 27, single, and in their ministry.
Secret envy immediately crept into my heart when I heard my friend describe her 27-year-old single friend as her “best friend”. Not envy because I wanted to be my friend’s best friend, but envy for the single woman. What a blessing to have such a Godly woman in her life – mentoring her, speaking truth to her, and sharing life with her.
When I was single I had one special friend kind-of like that. I taught her first-grade daughter, and they also went to my church. Even though I wasn’t too much younger than she, we were worlds apart – her with a family, me wanting a family.
Every month or so she would invite me over to eat dinner and watch a movie with her after her girls were in bed. Her husband travelled some, so this worked out nicely. More than anything, it made me feel a little more “normal”. If you’ve been single for any length of time, you know what I mean. Sometimes there’s an invisible stigma from married women towards single women. It’s no fun to be in the middle of it.
So I would go and hang out. It was nice to get a home cooked meal, be in a “real home”, and hear children playing.
But one thing I missed out on – forming a mentor-type relationship with my married friend. You know, past just eating dinner and watching a movie. A relationship where it becomes comfortable to share your soul and hear someone else’s perspective. The kind where someone says the hard stuff and you receive it as a blessing. The kind where truth is spoken.
I made a lot of really dumb choices in my twenties. I joke that most people’s dumb choices are in their teens and early twenties. Not me. Mine were after college. “If only” rings through my mind quite often. If only someone was there to speak truth to me.
Now, please don’t get me wrong. I’m not blaming anyone for any of my actions. I know I am 100% responsible. I’m just saying that having a mentor – a true mentor – would have been a blessing.
That is one reason my main ministry is for young adult women. My heart breaks for women in their 20’s who don’t have anyone to speak truth into their lives. God does say He brings good from all things, doesn’t he? This is the good that’s come from my experience.
So, if you’re single remember, you can’t do it alone. You really can’t. I am bold enough to say that if you do not have Godly women in your life speak truth to you, you will not leave your 20’s unscathed.
And married women, you can’t do it alone either. We all need mentors. I want to encourage you to not only have a mentor for yourself but be a mentor to one of these younger women.
For more resources on mentorship, please visit MoretoBe.com.
Do you have a mentor? Do you want a mentor?
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