Mentors — No one is perfect.

There aren’t perfect mentors. There aren’t perfect mentors because there aren’t perfect people, and that’s okay. What matters in mentorship is that the relationship fosters some sort of mutual self growth. What matters is that both people learn from each other, and use what they’ve learned to grow their characters.

Once you accept this, it’s easy to find mentors and mentorship opportunities within people and in places you hadn’t expected.

I learned this lesson from a corporal early on in my career. I was a private fresh out of boot camp. I had a picture of an ideal Marine Corps in my head where every Marine was as squared away as the drill instructor who’d helped them to earn the title. When I’d reached the fleet, I was shocked to find that this wasn’t the case.

I’d suddenly found myself far from a pristine Parris Island and now in a fleet where several Marines, well above my pay-grade, were no where near the caliber of my former drill instructors. Their cammies were wrinkled, some smoked… I even saw a Sergeant put his hands in his pockets!

I was shocked. More shocking was that I was under the charge of some of these Marines. I became discouraged. How was I to find mentorship so that I could become a better leader of Marines when those I was lead by didn’t quite fit the mold I had in mind.

One of my NCO’s, Corporal Ramos, pulled me aside and talked to me about this one afternoon. He’d noticed a level of demotivation and was able to get me to speak about how I was feeling. He gave me a great piece of advice. One I’ve kept with me to this day:

No one is perfect. Everyone has many sides to them. Those sides show through at different times. Instead of looking for perfection on all sides, take a bit from every side, both good and bad. Learn from everyone around you. The qualities you like — make them a part of you. The qualities you don’t — understand why you don’t and try not to exhibit those. Mentors are everywhere.

The funny part is, at the time I definitely wasn’t looking to him to be a mentor.

He soon became one, as did many others.