Do creatives need a mentor?

Can someone show me the freaking ropes?!

I have self published a lot of books. I am the King of championing my writing. But in 47 days my first traditionally published book comes out. There are just so many more moving parts. So many people involved … so much less control. Also, I am daring to give a lot of fucks about this book. We Need Your Art is the culmination of a decade of work. She is precious. And she will change lives.

Yesterday I was so fucking overwhelmed. I went full shut down mode. Sat on my weird, off grey, ovoid couch, backed myself right into the corner, checked my oura stats (“You’re in a state of high stress:”¹) and thought, Fuck, I just want to text someone. Someone who’s been through this a lot. Someone who knows my drive. Knows the industry. Knows my work. Knows me. I just wanted a sentence or two of reassurance, from another author, further down the line.

I do not have that person to text. I have a few amazing peers in the industry. I have very, very good friends, who would remind me of who the fuck I am. I have James, my partner, and fellow writer, who is, I mean …fuck… how can I whinge about not having a mentor when I have James, but whinge I will: I didn’t have a guide to reach out to and in that moment. I felt sad about it.

Do we need a mentor?

Girlies², I won’t lie to you. I am trying to figure out the answer to this question by writing this essay… right now I don’t know.

I do know that I have low key been a tiny bit sad about not having a mentor for a decade. Not hugely sad, just a little bit curious and a little envious of people who do. Especially in the beginning, and whenever I am having a level up, (which is now btw, my mum said so on facetime the other day). It’s always felt like I am out the front doing shit first with absolutely no clue what I’m doing. And of course, sometimes I am. I have been a torch bearer, and I am incredibly proud of that. I have gone first time and again. Truth is, a lot of the time, creative people go first. Sometimes we are the first in our family, the first in our community, the first in our country, the first in the world. We are the ones who try shit out. Artists frequently don’t have footsteps to follow. I am so proud of us for that. Holy shit we are brave.

But I want to validate the part of me, and perhaps the part of you who occasionally cries out: holy shit can someone just see my brilliance and take me under their wing?!!? Can someone show me the fucking ropes?!

How I’ve navigated my creative journey mentorless.

Let’s go back to the tearful Amie who pinned herself into an acute angle of the couch. She didn’t have a mentor to tell her how to handle this pre-publishing shitshow. She didn’t have anyone to give her advice about what steps to take next. So, what happened instead? She cried³. Then, she took care of herself by herself. I mentored myself, (AKA blind mentoring, when you have absolutely no fucking clue but you give it a go).

“This is huge darling baby,” she said “It’s so valid to be overwhelmed. You are doing so well. You have so many natural instincts that serve you in these situations. Trust them. You are brilliant. You are going to have to learn shit the hard way at points, but you’ve got this. Trust yourself.”

Becoming a writer has made me someone who can take profound care of myself. My absolute dickwad of an inner critic has been softened and made to feel safe by a new voice that I cultivated; she is mothering, caring, and inherently wise.

The fact that no one scooped me up and said, “I see something in you, let me introduce your work to a few people”, has meant that I had to say those words to myself first.

Amie had to say, “I see something in you, Amie, let’s go share our work with a few people.” In many ways, I wonder if my wanting a mentor was the same as my initial obsession with being picked by a publisher. If someone took me under their wing, that would mean I had value! I wouldn’t need to see the value in myself first, because someone else did that for me. The fact that no one ‘saw something in me’ meant I had to go through the most profound revolution of my life and see something in myself.

The fact that no one individually plucked me out of obscurity and mentored me, also meant that I got to go find mentors in books and podcasts. We don’t need to know our mentors we just need to have access to other people’s brilliance. And truly, I owe so much to Julia Cameron, Ryan Holiday, Martha Beck, Seth Godin… and many more.

Artists do lead and guide and care for other artists without ever knowing each other. It is the nature of sharing art. We mentor from afar. And that’s so fucking beautiful. But I do think, especially in the age of online connection, that being seen and KNOWN by another human is something different.

As I write this, I realise that I just wanted someone to come in and make this journey a tiny bit easier. I think that’s what mentors are meant to do, make the journey a tiny bit easier, in whatever way they can.

God, I just wanted some help. Someone to turn to. There is something so lonely about the moment when you’re sharing and making your art and shit isn’t going the way you want it to. The question What do I do next? is one I always answered for myself (and with James, again I’m blessed). But we had to make it up as we went along.

I have been UN-MENTORED by authors more times than I have been mentored.

Let me explain. I have one particular memory of meeting an author in a very synchronous way, in the middle of a walk in the Australian bush. I remember thinking, this is what Julia Cameron is talking about! This is the many hands of god helping me on my creative journey. This is the synchronous magic that happens when you take art seriously! I was so brave. I introduced myself. Told her about my work. She told me that it was a shit industry and I should keep it as a hobby…

The creative industries are RIFE with artists warning other artists off of their profession. I’ll talk about that in another article. But this happened to me a lot. Especially when I was starting out, whenever I would speak to elder professional writers, they wanted to warn me off doing it, rather than taking me under their wing to support me. I think maybe they needed a mentor more than me.

I don’t think we are currently living in a culture that encourages creative mentorship. Because we are so battered from … lets just call it “the fuckery⁴”, artists seem to favour either trying to stop other artists from going into the industry as some sort of patronising protective instinct, or to see other artists as a threat to their success. This needs to change.

Because most artists already know the road is hard. What they need is someone to say, “it’s going to be tough, but I will walk the road with you. I’ve seen it’s twists and turns and, though it might have changed over the years, though parts of it may be cracked and broken, I will try my best to point out where you might stumble. We will find a way through together.” To say that isn’t to give false hope, or to deny reality. It is to be human.

I am a creative mentor.

I mentor through my art. I write about the creative journey and share it. I like to think I mentor through my fiction, for any other fiction authors who may look up to me. I mentor in the Inspired Collective, my community, my family, my church.We meet once a week and we BE together. And I do so individually with several artists on an adhoc, here if you need me, I talk about you in rooms you’re not in[1] , situation.

Nothing lights me up like fighting for creatives. This is obvious as I write it It’s basically my whole career, but … I am so excited for 80 year old Amie to wield her power to help others. I hope she has loads of cash and loads of influence, because she’ll do very cool stuff with it. She’d mentor, I suppose[2] .

Okay, I feel I am coming to an opinion.

Artists should be finding each other and lifting each other up. Sometimes we do it as peers, sometimes, when we are further down the road, we do it as mentors. It is how we survive and thrive.

So are we pro mentorship?

Yes. I think sometimes we seek out mentorship for the wrong reasons: to feel valid, to feel important, to feel chosen. We have to do these things by ourselves, I fear. But we do need support. We do need some forms of mentorship in our lives.

I am going to go all in here and see how it feels: If you’re an artist in a good place, you should be mentoring other artists. It should be a mandatory part of the process, like a sponsor. Mentorship doesn’t need to be elaborate, it doesn’t mean weekly checkins, though it can. It means that the artist has someone to come to when they need a bit of support. It means they have your number so, when they’re crying on their strange ovoid couches, they have someone to turn to. You offer help to creatives who need it in ways that are sustainable and aligned to you.

Scott Galloway says a similar thing about Men. If you are a man in a healthy relationship with yourself, it’s your duty to go mentor other men. They need it.

I had many many privileges on my road to becoming a professional writer, but mentorship wasn’t one of them. And I am proud of the way I navigated that, I am proud of the mentor I have found within myself. But I wish someone had been there for me when I was younger. I wish that the elders I had come across had offered me support, not warnings. I wish I had someone to text the other day. Someone to point out the cracks in the road.

We need community in this funny broken world. We need to be looking after each other.

How do I find a mentor?

I don’t know. I don’t have one…

Okay, no let’s think about this. I do think mentorship can and will vary and look different for all of us. But we deserve guides on our journey.

Some ideas:

• If you want support, firstly read the books, find the podcasts, and know that I, Amie McNee, am backing you.

• Don’t be afraid to ask for help. Perhaps that has been part of my issue. A lot of artists feel that this journey is one to do alone, and that’s not true. We need to realise that we deserve support, and we need to go find it.

• I suspect that some of us need to realise that finding a mentor is nearly always an active pursuit. You cannot wait to be found. You must choose yourself, then go find support. Let people see your work. Make sure you are visible. Mentorship cannot be another way to feel ‘chosen’. It is a way to feel supported.

• Message someone who you admire and tell them that they are guiding you whether they know it or not. This will probably not go anywhere, but it’s important.

• If my work speaks to you, join the Collective and be part of my family, we open in March for enrolment. There’s a wait list.

• Anyone who has a mentor and who is reading this! Let us know how you formed that relationship in the comments!

You don’t NEED a mentor on this journey but you do deserve help and support and love and belief.

Are you in a position to mentor?

Tricky question. You might know the answer straight away, you might not be entirely sure. What you need to know is: you don’t need to be a millionaire, or have 100,000k followers, or a book deal to mentor someone. The journey is long, you are almost certainly ahead of someone, and able to offer them the help and support they need. This isn’t an ego game. This isn’t a way to lord your accomplishments over some poor little artist bebe, this is revolutionary community care.

Don’t overstretch yourself. I know I need to warn myself off of this. I simply cannot have 30 artists who have my number and can text me when they want. I have art to make! You have art to make! You have the world to change with your creations. Don’t martyr yourself and your art to the role of mentorship. It is not a good example to set.

It is my belief that we are entering the Era of the Artist.

It is our time to shine. But if we are going to sparkle and thrive, we are going to need support. We deserve support.

Thanks for going on this journey with me as I literarily wrote my way to an opinion. I feel like we got somewhere. As I conclude, I feel settled. This world needs more community care. We need more mentorship. Let’s find our people. Let us take care of one another as we create.

Do you remember when I said that Martha Beck is a mentor of mine?

Well, get very excited for me because she blurbed my book for fucks sake: “This book is desperately needed medicine for our hearts, our lives, and our culture. I will read it over and over until its many truths sink into every one of my cells.” The book, We Need Your Art, is out on March 11th in e-book, audio, and hardback and it would mean the world me if you pre-ordered it !

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1. Tangent: I have started adhd meds, dexys to be precise and my oura (a ring that tracks my biometrics) has me in a near constant “high state of stress” presumably because the meds activate my sympathetic nervous system. This is -ungooglable- any one else on dexys and use a wearable?? I don’t feel more stressed than when I am off them. I am recovering really well with sleep. But the constant stress state on my ring is distracting

2. Gender neutral

3. For those interested in the oura saga, crying is the only way I can get my “State” to go from stressed to relax… isn’t that kindoff beautiful. It plummets.

4. Neolibralism, industrialism, amazon, tech bros, elitism, systemic oppression, the ways of the world