One of the most influential teachers I have ever had was in consumer education class in high school. I remember taking the class mainly for two reasons: one, to fulfill a general education requirement and second, because everyone said he was quite easy as a grader. Mr. Forgette was one of the teachers I credit with teaching me a fair bit about the real world. Don’t get me wrong: there were many teachers I adored during my four years in that red bricked building. I loved French with both madames, many of history teachers, and credit Mr. Del Fava with much of the interest and love for literature that has driven me to where I am now, pursuing what I love and the life I want to lead. But Mr. Forgette was an interesting soul to me.
He taught us about filing taxes, buying houses, and about bank accounts. We read The Richest Man in Babylon not to discover what would make us incredibly rich, but to learn that maybe it wasn’t all diamonds and gold that made someone wealthy, but someone’s willingness to give that made them so prosperous. And he also told us stories of the real world, some of them ones that maybe our parents would turn a blind eye to, knowing some of them were far too honest. Stories about getting lost in the city, about scrubbing toilets because the repair guy couldn’t come to fix it in time for a new tenant for his building to move in, and loads of others.
He was a self made man and the irony of it all is that he didn’t have to work at the time that I knew him. He worked because he loved teaching. Mr. Forgette spent much of his early years working, investing, and then came to the conclusion that instead of retiring, he’d work and teach others. He’d teach teenagers some of the wisdom he knew because he enjoyed it. And you could tell he genuinely cared about each and every person he encountered. Even the odd balls in the classroom, the students that sat beside me who maybe were called out by other educators.
He gave us all a fair shot, always telling us that he believed we had more in us than maybe we saw. We all had potential in his eyes, no matter what box we were put into. No matter what income bracket. No matter any previous judgments placed upon us. It was a classroom where you entered, were entertained and encouraged, no matter what may have happened that day. And that, I believe, is pure magic.
If anything, I used to think I liked his class so much because it made me forget I was in high school, waiting to leave at three o’clock to go to hockey practice or home to write homework. But he made me believe there was more out there for me, even in the bleakest of moments. In a sense, he was one of the first people I associated with the word mentor.
We all need mentors or people we look up to, whether it’s those who show us the life we want, or people who embody every sense of the spirit we want to carry with us each and every day. As social creatures, we search for those who answer our questions with the same responses that we only think in our heads, the ones that we hope to find in kindred spirits. But often times, we are too scared to rise to the challenge of exceeding our own expectations and rising to all that our mentors want us to be, all that we are destined to become.
And yet, we must. Even if it is the hardest thing in the world, we must rise and be better than we were yesterday. Imagine, if you will, what our lives would be like if we didn’t listen to our teachers. Our parents. Our friends. Any loved one who ever sat and consoled us, giving us the advice we sometimes didn’t want to hear but needed to hear. We don’t like criticism. It scares us. And why, you might ask? Because it points out areas for improvement, leaving our egos naked and threatened.
That’s when you have to ignore your ego, take a deep breath, and agree to whatever necessary adjustments your mentor presents you. The ego is only our pride, puffing its chest and waiting for the right moment to show off, which is pointless anyway half of the time. It’s up to you, whether you take the advice or not, but naturally, any person who cares about your well being will only tell you what you need to hear. And if they want the best for you and want you to be happy, you need to trust that their advice will do nothing but good for you.
Mr. Forgette was the kind of man who knew how to speak with conviction and grace, telling people what they needed to hear with nothing but kindness coming out of his mouth with each and every word. That’s why, no matter what student walked through his door and told him about their issues, he listened, took it in, and offered his own advice, without a care in the world about what kind of return on investment he was getting. That’s what the world’s best mentors do: they give and don’t expect exactly the same return, because they know the best reward is seeing you with a smile on your face, living life according to your terms, grateful for their guidance.
