What Mentoring College Students Taught Me About Myself

for two years after college, i didn’t write a single line of code professionally.

i thought i was supposed to try everything. so i did.

marketing. data mining. business analysis. qa. project management. product. ui design. ux. even psychology.

not because i had a plan. because i had no idea where to go.

every opportunity felt like a test. every turn felt urgent. i said yes to everything, hoping one of them would feel right.

looking back, i just wish someone had helped me filter the noise. all those tutorials. trends. advice from every direction.

i needed someone to help me think through what actually mattered.

now i mentor college students. not because i have all the answers. but because i remember what it felt like to drown in options and call it exploration.

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what i got wrong about mentoring

most new mentors think their job is to have all the answers.

they prep like they’re giving a lecture. try to sound polished. act like experts on everything.

i did this too.

a student would ask something and i’d scramble to give them the perfect advice. tried to be the career guru, the tech expert, the life coach all at once.

felt exhausting. felt fake.

here’s what people get wrong about mentoring.

it’s not about being everything to everyone. it’s not about sounding smart or having your life figured out. it’s not about fixing their problems or handing them a blueprint.

you need to know your domain. you need context in what you’re helping with. but you don’t need to pretend you know everything outside that.

mentoring is helping someone think clearly. helping them filter signal from noise. being honest when you don’t know something and figuring it out with them.

students don’t need another authority figure telling them what to do.

parents are telling them one thing. society another. seniors have opinions. college has expectations.

they’re already drowning in noise. tutorials everywhere. creators with conflicting advice. trends changing every week.

a good mentor doesn’t add to that chaos. they help you see through it. they teach you how to filter what matters from what doesn’t.

the day i stopped trying to be an expert was the day i became useful.

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when i learned about boundaries

in 2025, i was mentoring everywhere.

colleges. hackathons. linkedin dms. google meets. events.

i was handing out advice like i had the blueprint to everyone’s career. like i knew exactly what path they should take.

felt productive. felt like i was making an impact.

but here’s what i missed.

you can’t genuinely help 50 people at once. you can’t give real guidance when you’re context switching between strangers every hour. you can’t mentor well when it’s superficial. when there’s no follow up. no feedback. no progress to see.

mentoring isn’t about volume. it’s about depth.

a mentor needs boundaries. they need to focus. to invest time in understanding your context. to help you filter the noise that’s specific to your situation.

you can’t do that for everyone.

by the end of the year, i made a decision.

i stopped taking 1:1 personalized mentoring. limited myself to groups and hackathon teams. i kept a few mentees. people i could actually stay invested in. people who’d show me their progress and give me honest feedback.

this worked for me. some people can mentor many at once and do it well. but i needed to focus to be genuinely helpful.

because real mentoring requires focus. it requires seeing someone grow over time, not just giving them 30 minutes of generic advice.

it has to come from a genuine place. not from wanting to feel helpful.

sometimes the best way to help more people is to help fewer people better.

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what good mentoring actually looks like

i’ve been mentoring someone for months now. let’s call them X.

X faces challenges i can’t even imagine.

their college is brutal. doesn’t let students do anything during lectures. extra classes piled on top of regular ones. the system is designed to drain you.

and on top of that, X has problems of their own. life stuff that has nothing to do with college. the kind of weight that makes just showing up feel like an achievement.

and yet X shows up. every session. every week. still curious. still trying.

i don’t tell X what to do. i’m not here to hand out a roadmap.

i’m here to ask the right questions. to help X think through decisions that feel impossible. to remind X that progress doesn’t have to look perfect.

when X tells me about a small win, i see it. when X is stuck, we work through it together. not because i have the answer. but because sometimes thinking out loud with someone who cares is enough.

the progress X has made isn’t because of me. it’s because X kept showing up despite everything.

i’m just proud to witness it.

this is what i was looking for in a mentor too. someone who doesn’t try to fix you. someone who helps you see yourself more clearly.

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and then i found my own mentor

people always ask where to find a mentor. like there’s a database somewhere. a form to fill out.

i found my mentors by accident.

a common friend introduced us at a meetup. a senior at work who actually cared enough to check in.

and now, my current mentor. i found her on linkedin.

but finding someone on linkedin isn’t the same as having a mentor. we talked. met. built a relationship over time. it wasn’t transactional.

she’s everything i could’ve asked for. not because she has all the answers. but because she helps me think through my own questions.

here’s what i learned about finding mentors.

you don’t find them by asking “will you be my mentor?” you find them by showing up. being curious. doing the work.

you find them in conversations that feel natural. not forced. not transactional.

mentors don’t always choose you because they see themselves in you.

sometimes you just bring fresh energy. ask questions they haven’t thought about. work on something they find interesting. or they simply enjoy the conversation. sometimes they’re learning from you too.

the best mentor relationships happen when someone sees you trying and decides to help.

not because you asked perfectly. but because investing time in you feels worth it.

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what i know now

mentoring changed how i think about growth. mine and others.

it’s not about having a perfect path. it’s not about knowing everything or pretending you do.

it’s about showing up. asking better questions. filtering what matters from what doesn’t.

and most importantly, it’s about depth over volume. real investment over surface level advice.

if you’re thinking about mentoring, start small. focus on a few people. be honest about what you don’t know. help them think, not just listen.

and if you’re looking for a mentor, don’t look for someone perfect. look for someone who’s willing to sit with you while you figure things out.

that’s all mentoring really is. thinking together. growing together. one conversation at a time.