Mentoring e-Mail # 14

Happy Tuesday, my Fantastic Mentees!

It is I, your Artful Mentor, with, yes, one more whacky note to spur you on to great fund-raising heights! Actually, I think you are doing just fine without me spurring you on, now that I think of it.

This week is the 200th birthday of Charles Darwin, one of the developers of the Theory of Evolution, and to whom the concept of “survival of the fittest” is attributed. With my mentoring group down to five people, you five are now the fittest ones able to survive the ramblings of your Artful Mentor. We started with a cohort of eight, and one dropped out. Two fled their Artful Mentor, deciding that a marathon in the wilds of Alaska with the summer team was preferable to dealing with any more of my emails. One of them told me, as she fled in terror, that although she might run into an Alaskan Brown Bear on a remote part of the marathon trail, at least a bear wouldn’t try to email her!

Actually, neither of these two fine ladies were quite that dramatic about their reasons for leaving the Spring Team. One just wanted to switch to Alaska, and the other was injured and needed to heal before trying a long distance event. But in any event, the five of you are my mentoring survivors. Drink a toast to Charles Darwin, and to your persistence! And then, drink another toast to your teammates, Lexi and Leslie! Both have not only recommitted for Shamrock, but both have also passed their fundraising minimum. Way to go, Double-L!

Isn’t it great to finally have some spring weather for the Spring Team? I did my four miles tonight in shorts and a tee, and it felt wonderful! I have a cold, and so it feels especially good to not have freezing temperatures. I am hoping to feel well enough to be at training and to see all of your smiling faces!

I just have a few reminders for the week. First, remember to wear something red or pink to training Saturday for Valentine’s Day! I have my pink bunny ears that I wore during the Breast Cancer 5K last spring, but I think I need to find something else. Pink tights? No, don’t worry, I wouldn’t do that to you!

Second and more importantly, for the three of you joining me for Country Music, you should have gotten an email from Amber with all your recommitment paperwork. That needs to be completely filled out and returned to her by February 23rd. Whether you recommit or not has to be entirely your decision. You know what you have to do fundraising-wise. If you want to talk about fundraising, if you have questions or concerns, just give me a call. I will also try calling each of you in the next week to see if you have any questions or concerns.

One of the fundraising notes that has been going around and apparently has been successful is the one with the “Gimme Five” theme. If you haven’t tried that one yet and want an example of it, just email me and I will get you an example of it. We are coming down the home stretch now, both for fundraising and for training, so don’t let up! If you haven’t reached your minimum yet, you need to look at how much more you have to raise over the next 2.5 months, and plan how much you will raise each month to attain that goal.

I hope to see you all Saturday for our Valentine Run. As always, please let your coaches know if you won’t be there.

GO TEAM!
Art