Our story: Why I started Well Mentored

From Michael McArthur, founder

I'm a husband, a dad, a brother and a friend. I want to be the best person I can be, and to build character in my family. It doesn't happen by accident. It takes reminders, every day.

I want my kids to have those reminders too. But I'm Dad, and sometimes what I say gets waved off because it's coming from me. I understand. I was a kid once.

Our kids are on their phones. Honestly, so are the rest of us. Instead of fighting that, I wanted to meet us there, with a few words worth reading in between everything else.

So I started Well Mentored. Each day they choose, each person gets a short reflection by text, written for their age and their life, and there's a private journal for thinking it through. The same idea, coming from somewhere other than Dad, can sometimes reach a kid in a way a lecture doesn't.

Some kids can't or won't talk to their parents about what they're going through. I hope Well Mentored gives them words for it and a quiet place to think, and helps them turn to the people who love them.

Marriage, parenting, school, friends, work: these reflections are about the things that matter in all of them.

Where the name comes from

The word mentor comes from the Odyssey. When Odysseus left for war, he asked his trusted friend Mentor to watch over his son, Telemachus. Later, the goddess Athena took Mentor's form to guide the boy when he needed it most. The first mentor was a father making sure his son heard the right words while he couldn't say them himself.

The daily reflection plays Mentor's part: the right words, there on the days a parent's own don't land. And the goal, a child turning back toward their parents, is how the Odyssey ends.

That is what Well Mentored is for: helping each person become well mentored, by their parents first.

Michael McArthur, founder