[MR] Peerage questions

[Kelly Keck]

On Tue, Jun 24, 2008 at 8:24 PM, Nicole Spaun <icychaos at msn.com> wrote:

>
> Dame Anne,
> > I do have dear friends who have chosen to not have a sole Peer. I have>
> cautioned them that seeking out too many mentors can actually be confusing,>
> fragmenting and frankly, THAT might delay growth in an area.>
>
> Hmm, hadn't thought about it that way!!!  I run things by a people,
> including peers and friends and peer-friends, for "ground truth" when I need
> to sort out conflicting ideas or when I start trying to run in multiple
> directions at once.  I hadn't thought about that as a potential negative for
> people who don't think to ask or don't have ground truth to turn to.  Or,
> for example, when I've been too confused to know I was in the, um, stuff
> until it was almost too late... since I'm still happily playing I figure I
> haven't gone beyond 'almost' yet ;).   Interesting though- I'll have to bear
> that in mind.  Thank you!!!
>
>
>

I think the merits and the drawbacks of having one teacher versus several
depend on the area.  Wanting to learn from everyone can be a great attitude,
because different people have different strengths they can pass onto you.
In the arts, that might be a matter of having one teacher for calligraphy
and another for costuming.  In service, the person I'd go to for advice on
conflict resolution might not be the same person I'd go to for advice on
event budgeting or how to run Troll/Gate.  In fighting, it gets a little
trickier to "learn from various people" because it's a narrower focus, and
they're likely to contradict each other more often.

Maybe the trick is to have lots of teachers, but one mentor.  That central
person is someone you can run the advice and ideas of others by, and is
someone who will probably give you guidance on who to seek out for
teaching.  (I doubt every apprentice has the exact same interests as their
Laurel, but if your Laurel can't help you with a skill, they'll probably
say, "Oh, you should talk to Mistress So-and-So--she's really good at
that.")

Adriana