BINGO!!

How many of you remember playing BINGO in school, your teacher calling out the numbers, and you sitting on the edge of your seat because you almost have five in a row? Remember how much fun and competitive it was? Those were the good old days. Now imagine playing BINGO in an interactive way -getting up, walking around, and trying to fill in the blank spots with names of people in the room, matching them with an interesting fact no one would have guessed. And the prize is finding out who your mentee/mentor matches are for the next nine months! This game was so much fun for both mentors and mentees. I saw a mentor dancing and singing, “ BINGO, bingo, bingo!” Other than seeing them discover who their matches were, that was the highlight of the day. That, and knowing everyone was enjoying themselves.

Welcome 2012

As the wheel of life turns and the light returns, we don’t know what is in store for us in this new year.  So, the best that I can do is to be grateful for the gift of today, as each day is a chance for a new beginning. 

love & gratitude,

Tony

Founder/CEO, Youth Mentoring Connection

When the song of the angels is stilled...

"When the song of the angels is stilled,

When the star in the sky is gone,

When the kings and princes are home,
When the shepherds are back with their flock,

The work of Christmas begins:

To find the lost,

To heal the broken,

To feed the hungry,

To release the prisoner,

To rebuild the nations,

To bring peace among others,

To make music in the heart."

Dr. Howard Thurman

Happy 2011

We return, restored and ready to do the vital work
that fills our lives with purpose. 

Please join us in healing Los Angeles and the world.

peace and blessings,

Youth Mentoring Connection

peace and blessings,

Tony

My New Mentor…the lady in apartment #6

My Dear Friends,

Let’s put down our anger for a moment. Let’s forget about how our parents messed us up; how our culture messed us up; how the Republicans and the Democrats messed us up; how we messed ourselves up and take a few minutes to allow an amazing woman to mentor us.

http://www.youtube.com/user/AliceTheFilm.  Turn your speakers on.

Alice could certainly be bitter or angry about what she had to endure in life. Her mother was killed during the Nazi invasion of Czechoslovakia. She, her husband and son were sent to the Theresienstadt concentration camp. Her husband was moved to Auschwitz then Dachau where he died.

Alice swam daily until the age of 97. At 104, she published a bestselling book "A Garden of Eden in Hell" recalling the events of the concentration camps. Alice Herz-Sommer attributes her longevity to her optimism.

This month Alice will celebrate her 107th birthday. Happy Birthday Alice. Thanks for your birthday presence on this planet.

Peace and blessings,

Tony

Tony LoRe
CEO/Founder
Youth Mentoring Connection/Urban Oasis

Inspire: “to breath one’s spirit into the world”

I showed up to the beach uninspired. My co-leader on the beach was not feeling it either. She asked me for help and that little act of connection woke up the purpose inside of me…service to others. By allowing me to help she woke up my inspiration and thus inspired me to offer my gifts to those gathered around us. The word inspire comes from the latin “inspirare” meaning “to breath into”, and it also holds the root of spirit. So,

Inspire: “to breath one’s spirit into the world”.

It occurred to me how much of the time I do feel inspired, and in turn I realized how much of my life is surrounded by sources of inspiration. So, my privilege to set the inspiraton of the day for the 120 people on the beach came from those very people. Eventually that led to a discussion about the people we surround ourselves with. Do they inspire us? Do they breathe life into our spirit by encouraging the expression of our higher self?
One of the most effective ways to influence change in one’s self is to change the crowd one hangs out with. Yesterday on the beach we had a crowd of 120 who got together to inspire the highest, noblest part of our youth and each other…and it’s always fun.
Rumi said:

Be with those who help your being.

Don't sit with indifferent people, whose breath

comes cold out of their mouths.

Not these visible forms, your work is deeper.

A chunk of dirt thrown in the air breaks to pieces.

If you don't try to fly,

and so break yourself apart,

you will be broken open by death,

when it's too late for all you could become.

Leaves get yellow. The tree puts out fresh roots

and makes them green.

Why are you so content with a love that turns you yellow?

Yours in spirit,

Tony

Tony LoRe

CEO/Founder, Youth Mentoring Connection/Urban Oasis

Founder, Boarding House Mentors

It's time for our annual campaign drive! Partner with us to mentor our youth from the threats of gang violence, drugs, and dropping out of school. Everyone who donates will be entered to win two tickets to our benefit concert with Jackson Browne in October.

YOUR DONATION WILL CHANGE LIVES! Donate here: Youth Mentoring Connection Annual Campaign

The Ultimate Mentor Passes Away

The Wizard has died.

On June 4, 2010 just months shy of his 100th birthday the man known as the Wizard of Westwood left this plane of existence to join up in the afterlife with his beloved wife of 53 years ‘Nell’. John Wooden left behind a legacy of mentoring that is second to none. The man lived with total integrity. He was never heard to utter a curse word. It’s not the lack of cursing that is so impressive. It is the fact that he lived his values so unfailingly every day.

John Wooden was arguably the greatest coach that ever lived, not just basketball – any sport. He won 10 NCAA basketball championships at UCLA (7 in a row), the last in 1975 (my second year at UCLA). Nobody has ever come within six of him. His teams once won 88 straight games. He amassed perhaps the greatest winning record in sports history without ever talking about winning. He would say that:

 "Success is peace of mind, which is a direct result of self satisfaction in knowing you did your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming."

It’s not his impressive records that will be his most important legacy. It is the lives he touched. His former players speak of him in reverent terms as the man who molded their lives forever. Until the day he died he was still in contact with 172 of the 180 of them (more than 30 years later). Since his coaching days John Wooden has taught and inspired thousands of others, from young kids to seasoned executives. He was an unlikely hero to my partner Susan, who went to UCLA’s rival USC, and who I have to explain the game of basketball to as we watch the NBA finals. She proudly displays a picture of her and Coach. She has read his books, which are not so much about basketball, but are anthologies of wisdom. John Wooden not only transcends the game of basketball, he just transcends.

Some of my favorite mentoring stories are about the way he guided Bill Walton. The 7 footer Walton was the most coveted basketball prospect in the nation when he decided to sign with UCLA in the 1970’s. These were times of great upheaval in the country when the most prevalent bumper sticker read “question authority”. So, in the zeitgeist of the time Walton grew a beard in defiance of Coach Wooden’s policy against facial hair. When confronted Walton explained that he should have the right to assert his own individuality. Wooden asked if he believed that strongly. Walton said he did. "That's good, Bill," Coach said. "I admire people who have strong beliefs and stick by them, I really do... We're going to miss you." Walton shaved it right then and there. Since leaving UCLA Walton called once a week to tell Coach he loves him and he used to write quotes from Coach on his kids' lunch bags.

According to the New York Times, John Wooden always carried around a small piece of paper on which the words of his father were written: "Be true to yourself. Make each day a masterpiece. Help others. Drink deeply from good books. Make friendship a fine art. Build a shelter against a rainy day."

RIP “Coach”

Respectfully,

Tony

Tony LoRe
Founder/CEO
Youth Mentoring Connection/Urban Oasis

Founder
Boarding House Mentors

Tony’s Blog: OMG Daisy is Happy!

This work that we do with a population of wounded and neglected young people can be filled with heartache and tragedy. Often people ask me “how do you do it? How do you see so much pain and handle so much grief without getting depressed?” I usually answer in a philosophical way. Today my answer is “Daisy”.

Daisy came to us a severely wounded, shy and scared little girl. The old phrase “quiet as a church mouse” comes to mind. The past that she endured had left her with almost no self-esteem and clearly no reason to trust adults. However, something inside convinced her that she needed a mentor. I remember asking her early on why she wanted to have a mentor and she sat silent, unable to answer. Eventually I got an almost inaudible “I don’t know” (the most common phrase uttered by teenagers). I asked her if she really wanted to be in the program and with eyes unable to make contact she managed to respond with a barely perceptable affirmative nod. So the adventure begins.

Daisy’s experiences in mentoring had their highs and lows. Through it all I saw this young lady begin to break out of her shell and blossom. As time went on I was fortunate enough to witness the transformation of Daisy as she went through many difficult initiations, each time calling on an undefeatable soul to come back stronger than before. (Maybe someday I’ll be free to tell the whole story.)

I saw this young lady find herself and develop a strength that is hard to imagine, but wonderful to behold. She sacrificed for her family, putting many of her dreams on hold to work to help support the family so that her younger siblings could start to develop their dreams. It wasn’t easy and we had many a tearful session in my office. But she endured and continued to blossom into a powerful young woman. She learned to trust and allowed her present mentor, Suzanne Rico, a strong role model and successful television personality to take her under her wing and help her shine even more. Now she wants to become a news anchor at Univision, inspired by her mentor, but doing it her way. She stopped putting her dreams on hold and is creating a career for herself in TV news while attending Cal State University at Northridge. Recently Daisy participated in a surf contest with us at Rincon Point. Miss “quiet as a church mouse” now finds herself a spokesperson for our mentoring programs, often speaking in front of groups numbering in the hundreds. She has given back by becoming a mentor and jokes about the irony of ending up with a painfully shy, quiet and untrusting mentee. Payback is a ‘you know what’.

Today, many years of “Tony, I don’t know if I can take it any more” are replaced by the e-mail that I just received with the subject titled “Happy Friday”:

HI TONY!!

oh my gosh! I am having such a great month....i am extremely happy regardless of all the cuts that have been done at work doesn’t affect me anyway. I can't even explain how happy i am i should be stressing with school deadlines I’m not...my trip to davis was great! and im going back this weekend. my birthday was great...So one of my friends is throwing a party at the W Hotel in hollywood on sunset. I'll email you the info. Im so excited to go to davis this weekend. i get to see liliana again...she is doing GREAT!!! yeah my co workers are tripping out on me cuz "im too happy and im smiling way too much" lol i cant help it i have no reason besides the fact that this month is the month of my bday and i've decided to embrace it and enjoy it just like im feeding off this high from suzanne she is soo happy and im happy for her just like she is with me. im high on happiness! lots of hugs and kisses i love you so much and i hope i get to see you soon!!!

Daisy

Thank you Daisy for bringing so much love and joy into my life. You are the answer to so many questions about what makes this work fulfilling.

Humbly,

Tony

Tony LoRe
Founder/CEO
Youth Mentoring Connection/Urban Oasis

Founder
Boarding House Mentors

Griselda - 1, Racism 0

This weekend I had the distinct privilege (hmm, there’s that word) of accompanying Griselda, our brilliant and courageous young woman up to San Francisco State University for an orientation to her chosen college. I couldn’t help but reflect upon the first time I met this determined, yet angry and brooding young lady in our mentoring program at Rhino Entertainment. Over the past few years I have been given many opportunities to marvel at her resilience as her story unfolded.  This is a remarkably conscientous, thoughtful and intelligent young woman.  But like many of our young people she grew up in a household rife with the struggles of poverty and alcoholism and a neighborhood with gangs, drugs and other forms of violence. She battled and defeated these challenges, as well as a school system that crowds too many kids in classes that are too short of the proper resources.

I permitted myself to be present in the joy of the moment, to feel the pride I imagine a father feels and the excitement as his daughter transitions into a new phase of life. Plus, I always love the feel of a college campus and the exhilaration of young minds in pursuit of knowledge (and all the other trappings of the college experience).

But now my mood changes to one of righteous anger as I think about how relatively few young people from the inner city of Los Angeles will accomplish what Griselda has, not because they don’t have the inherent ability, but because they have not been able to summon up the heroic qualities that she has found. It shouldn’t take that. We as a society have failed them, and the vast majority of ‘them’ are “black” or “brown” students. If you are buying the myth that we are gradually desegregating and bringing equal opportunities to all, return that purchase to the counter for your money back. We have resegregated big time. The schools we work with at Urban Oasis YMC are well over 90% African American and Latino and the conditions for learning are deplorable. The evidence is in. This is a national phenomenon.

We have replaced legally enforced segregation of the 50’s with economic and social apartheid today, replete with a quality gap in education reminiscent of Jim Crow days. Despite the fact that desegregation efforts were working (graduation rates increased amongst African American and Latino students and test score gaps narrowed substantially) the dismantling of these efforts starting with Reagan and resurfacing with zeal under Bush (and the failed policy cynically titled “no child left behind”) have reversed the gains. Is this racially motivated? Hard to say. Is this nonetheless a form of racism? You’re damn right it is. Is it wrong, duplicitous and self-defeating to the concept of democracy?

Jonathan Kozol writes in his book “The Shame of the Nation”:

“There is something deeply hypocritical in a society that holds an inner city child (only eight years old) accountable for performance on a high stakes standardized exam, but does not hold the high officials of our government accountable for robbing her of what they gave their own kids 6 or 7 years ago.”

This must change. Charter or magnet schools are not the answer. We don’t need magnets to draw the best and brightest out of our public schools, leaving behind those children who are too wounded to know how to motivate themselves. ALL children in a humane society should be entitled to an equal quality education, regardless of their place of birth. We need to fix the public schools if we are ever to have a true democracy where those less advantaged get a fair shot at a better future.

In the meantime those of us in the trenches will continue to try to inspire heroic efforts on the parts of young minority students to overcome the disadvantages of this culture. Our bright and beautiful Griselda will be a shining example to them and a source of pride and inspiration to those of us who love her.

sincerely,

Tony

Tony LoRe
Founder/CEO
Youth Mentoring Connection/Urban Oasis

Founder
Boarding House Mentors

Number One Supporter

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How surfing leads to graduation and college

On Sunday, Boarding House Mentors took a group of young folks from YMC/Urban Oasis to Rincon Surf Point for a contest hosted by Glenn Hening and the Groundswell Society. The contest is focused on “sharing the stoke” of surfing rather than seeing who could score the “sickest wave” or do the gnarliest tricks. There are two things about this event that resonate with what we do at YMC/Urban Oasis:

1) We were “invited”. Despite the fact that the other surfers in the contest were more skillful than our group, we have been welcomed for three years in a row with warmth and enthusiasm. The young people we bring come from a society that gives them messages every day that “you don’t belong here”. So, to be invited to this famous surf spot, three hours from home and welcomed in such a manner is a healing gesture. It is like this entire community was practicing our traditional program greeting “sawubona”, a Zulu word meaning “we see you”.

 2) The event is intended to bring everyone closer together. By so doing everyone’s spirits are awakened. Walking around the beach everyone was friendly. Strangers greet each other and make real connections. This waking of one’s spirit goes so much further than remedial interventions to help young people advance their lives. This is why at YMC/Urban Oasis, even though we do no formal academic counseling our youth graduate at a rate of 96% compared to their counterparts whose graduation rate is well below 50%.

So, I’m sitting out in the water with Glenn and he asks me about our youth. While they are falling off their boards and wiping out in the waves, I point them out one by one: Daisy, graduated and going to CSUN; Creon graduated a full year early, is a team leader in City Year, headed to college; Davon will graduate, talking college with his mentor; Jovan graduated and working full time; Esteban, graduated and going to CSUN; Brian, graduated; Alvin, graduated; Floyd, graduated, studying to be a stunt man and evaluating colleges, Sidney, will graduate and go to college; Danny will graduate and go to college.

Thanks to Boarding House Mentors and Groundswell Society.  Thanks to our young people for stepping up to life.

peace and blessings,

Tony

Tony LoRe
Founder/CEO
Youth Mentoring Connection/Urban Oasis  

Founder

Boarding House Mentors

Let yourself be silently drawn
by the stronger pull of what you really love.
--Rumi

Tony’s Blog: The World Does Not Support “Shy”

In this otherwise cynical and increasingly polarized world I am fortunate to see the best of the human spirit on a regular basis because of the work that I have chosen as my life’s path. I see people who have given up lucrative careers to work with youth because they saw a greater purpose for their life. I see adults give up large chunks of their time to mentor young people through difficult passages. I also see accomplished professionals using their gifts, cultivated over a lifetime of dedication, to give back and inspire young people to imagine a better future for themselves.

This morning I had the privilege of witnessing just that, as acclaimed stuntman, stunt coordinator, actor and director John Moio invited me to bring one of our young men from YMC to his Stuntman Workshop that he conducts twice per week without charging any of his students a penny to benefit from his wealth of knowledge, wisdom and experience.

Our young man who received this opportunity of his lifetime is Floyd Atkins.

Two of the tenets that I am constantly reinforcing with our youth are:

1. Don’t compromise your dreams

2. The world does not support “shy”. If you don’t put yourself out there the world is not likely to come to you.

Floyd has dreamed of becoming a stuntman since he was six years old hanging onto his father's back as dad lept onto the roof of their house.  When Floyd witnessed similar behavior in the movies and on tv he was hooked and has been testing his body's athletic capacities ever since. 

Following my advice from above he shared his dream with us. So, when I was introduced to John Moio by my friend Cristi Catlin of HBO, and learned about his gifts as a stuntman I knew that Floyd’s opportunity to move in the direction of his dream had arrived.

Respectfully,
Tony
Tony LoRe
Founder/CEO
Youth Mentoring Connection

Floyd Atkins at his first Stuntman Workshop

Tony's Blog: Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that

I have been mourning the lack of civil discourse lately and thinking about how our political process risks turning us into a nation of verbally violent people. People sitting at traditional seats of power at our highest levels of government sew hatred in order to incite the masses so that a political party can win some kind of advantage. They use fear to turn the gullible masses into tea bagger crowds demonizing and labeling their rivals.

Young people learn about power from adults. So, how can we sit in judgment of them as they form gangs and toss epithets at their rivals. Power without conscience is their cultural heritage if they look to the greater culture. So they take it to extremes. Their other alternative is to reject it altogether and check out in hundreds of different ways (apathy, cutting, mind-numbing drugs, alcohol, etc.).

Griselda, our beautiful young intern at YMC, attended a "Non-Violence Training" over the weekend and came back to tell me of people fighting for the same cause but fighting with each other in the process. "They were disagreeing on so many levels with such animosity towards each other that the whole thing turned me off." She described heated arguments over non-violent tactics ranging from total passivity to militantly taking it to the streets. She was looking for a different kind of imagination. There is a Buddhist concept of non-violent language which states that any language that divides us is violent.

Dr. Martin Luther King said: "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that."

What if adults were to exercise power with love and respect, honoring even those that disagree with us? I happen to like (peaceful) protests, but I have learned that what we need more is mentoring. Where are the elders who will cultivate a different kind of wisdom in our lives and offer it as an alternative example for the youth? I know that I have the privilege of working with many of them, hundreds of mentors, as well as our amazing staff at Youth Mentoring Connection. They number thousands of adults who have come into the lives of young people to try to create a different reality--one where respect and consideration replace judgment and blame.

yours in peace,

Tony

Tony's Blog: How a white man goes into the hood

Recently, a corporate executive asked me how a white man goes into the hood. My answer was that most of the time he drives east and then south.

No, seriously he said: How do you learn to speak their language?

I try to meet them at a place that is beyond language. Connect to their hearts.
If I try to talk like them I’m being inauthentic and they pick that up and that becomes what is communicated.

If I try to talk like an adult to a child, they turn off. So, we have to discover a common language together: A language of the heart, or perhaps the soul. The language they are used to from adults is the language of judgment. “This is what is wrong with the way you are living your life. Let me tell you the right way”.

"Out beyond the ideas of wrongdoing

and rightdoing, there is a field

I'll meet you there."

Rumi

The other thing they get is the eight words: “If you do this, you will get that.” Trust me, these kids know about accountability. They are hammered over the head with it every day. They just don’t see the point. What young people want is to be seen, to be valued. It is more important to the human spirit than the knowledge of reward and punishment. This is especially true during the years that they are trying to form their identity in the world. Youth in the city get messages everyday that they translate to mean, “you have no place in this world…you don’t belong here.”

So, I try to bring them a different language. One that is more imaginative, thoughtful and resourceful. One that is not based on “put downs” which is the most common language of youth today, but one that is based on connection and recognition. That is the spirit of “sawubona” (Zulu for “I see you”).

Finally, I try to see them as bearers of great gifts, not as receptacles for my wisdom. This is perhaps the key to their respect and to my humility which makes us both approachable.

This is my approach to ‘inner city youth’, but come to think of it:

Isn’t this what we should all be doing for each other?

respectfully,

Tony

Tony's Blog: We have it in our power to begin the world over again

Dear Friends,

When I woke up this morning my heart was full. There is something in the air. It smells like optimism, sounds like enthusiasm and feels like love. It comes in the form of an outpouring of support for our dream of an Urban Oasis for teens in the heart of the city.

That feeling has since given way to deep reflection as I realize that this is the day that we celebrate the life of another man who had a dream: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., visionary leader and advocate for human rights for all. Unfortunately we must also reflect upon his death in 1968 at the hands of those who felt that such a vision could be silenced. It cannot. His life was ended, but his voice lives on.

I call upon the memory of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. for guidance in our quest for cultural renewal. I call on his legacy to fuel our courage to check the ignorance of racism, born from hatred which in turn is born from fear. We need the memory of MLK to incite the promise of Obama that is threatened by incivility and the disingenuousness of political discourse. A political solution without a cultural shift will be short-lived. The very work that we do at Youth Mentoring Connection is aimed directly at such a shift. Our best hope is in understanding our interconnectedness, revisiting old wisdom, understanding new ways of connecting (social networking, media outreach, etc.) and practicing compassion toward our youth and their communities. We’ll have to use all these tools and our greatest levels of creativity.

Yet, as our name implies, it comes down to developing a culture of mentoring. It comes down to our ability to proliferate the number of adults who will approach our youth in the spirit of “Sawubona” (Zulu for “I see you”), to recognize the “gifts” they were each born into this world to share. Indeed to recognize that the most wounded of them carry deep medicine that we all need, and by helping them heal we learn to heal the entire culture.

Mentoring as practiced at YMC is a community endeavor rooted in the imagination of old wisdom. The word comes from Homer’s Odyssey and involves the healing of a culture wracked by war. “Mentor” becomes guide for the young prince Telemachus and inspires him to find his voice and go on the necessary journey into adulthood. The ultimate conclusion is that the gifts of the youth mingle with that of the elder, thus driving out the forces of fear. I believe that is our battle today. If we defeat fear, we can face ourselves, face our individual and collective wounds, and build the compassionate society that has always been the promise of America.

Thomas Paine wrote, “We have it in our power to begin the world over again.”

What an amazing thing, this human capacity to reinvent ourselves; to start anew. Let’s use the symbolism of a new year and the inspiration of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. to inspire us to move our society to where all peoples can finally say:

"Free at last, free at last.
Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"

yours in peace,

Tony