Todays guest post is from Kneale Mann.

Kneale Mann is a writer, a coach and a strategist. With 26 years experience, he consultants on communications, marketing and social media strategy in the private, hi-tech and public sectors. He is also an associate with CEPSM and a member of the TEDxOttawa organization team.

We All Have Choices

Recently, a friend sent me a copy of Rick Butts’ book “7 Choices”. In it, Rick talks about the time we work on us verses the time we work on what we do or getting customers or what we can offer. In the age of social networking, we can all create profiles and exchange ideas and share. But how much time do we spent on better understanding ourselves?

In 1943, Abraham Maslow outlined our need to belong in his paper Hierarchy of Needs. No matter your age or situation, you want your life to have purpose and passion. That is the core of why we may get stuck – we aren’t following either. We haven’t deciphered who we are and what drives our passion. All too often we seek external confirmation.

Internet Friends

If you are immersed in social media and haven’t taken a moment to think of all the wonderful people you would not have met otherwise you are missing the essential part of the process. In my case, I met Liz Strauss and Kathryn Jennex and over the course of two years we all got to know each other. A few tweets turned in to some emails and phone calls then in to actual work. I look forward to new projects with them in 2010. My friend Lisa Hickey calls it accelerated serendipity.

I was at an event last week and realized that the twenty or so people I was sitting with had all met online. We shared similar sensibilities, we found trust with each other and we want each other to be happy and do well.

So why do we get stuck? Is it because no one will help us realize our passion and purpose? Or is it that we haven’t discovered it inside us in order to tell people what we want?

Three years ago, a friend gave me a copy of The Secret and I have told this story numerous times but I watched the first half of the film with my closed mind and arms folded and the second half taking notes. But notes aren’t enough. We need action and focus. We are human. We get stuck. We fall into the same traps of listening to the opinions of naysayers. We fail to listen to that pang in deep in our gut.

I was speaking with a client the other day about Ellen DeGeneres. She endured three years of unanswered phone calls. No one wanted to hire her and she was running out of money. She was stuck. She then got the idea of doing her own talk show. The studios weren’t falling over themselves to help her realize her dream. But she made it happen and built it into one of the most popular shows on television. It took work and persistence. She did it because she found out who she was and got unstuck.

Why do you get stuck? Why are you not following your dreams and passions and purpose? Or maybe you are?

Does this mean we shouldn’t discover people we trust to help us navigate this journey? Ask the most successful people on the planet if they get stuck and you will get a resounding – YES! None of us is immune. But if someone asks you to help them get unstuck, forget their resume or the past and listen to what they need. If you do, magic will happen for both of you.