For anyone who may have noticed, I’ve been kind of quiet on “Your Career and You” for a couple of months. Lot of “stuff” going on both personally and professionally, and as blues legend B.B. King would say, “The thrill [was] gone.”

But I’m back now. The creative juices are flowing, although a smidge slower than usual. Just needed some “inspiration” to get the rhythm back.

Life as a professional communicator (former PR pro, now PR prof) is very much about finding and nurturing that spark that will give birth to an amazing promotional campaign or special event…something that will catch the public’s eye and focus attention on a client’s or employer’s product or service.

You can’t do this holed up in your basement office or workplace cubicle, though. No, you have to interact with living, breathing fellow mortals whose thoughts, actions and opinions can give you a “gentle” creative nudge.

Inspiration often comes from the most unexpected sources…I’m actually sitting on a bus with a group of Curry College Communication students and faculty heading to New York City for a two-day “field trip.” I’m listening to the quiet but excited chatter of the students for many of whom this is their first visit to the “Big Apple.”

I’m getting a sense of the eager anticipation that many feel about this adventure. And from this buzz of energy and excitement is coming my own inspiration…to write…to create…to communicate.

Circling back to my current “gig” of Associate Professor of Communication/Public Relations at Curry with an express goal of introducing young up-and-coming professionals to the career field that has been my own life’s work…

I try to help my students understand and experience public relations, and we achieve this through a combination of classroom discussion (well, mostly monologue from yours truly) and real-life experience (internships).

I don’t expect every single one of them to “drink the Kool-Aid” and dive headlong into PR. I want anyone who chooses to follow in my wobbly footsteps to be doing so because he or she gets it…sees the potential for making a difference for a company, a product, a service…whatever.

To accomplish that, there has to be a spark of “Oh wow…that is sooo cool. I want to do that.”

And to accomplish that, you have to be excited…to be motivated…to be inspired. That, in turn, requires that you be an active participant in all that makes up your “world.”

It’s not a passive “sit and wait to see what happens” relationship. Talking…seeing…and doing will spark your own creative juices and give you inspiration.