It was a warm, May afternoon 2011, in the west end of London in one of the nicer hotels. I sat in a room brimming with talent, entrepreneurs, thought leaders and authors etc. We were with the personable Penny Powers OBE as she led a social media master class.

During this time we were watching a You Tube video by Steve Jobs who was still alive at the time and we was watching his Stanford University graduation speech. I am sure you know the one “Stay hungry, stay foolish”, I had seen it before but this time was different.

As I watched the film, I was unusually emotional as all kinds of feelings were conjured up by me watching it and I couldn’t say why! But, to hear his story, the unconventional route he took to success, his passion, his perceptivity and his not so good start at life was inspiring.

At the end of the film Penny started to talk about the importance of joining the dots in your life as everything happens for a reason, the good and the bad. We were encouraged to have lunch on our own and to reflect and write down what we discover concerning the joining of our dots.

This was strange we were never told to have lunch unsociably but hey, I just went with it!
I went to a nice French eatery called Cafe Rouge on my own and ordered my food. As I awaited the food to come I jotted down some “dots” life experiences & crossroads in my life, which was not easy. I started to see more pain, hurt, unfortunate incidences which were hard to swallow.

As I continued, my food arrived I then got to a point where, I could see my “why”, the why I do what I do. As it started to unfold the tears started to stream then I started to sob uncontrollably, in fact I didn’t want to control it, it was time, it had to come out, I had to be free to feel my heart.

I needed this moment even though it was “awks” (short for awkward), as my 14-year-old daughter would say. As I was crying the waiter came back with the sauces and garnishes I requested, however I was now crying over my food and I guess we both felt a bit embarrassed.

However painful this was, it was good! It gave me a greater understanding of my “why” which I was pleased to discover. As an entrepreneur, I do want to be successful as a businessman providing a service however; I never want that to be my sole or most dominating motive.

My work is to change lives and inspire minds, which I have done, would do and still do for free (in some instances); I am also paid to do my work. So I needed this, I needed a motive check.

What I discovered in that restaurant was due to the pain I experienced in my life from having a challenging upbringing and I realised that I do what I do because I don’t want young people to experience feeling how I felt. I would like them to feel worthy, valued and inspired when young.

My sadness was not due to not being loved by my mother or not having fun as I did and she done really well to cushion me and my siblings from a hard life that did hurt at times. But my self-esteem and self-image was shot from some of my experiences so my perspective was painful.

This comforted me as I realised my pain could now become power and a motivation to change the lives of many through mentoring. This helped me greatly as it made my previous sadness more acceptable and I could see the well ran deep and wasn’t motivated by just earning money.

My question to you is: what is your why?
Why do you do what you do?
On a real level, are you even aware of your why?
Are you pleased with your why?
Or would you like to discover a new why?
Hopefully this will help you to discover and unearth what makes you passionate about your area of work, expertise, influence or contribution. You are powerful and knowing your why helps.

If you want to find out more of my story, you can read, “Every Child Needs a Mentor” available on Amazon or good book stores.