Kyle Thomas

The Website of Kyle Thomas (KyleWith)

Let your passion drive you

Education and training are important attributes to have. Especially when it comes to achieving goals but passion should not be disregarded.

Passion is infectious. When I talk with passion and conviction about what I do, people listen. <insert tooting of own horn>

It works in reverse as well though. When I hear someone talking about what they love doing with a deep passion I’m instantly drawn in. I want to immediately know more about their work, buy their product or invest in them.

Passion builds community. When I talk about baking bread you can hear the passion gushing out of me. Not because I want you to buy my product but because before it is a business it is something I love.

I’m so passionate about baking bread that I will admit I’m not the best at it.

I’m not a trained baker.

I’m passionate about it and I’ll show you that good or not.

I will talk about trying new products. I will talk about the failures. I will talk about how I do it all. And when I do this I end up with an engaged community of people who support me.

Talking with passion doesn’t mean you have to be the loudest one in a room. It means when you talk about what you love or believe in people actually listen. They listen and hang off of every word. Most of the time that loud person is overcompensating for something anyway.

Letting your passion drive you is a profound notion and one I like to live by. Passion doesn’t always pay the bills though. Which is why I often let reality be the navigator.

If you look at the dynamics of a driver/navigator relationship you’ll see a symbiotic partnership. If the driver were to just drive with no direction they might end up going in the wrong direction or going too far. But if they have a trusted navigator to help direct their passion, they’re going to be able to change and adjust as you go.

The point being, letting passion drive us is key to having a successful practice and building a community of supporters. But without the direction of reality, it can sometimes misguide us.

So be the optimist who lets passion take them to new and exciting places. But remember to stop and consult with reality regularly about the truths of what you’re doing.

As a take away to this post, I encourage you to think about what you are passionate about. Then think about how much that plays into what you do. Can you take that passion and talk about it more? Can you show your community why you are passionate about what you do?

This is all part of letting the universe know what you want. Be bold.

This post is post is part of a bigger series called Let The Universe Know What You Want. See the other posts below:

• Seek Out Subject Matter Experts
• Let Your Passion Drive You

John Goodman on Community is Awesome

I became a fan of the TV Show Community in June when a friend showed it to me on Netflix. I have also been a fan of John Goodman since the Flinstones and Rosanne.

Now the two have come together in EPICNESS. I love this trailer and I think I’m going to love his character.

Watch it and tell me how good it is!

I shall write for you, about me

Well now that I have found a place to sit, I shall write for you. I shall write for you today something more personal, instead of some topical article. I shall write for you because I haven’t in sometime and I feel it has been to long. The main reason I shall write for you today, is because I would like to share something with you. It will most likely be something to do with my life. So now that you understand I shall be writing for you today, I shall begin.

I’m in an odd place in my life, well I always seem to be. I have been searching for the last 2 years. For what, I don’t know. For who, I don’t know. My hope is I find it and them soon.  I will try to explain this as best as I can.

I write a website that is growing and becoming more and more recognized, and I know tons of people in this town (Yellowknife) but still I am missing something. Now the reason for this post is not for pity (I don’t like pity), but it is more to explain how I feel when I’m alone. I know an amazing bunch of people, but the only issue is (I don’t know how to explain this properly) I don’t share that bond that good friends share (You’re all awesome by the way, please don’t take offense to this). I long for someone who shares my passion of things, someone who has an interest in Yellowknife and its community events, understands my passion for social media and maybe most important to me is someone that is relatively close to my own age.  That is a lot, to even imagine, but did you know I can almost guarantee the people and friends I will meet will be at least 10 years older than me. It is bizarre.

Like I said this is not a pity cry, I just wanted to get this down on words. I also understand my problem. It is me! Most of the time my mind is wondering how to do something or how I can make that work or where to find this and that, it never stops. From the second I wake up to the moment I fall asleep, I’m thinking about websites, design, social media, marketing, profiting, how-to’s or scheming how to make back money spent. If I could shut it off for a couple hours a day I would, because I know it affects the people I’m around. I barely have an interest in anything else, except for maybe my vehicles. But on the flip side, I wont push myself to fix my own problems. I say I want to go see live music at the bar or coffee shop but I don’t have anyone to go with, so I won’t go. Which is ultimately like stabbing myself in the foot, if I never go I will never meet anyone like that. Part of that, in my mind anyways, is that I don’t drink, so I rarely ever see the need to go out – or something like that.

I hope some of this makes sense. Maybe I am making this a lot more dramatic than it really is, but this is my blog and I can write want I feel.

No that I have written for you, you should write too. As you are doing that, I am going to go try the French Onion Soup and BLT combo from Tim Hortons.

What is Hyperlocal Blogging? Is it my niche?

I have struggled for a long time to find my blogging niche. I love blogging but I have felt I don’t blog about anything interesting and what I constantly am trying to do is create myself online.

So it wasn’t until I moved down to Dawson Creek did I realize I had found my niche, I just hadn’t realized it. After seeing how successful YkOnline was or could have been had I still lived in Yellowknife I thought I would try a similar thing for Dawson Creek.

I think subconsciously I like to create these types of blogs because not only does it bring community together online but it also helps me get out into the community. Meeting knew people has always been a fault of mine so by giving myself these projects to keep up with it forces me out there. Then once I start to grow the readership I continue to do it because I feel it is expected of me. Make sense?

So what type of blogs are these? Well they are referred to as Hyper Local Blogs.

Hypelocal described by Wikipedia:

Hyperlocal content, often referred to as hyperlocal news, is characterized by three major elements. Firstly, it refers to entities and events that are located within a well defined, community scale area. Secondly, it is intended primarily for consumption by residents of that area. Thirdly, it is created by a resident of the location (but this last point is discussed because for example a photo or a gov stat can be hyperlocal but not locally produced).

This type of content should be contrasted with local news which tends to be less geographically constrained.

There are other types of data which have local or hyperlocal relevance, or be of interest to residents – e.g. a government statistic on crime rates in your neighbourhood. Such data, while relevant to residents are of a qualititively different type.

I guess some would call it just a Local Blog and would say that I am trying to be a Citizen Journalist and maybe I am. Watch the quick video below describing citizen journalism and tell me if you think that is what I am doing.

Whatever it is I am doing, I enjoy it and want to peruse it with all the information I can get my hands on. Over the next couple days I am going to do some more research on this niche and will write about it so 1. I can understand it better and 2. you have a better idea of where I want to go.

My Mind is Racing with Ideas

I feel like my mind is racing so fast that I can’t take the time to stop and blog about it. So I am going to try really hard here right at this moment to stay focused on writing this.

Couple things that I have been pondering and watching this morning are the development of YkOnline and the Blogathon that is happening in Vancouver as well as all over the world over the next 24 hours.

I will start this with YkOnline. It has yet to be written in stone as to what I want the site to be, although it does seem to be something. I have been watching several other “community” blogs trying to taken in how they are built and maintained. Ones such as BlogTO and Beyond Robson which are Fresh Daily blogs, Torontoist and The Coast. These are all well established sites, run by several people and catered to 100x more people than Yellowknife’s population. But I believe that someday soon with some dedication I can get the site to become not only a great site for locals but also a resourceful site for people researching about moving to Yellowknife. I’m facing some challenges as I have to leave the north for 8 months for school but I know in the long run it is a good thing and will only help with the site but in the mean time I don’t want it to die. I will have more details about YkOnline soon.

As for the Blogathon, this has got me excited. I absolutely love the idea. I’m watching a lot of Vancouver bloggers do it right now. Check it out at Blogathon.org and consider donating. What is happing, is several bloggers have gotten together (you don’t have to, but they have chosen to this time around) and will be blogging for 24 hours straight. They will each publish a post every 30 minutes about what ever they like. Each blogger has their own charities they are getting pledges for. Some of the bloggers are writing about their charities and why they are blogging for them, while others have themes to go off of.

My mind is flying with ideas and possibilities for a Yellowknife Blogathon. I am just imagining all the local bloggers getting together at Javaroma or some other local for 24 hours of blogging. Now I’m not sure if Yellowknife’s Bloggers get enough recognition but I still think it would be fun and worth it for the charities.

Got a comment or suggestion about either of these things. I would love to know.