However, the worst feeling is that life is passing by and one has still not achieved what one wanted. And when one looks around and sees his / her peers doing much better , it can be sickening.

Before we talk about how carreer can be resurrected, let us first look at some of the reasons why one is stuck.

1. The biggest reason for getting stuck is Not Being Present to your Environment. Let me elaborate this a bit. Mostly we are sleepwalking through most things in our life. Be it college or  job. Our frame of reference is limited to us (80%) and few friends (20%). Moving around like in sleep, we miss out whats happening in our environment alltogether, we fail to take cues that it is offering. Most of us work like jombies after establishing some pattern to life or job.

2. Learning:One stops learning after putting certain number of years on ones resume. The belief is that after reaching a certain experience level we have learned a lot on the job and we have examples to prove how intelligent or smart we are now. Learning , if happens is mostly by default.

3. Curiousity : Age dulls the natural curiousity that one has. Coupled with cynicism and feeling of being wronged/ not treated failry , well thats the last straw.

Above is not an exhaustive list, but the ones i feel are most important and also will show quick results if acted upon.

So what can be way out. Lets start from point no 3 to point no 1. 

1. Be Curious: Look around and see what is happening in your firm. Try to make sense of if it. If things are happening in a particular manner , analyze why and what makes things tick in that way. One of the ways to start being curious is by interacting with people from different departments. Having interesting and meaningfull conversations with them. Trying to understand their department way of functioning/ thinking/ approach etc. Observe if something new has happened in their function and have a conversation with them on that. One golden rule here is:  Let the other person talk more and do not get into debates of what is right or wrong.

2. Learning: A curious person by design probes a lot. His conversation is designed to understand, to explore a bit more. When one is open , learning happens. So Being Curious will by default help you learn more.

Besides On the job learning, it is also important to re skill oneself time to time in different areas: Technical, Job Related and Self Development. People who read always continue to learn as they are open to other ideas more than non readers.

3. Being Present to your Environment: A Curious and Learned person knows the importance of living in present. He designs himself to live in the moment and to catch himself if he is not doing so. Being present to your environment means that you are catching signals from the world around you and interpreting them to understand what can be the impact of an event at Macro level and to you as an individual. 

4. Chalking a Course of Action: Most actions that you take in your job should be planned after carefull analysis. Curiosity, Learning and Being Present needs to be grinded in Crucible and a potent action plan needs to be created. Now this is true in normal day to day life as well. A life lived without any purpose, without familarity of environment can get one nowhere.

Observe your immediate environment and capture its signals. They will help you get unstuck and move to next level and level above that.