Stop Feeling Stuck, Right NOW

You feel stuck. No matter what you do you can’t seem to get ahead.  You work hard to fill the schedule only to have it fall apart. Paid marketing attempts fail to bring in the new clients you so desperately need.  The nanny you recently hired is already showing signs of not being the right fit.  And, most importantly, you’re bringing your worries home and it’s creating havoc between you and your spouse/family.  You’re at a loss on how to move forward.  You can feel yourself not only falling backward, you’re spiraling downwards.

There is nothing about being stuck that feels good.  To the contrary, being and feeling stuck can overwhelmingly derail you from even attempting to take micro-steps forward.  So then what do you do?  Become resolved to the fact that you will forever be in the current state of affairs you’re in right now?  That can sound like hell on Earth.  Do you quit, sell, hide, run away just to start the whole process over to land exactly where you currently are today?

There is a simple, yet powerful, actionable step you can take to get unstuck, feel as if you are moving forward (even if it is baby steps), and get to where you want to be.

You start with verbs.

Verbs are action words in the English language.  They are the single best use of syntax you can incorporate into your goal setting, daily affirmations, task lists, morning huddle, and relationship building.  Here are a few of the more powerful verbs and ways in which you can leverage them into getting unstuck.

Accelerate

1. Acknowledge

When you’re feeling stuck, it’s important to acknowledge the stories in your head. These stories are filled with GAILs (Gremlins, Assumptions, Interpretations, and Limiting Beliefs) that keep us from moving anywhere so we stay safe (remember, the main function of the brain). So our GAILs can give us insight into those deeper emotions that often are the true culprits of our stuckness. Acknowledgment of these emotions is essential to getting and staying unstuck.

2. Control

Many times the reason you get stuck in the first place is that the world around you is chaotic. There are too many things to do, too many choices, too many decisions to make, too many ways to be wrong or fail, too many times you’ve screwed it up before, too many voices, too many BS excuses. When in the presence of chaos, you hyper-focus on what is within your control.

Control is a foundational element of SMaRT. When we feel there are things within our control, we can start to believe we are in control, so we then can be in control. What’s wonderful about the verb control is that we don’t need to be in control of everything or be “controlling” to reap the benefits. All we need is a little bit more control to move on. And when we can move, we’re not stuck.

3. Connect

Even though you may be with people all day, how often are you able to connect? This is a common myth that just because you surround yourself with people, you are sharing innermost thoughts, binding, uniting, and joining together, which is what connect means to do.

Research shows that social connection increases our longevity, reduces anxiety, curtails depression, and is identified as one of our most basic human needs. When you connect, you can share all of your varying degrees of stuck and broaden your support network.

4. Empower

To empower someone evokes strength, confidence, and trust.  As a leader, parent, spouse, or some other title with authority, you’ve empowered others to take some sort of action. From making the decision as to when to add another team member to picking up their own socks, empowering someone is a quintessential act of strength, confidence, and trust.

Now, what stops you from empowering yourself? Empowerment is not something reserved for others. You have the power, authority, control, and permission to empower yourself to do whatever is needed to get unstuck. You can even be UNSTOPPABLE!

5. Listen

We acknowledge our head (see above) but we listen to our gut. Here is where you’ll find that inner voice that tells you exactly what you need to hear, just not necessarily what you want to hear. We all have a level of intuition that brings us to the place or decision we always knew we were going to end up but fought going there.

Also, listen to your body and trust that it’s telling you exactly when you need to sleep, eat, relax, take a deep breath.  Listen to joyful sounds of the world around you: birds chirping, kids laughing, horns honking. Listen to your family and friends when they say you have things so good and you’re blessed. All of these are reminders you’re still alive and there are verbs to use.

6. Educate

One of our favorite mantras is a famous quote by Albert Einstein, “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.” Applying that same thought process to getting stuck, let’s wordsmith that quote just a bit, “We cannot get unstuck with the same thinking we used to get us stuck.”

Leveling-up our thinking means educating ourselves to expand our minds and explore other solutions. With a world of knowledge at our fingertips, this verb is the easiest to implement.

7. Reach out 

When you feel stuck, it often comes with other emotional weights such as sadness, depression, anxiety, anger, guilt, regret, and fear. The combining of these emotions can make it difficult to get unstuck yourself.

Reach out to professionals that can guide you through the process of moving forward while supporting you in your emotional process. Without leaning into the other emotions surrounding your stuckness, you’ll find yourself taking longer to move on and, most likely, getting stuck again in the near future.

8. Accept

Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference. 

The above is known as the Serenity Prayer. Everything that is needed to know about how to accept is said within these short lines. Because the fastest way to get unstuck is simply to accept and move on.

9. Truth

Here’s the Truth; if you’re moving you are not stuck. You might not be moving in the direction you wanted. This is something to celebrate because any kind of movement is still good movement. There are things to learn, experience, teach, lean into, and other verbs you can say to make your movement relevant.

Now all you need to figure out is how to steer.

Note: Do you see that capital T in Truth above? We did that on purpose. There is a difference between Truth and truth. Truth, with a capital T, is the symbol for something that is universally true. It’s factual so everyone can agree. To use truth, with a lowercase t, is an individual truth. Something that is seen from your perspective and you believe it to be true.

10. Eliminate

Getting unstuck NOW requires you to break barriers and overcome obstacles. Often we are uncomfortable and cautious about exerting this much energy because the amount of power it generates can be uncomfortable and downright scary. The story we tell ourselves might be, “What if I make things worse?” or “What if I do it wrong and embarrass myself?”

Screw the inside voices! Feeling stuck is a slippery slope to darker, scarier places. If it takes you a short burst of aggressiveness to free yourself from the chains binding you go for it.

Caution: When eliminating barriers and tapping into your aggressive power, be sure you don’t harm yourself or others along the way. There are ways to eliminate barriers without causing more damage. Be creative until you find them.