Does anyone think it's funny to be stuck?
Does anyone ever think it’s funny when they’re stuck? I’ve never seen that happen.
Pretty much everybody is angry, frustrated or depressed when they’re feeling stuck. I’ve seen grown men cry, grown women break plates and both sexes turn the air blue with their expletives.
It’s impossible to come up with a solution if we’re miserable. So why don’t we remember this as we’re starting to pull our hair out?
I think it’s because we’re taught to keep going over and over a situation which rarely solves anything except frying an inordinate amount of brain cells. As if the more we “think hard” the quicker a solution will arise.
For how many of us has this actually worked? Not many. No wonder it’s not funny.
I’m convinced that when we’re trying to fix or solve our lives, we’ve been taught to go about it the wrong way.
Next time you’re stuck trying to get an answer but you’re not succeeding, try something that may sound counterintuitive:
1. Have fun. When you enjoy what you’re doing, you’re likely to be more successful. And the people around you who are either directly or indirectly involved, will have more fun, too.
2. Play with your “situation” the way a child does: they play, they explore, they break rules, they live in the now. And (before they’ve been socialized) they don’t care what adults think.
3. Use visualization to picture already having the answer you need. Visualization isn’t magic, nor does it replace “doing” but it shapes the nervous system in a way that makes doing more effective. It builds capacity, familiarity and presence.
The opportunity is to step into a different way of relating to the situation you want to resolve. Once you do that, you’re allowing something that wasn’t visible before to come into view.
In most circumstances, trying to use logic or formula doesn’t work because you’re approaching that circumstance in the same familiar way. When you interrupt the pattern, instead of trying to figure it out, you’re invited to act from a different internal posture.
It’s about access.
When you choose to engage this way—even for a few minutes—something in your thinking loosens. Not because you solved anything, but because you’re no longer relating to the situation in the same constrained way. And from there, you open up to new thoughts, new directions, and sometimes very concrete next steps begin to appear.
Clarity doesn’t come from thinking harder about your life. It comes from engaging with it differently. From a place that isn’t dictated by the past.
Pretty much everybody is angry, frustrated or depressed when they’re feeling stuck. I’ve seen grown men cry, grown women break plates and both sexes turn the air blue with their expletives.
It’s impossible to come up with a solution if we’re miserable. So why don’t we remember this as we’re starting to pull our hair out?
I think it’s because we’re taught to keep going over and over a situation which rarely solves anything except frying an inordinate amount of brain cells. As if the more we “think hard” the quicker a solution will arise.
For how many of us has this actually worked? Not many. No wonder it’s not funny.
I’m convinced that when we’re trying to fix or solve our lives, we’ve been taught to go about it the wrong way.
Next time you’re stuck trying to get an answer but you’re not succeeding, try something that may sound counterintuitive:
1. Have fun. When you enjoy what you’re doing, you’re likely to be more successful. And the people around you who are either directly or indirectly involved, will have more fun, too.
2. Play with your “situation” the way a child does: they play, they explore, they break rules, they live in the now. And (before they’ve been socialized) they don’t care what adults think.
3. Use visualization to picture already having the answer you need. Visualization isn’t magic, nor does it replace “doing” but it shapes the nervous system in a way that makes doing more effective. It builds capacity, familiarity and presence.
The opportunity is to step into a different way of relating to the situation you want to resolve. Once you do that, you’re allowing something that wasn’t visible before to come into view.
In most circumstances, trying to use logic or formula doesn’t work because you’re approaching that circumstance in the same familiar way. When you interrupt the pattern, instead of trying to figure it out, you’re invited to act from a different internal posture.
It’s about access.
When you choose to engage this way—even for a few minutes—something in your thinking loosens. Not because you solved anything, but because you’re no longer relating to the situation in the same constrained way. And from there, you open up to new thoughts, new directions, and sometimes very concrete next steps begin to appear.
Clarity doesn’t come from thinking harder about your life. It comes from engaging with it differently. From a place that isn’t dictated by the past.