How to get unstuck
Getting stuck is an inevitable part of living a New Happy life.
Getting unstuck is a skill that we can learn, one that helps us to move closer to our values, dreams, and goals.
In this episode, you will learn four science-backed tools that will get you unstuck.
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Transcript
Hi, I’m Stephanie Harrison and you’re listening to The New Happy podcast.
You know what to do, but you can’t make yourself do it.
You know that if you took that leap, things would be so much better – but the leap is too big and scary.
You sit down each day with the resolve to do the big thing, but at the end of every day, it is still unchecked on your to-do list.
You’re stuck.
Getting stuck is an inevitable part of living a New Happy life.
It isn’t a moral failing or something wrong with you: it’s just something normal that happens when you are pursuing your dreams. Because if there is one thing that your brain doesn’t like, it’s feeling scared. It will do whatever it takes to stop you from taking the step into the scary unknown. If you want to live your true potential, it’s essential that you learn the skill of coaxing yourself into coming out of the safe, cozy cave and into the daylight to make stuff happen.
Getting unstuck is not something that most of us are ever taught how to do. That’s why we need to learn it. It’s a skill, something that we teach ourselves or learn by doing. We have to practice it over and over, and eventually it becomes much more of a default response.
One of the biggest questions I’ve heard lately from our community is about this. I hear things like:
“I want to do something but I can’t make myself do it.”
“I have a dream but no motivation.”
“I am terrified to do the thing I really want to do.”
The key thing to remember about being stuck is that being unkind to yourself simply will not work. You can be disciplined and accountable in your self-kindness, but you can’t be cruel, shaming, or destructive. In fact, this lack of self-kindness is often what leads you to be stuck. The more you scream at yourself inside of your head, the hardest it is to make the changes you want to.
Let’s talk about four key tools you can take the next time you feel stuck.
The first tool is to trick your brain by shrinking your task
The easiest way to think about being stuck is that when it happens, your brain is running two completely conflicting programs. The first program, run by our primitive brain, senses imminent danger and is screaming at us to not take a single step further. When this program is in control, you tend to either stare hopelessly at your task, procrastinate endlessly, or simply give up before you get started.
The second part of our brain, run by our more evolved selves, is begging us to please, please, please, just open the email and send it, start the poem, or make the call. It’s reminding you that you decided on this goal for a reason and that you really want to achieve it because it will make you happier. It also loves to berate you, telling you that you’re flawed and stupid and horrible because you can’t just do the thing.
The primitive program and the evolved program are battling it out in an arm wrestle fight for control. Usually, neither one wins, and deadlocked, you end up doing nothing for days and months and years, torn between stopping and starting.
To trick your brain, you need to shrink the task that your evolved self has set your primitive self.
Big tasks that represent extreme vulnerability and require big courage like “Write a book” or “Start a company” are way too much for the primitive program to cope with. They trigger instant five-alarm alerts.
Instead, you have to shrink the big dream into separate tasks that are much more palatable, ones that your primitive brain might not even realize ladder up into the bigger dream. “Write a book” turns into “write 100 words each day.” “Start a company” turns into “buy a domain name today.” This allows you to gently coax your primitive program into doing what your evolved program wants to.
The second tool is to shift the way you think about control.
Sometimes we get stuck because we have developed an external locus of control, which is the belief that external circumstances have control over your life, and what you do doesn’t really matter. If you have an external locus of control, you might catch yourself engaging in self-talk like “nothing I do really matters,” “this is never going to change,” or “no matter how hard I try, I won’t succeed.”
If your conflicting brain programs have been locked in an arm-wrestle for a while, you’ll likely develop an external locus of control. When times are hard, like these ones, it’s even easier to start to believe that your life isn’t your responsibility. Why bother acting? Nothing matters. Your lack of activity then results in no progress or changes, making you feel even more stuck. It’s a vicious cycle.
You have to reclaim a sense of agency by exercising control over your life in some way. My favorite way to do this is to make some really weird choices that shake up this mindset. Here are a few examples:
If you normally walk or drive a specific route to work, take a completely different one.
If you usually have yogurt and granola for weekday breakfast, make yourself a full-on bacon and eggs breakfast.
If you always flop on the couch when you get home, flop on the floor and do 20 sit-ups instead.
Any small, strange choice jostles your mindset just enough to see that, in fact, you are always making choices, not acting is still a choice, and you’ve just gotten mired in a pattern of making choices that make you feel stuck.
The third tool is to find the right type of support
Through our relationships with other people, we can find the security and safety that inspires us to take big, bold risks. If we believe that we have enough support — and critically, that that support will still be there no matter what happens with the risk — we can release ourselves from our self-imposed prisons. I love how a New Happy community member described this:
“My friends often have different perspectives than me and provide great words of wisdom on how I can reframe the situation and become more action-oriented (rather than dwell on a situation). Knowing that I can take action on the situation and make it better, rather than being a victim, helps me feel less stuck.”
Who in your life makes you feel safe and secure? Who can you share your dreams with? Who unconditionally supports your biggest, boldest ideas? These are your essential sources of support when you’re stuck. Here are a few ways you can lean on them to get unstuck:
Tell them what you are stuck on. Say the words: I AM STUCK. Sometimes, simply telling someone about our stories and challenges is all we need to see what’s getting in our way.
Ask them to help you identify your blind spots. A friend who will ask you great questions is an invaluable resource to pinpoint the things that are in your way.
Request a cheerleader. Sometimes, we need to just hear from the people we love that no matter what happens, they are going to love us.
The last tool: the real life copy-paste.
One of the reasons we struggle with taking action is that it’s much harder to do something than it is to think about doing something.
Why do we struggle to take action? The simple answer: it's much harder to take action than to just to think about taking action!
We need a toolkit to help make taking action and changing our behaviors easier. Here's one of my favorites to try out this week based on this study: the copy-paste.
Simply look for people around you who already do your desired behavior, and copy them shamelessly. In the study, participants who were trying to improve their health were asked to copy the workout strategies and routines of their friends and family who exercised frequently. The copy-paste exercisers spent nearly an hour longer exercising each week than those who just kept doing what they normally did.
We can spend endless amounts of tine trying to plan and figure out strategies and the optimal conditions and make sure everything is just right. But that can turn quickly into an endless source of procrastination.
You don't need to recreate the wheel and figure a new behavior out all out on your own. If you're struggling, turn towards a friend, family member, coworker, or loved one who has it mastered, and try to learn from what they do.
To recap, this week we covered four ways to get unstuck: trick your brain, check your control beliefs, lean on loved ones, and try a real life copy paste. Use these the next time you get stuck and let us know how it goes.
