How to Finally Get Unstuck and Get Going With Life

We have experienced this episode before, and it’s not going to be our last time.

This usually occurs when you contemplate life-changing decisions, when you believe that your lives seem mundane or do not feel fulfilled in your current profession or relationships.

It feels like you are in a stagnant position. Nothing out of the ordinary is happening. You are encountering certain issues in life that you believe have no solutions to them. Sometimes, when these thoughts land in your mind, it is normal to feel hopeless and question yourself as to why you are here on this massive rock in the first place.

To free yourself and get moving, you may have to do lots of research about yourself. It would be best if you can determine the factors that made you feel like you are not going anywhere. Once you identify them, work from there and do not be shy to ask for help, be it from your friends or family members.

Why Do I Feel Stuck in Life?

There are no right or wrong answers here because everyone’s journey is different, so you have to find your reason.

By listing certain possibilities below, I hope that you will be able to resonate with some:

• You do not have an objective in life to pursue, and you do not know what you want to do for the rest of your life.
• You cannot help but feel that you are not fulfilled by your current line of work or relationship with others around you.
• Something bad unfolded in your life, and because of it, happiness has eluded you, and you do not know how to regain it.
• You are bored by the monotony of routine life, and you are seeking for more. However, you are afraid to leave your comfort zone because you fear that you cannot take heavy criticisms.
• Difficult choices are right in front of you, and you are indecisive, let alone being fearful of the discomfort that comes once a decision is made.

I listed all that I thought of, but I am confident that there are many more reasons why one can feel stuck in life. Whatever the reason behind your sense of hopelessness is, go through the steps below. The steps have helped me tremendously on similar occasions, and I hope that they can help you too.

The Answer Lies In You

If you are struggling to find an answer that will help you dig your way out of this mess, you would not because you already have the answer. You may not know it but, numerous times, you know what your next move in life is. You feel indecisive because you are too afraid of the answers your intuition is presenting to you.

You still want to remain in your comfy cocoon and believe that experiencing pain would further exacerbate your harrowing situation. Hence, you have nowhere to go.

What if you did what your heart tells you to do?

The barriers suddenly disappear, and you roam this planet as a free being.

However, I am aware that the circumstance is different for an individual who, especially in this pandemic era, lost a loved one and unable to summon the will and drive to live any longer. I have been there before, and I am thankful for myself for seeking help when things became unbearable. Hence, get professional help if you still struggling to find your bearings to get on with life.

Besides that, all the answers we seek are normally found within ourselves. It is just that sometimes, those answers are deeply buried in our subconscious mind. We need to ask ourselves different questions than the usual ones to bring those answers to the surface. For instance, when I felt that I am paralysed in a difficult situation, my mentor asked this question:

Will you be pleased with your life after five years if nothing changed in your life right now?

A simple question, but it opened my eyes, and I realised how I need to summon the confidence and courage to change my situation for the better. That provided me with the ideas and, eventually, answers to get unstuck and continue to plough forward.

2. Pull Yourself Out Of The Comfort Zone

Is your life requesting you for an upgrade, but you are grounded in fear?

It is human nature to grab onto safety, security and comfort even though one is displeased and well aware that there are better opportunities available.

However, fear of failure and fear of the unknown hold you back. It comes from the idea that discomfort, regardless of form, is detrimental and failure is not an option. Despite that, the reality is that discomfort is needed for growth, and no matter how far you run away from it, it will catch with you eventually, one way or the other.

So, relax your shoulders and accept discomfort as a driver of personal growth. Learn to embrace discomfort and failure. When you look at its fundamentals, failure is feedback to you on what works and what does not work. Failure provides us (including myself) the opportunity to learn, improve and evolve. It is part of the learning process.

When being summoned to perform something that requires me to step outside my comfort zone, I would ask myself the following question:

Is the pain of not budging worth it? Which is greater? The pain of remaining in an unfulfilling spot and missing out on all the window of opportunities life is giving me? Or the pain of the temporary discomfort when I step outside my comfy space?

Even though you experience pain while growing, eventually, as you adjust to the discomfort and learn new coping mechanisms, it soon will become your new comfort zone.

3. Slowly Summon The Courage

Occasionally, you would find yourself between a rock and a hard place. It feels nearly impossible to get on with your life because you feel distraught, the pain, the confusion, and the fear of unpredictability.

When sadness and depression hit you, acknowledge it. It would be best if you could accumulate the strength to dig yourself out of this situation. So, give yourself tender loving care to build the courage necessary to dig your way out. The most vital thing is rather than staying stuck in this situation for life, develop plans in your mind about how you will overcome this before deciding on your next move.

We are a resilient species, and if history has proven something to us, it is that we have the strength to adapt to any circumstances. That is the beauty of being a human being. We might not see this yet (let alone acknowledge it), but don’t we observe people around us who encounter all sorts of impediments and yet continue to move on and seek happiness once more?

As human beings, we have developed this tendency to underestimate ourselves. Specifically, we tend to underestimate our inner strength significantly. We can do it, actually. We need to have faith and place our trust in the process while harnessing that strength of ours.

Additionally, as part of unleashing that strength, we must recognise that this is a subject of mind over matter. Our minds occasionally overdramatise the issues to the point that we find them nothing but specks of dust on our shoulders when we actually address them.

When you are ready, do not go all out. There is no need to rush the process. Take your time. Take baby steps. Celebrate the small wins. Let them be the fuel that will drive you to bigger and better things.

4. Never Challenge The Flow. Surrender To It.

We have a set of pretty good ideas about how our lives should look like.

We believe that we are destined to take up a certain profession for the rest of our lifetimes or live with one person for eternity, even if we see warning signals all the time.

I am here to inform you that at times, through unexpected ways, life informs us that we have in our hands the power to change our lives, and we have the time to make good use of it. However, the moment we think about changing our lives, the fear of experiencing discomfort automatically sweep in. Once that happens, we revert to the things we are familiar with becomes there is comfort in understanding and predicting established trends.

One marvellous thing about life is that it knows when you are not in the right place. When that happens, life will find a way to let you know that you have to take a different direction. It will seek ways to persuade you that what you have been doing is clearly not working anymore.

Acknowledge it as the natural ebb and flow of life. If you go against the natural flow of life, all you are doing is engaging in the act of self-harm. You will feel the agony more profoundly in your familiar setting than in uncharted waters.

What you resist persists. Hence, do not challenge the impending changes. Instead, embrace them with faith when they are heading your way. That way, you would not get stuck, and you can save yourself from unnecessary hardships.

5. Understand That You Always Have A Choice

When you consider it, you will find that it is funny how feeling stuck is just that. A “feeling” you fabricated in your head, especially when you are clueless about how to address a particular issue or lack the bravery to implement change.

However, are we actually stuck? Don’t we always have a choice?

The good news is, we do. We always have a choice. We can always choose happiness over sorrow, and our guts usually point us in the direction to live a more fulfilling life. This is a blessing to recognise because once we are geared to overcome our fears and face any criticism that people will present against our choices, we are getting somewhere.

Knocking repeatedly on the same door that would not budge will not get you anywhere. Only when you open your eyes and observe that there are other doors to knock on will you finally get moving again. Always remember, you have a choice:

• If you do not think about what others convey.
• If you are feeling confident to accept failures and live with the discomforts.
• If you follow your heart’s voice.
• If you choose happiness over agony.

All things being said, feeling stuck, at times, is just that, a feeling. Fuel yourself with more enlightening thoughts, and you will find a way towards happiness.

6. Begin With The End In Mind and Develop A Plan Of Attack

If the idea of a fulfilling life still eludes you, fetch out your notebook and note down how your ideal life looks like.

What do you miss now? What can you do now to get one step closer to that ideal life? What is keeping you at bay from taking that leap of faith?

Perhaps it is the next move that is keeping you stagnant. By answering the questions above, you would then figure out the necessary actions to propel yourself forward.

Yes, a considerable amount of fear and possible tears will be involved, but whatever happens, take the initiative to keep advancing.

7. Practice Mindfulness

Sometimes, we feel like we are not going around in circles, not making real progress in our lives. It could be that we do not have the people in our past any longer currently, and thus, life is not the same. So, we swim around aimlessly in the pool thoughts of our past life, forgetting to live in the present.

I have learned that if you are still breathing and able to see the sunrise every day, you have a purpose. If you woke up today, it means you still have another 24 hours to find the reason why you are here on this planet.

You may not know what that reason is now, but do not give up on the search. Patience is a virtue, and it will be revealed to you one day.

Loss is, unfortunately, a part of human life on Earth because it is the only way for new things to come to life. So, when the feelings about your past hit you, accept it, mourn the loss and acknowledge your feelings.

Have faith in the future that is being laid out for you and trust deeply that they are here to serve you better. Time is our most precious commodity because it is limited. Therefore, make it a point to make the most of every day.

To Wrap Everything Up

You cannot run away from life changes. No one can.

When you learn to accept and embrace the flow of life, you grow and evolve for the better. It also benefits you by helping you to widen that smile on your face because you do not feel lifeless at any turning point in life.

—

Previously Published on medium

***

You Might Also Like These From The Good Men Project

Compliments Men Want to Hear More Often

Relationships Aren’t Easy, But They’re Worth It

The One Thing Men Want More Than Sex

..A Man’s Kiss Tells You Everything

—

Photo credit: iStock