UNstuckness!

Sometimes in this journey I find myself well, STUCK.

Stuck like caught in the mud and the mire of stuckness. This is that place where I KNOW all about the things that I should be doing, want to be doing and know how to do.

But not doing them.

Stuck.

"Why" am I STUCK? Well, a counselor once told me that "stuck" is a form of disscociation. And in some instances I can see how that is...especially on days that I had found myself "zoning out" and not remembering what the hell happened to the last 8 hours....

What I've come realize though is that whatever you want to call it or say is the cause - focussing on that is not helpful to finding my way out of STUCK.

So when I catch myself feeling "stuck" I have a few activities that I do to help take myself of of AUTOstuck and get back in the groove of my day.

So here's a couple of things I've used to help push me from stuck - to UN stuck...

1. At different times I've used what I call a "Brain Dump". This is where I just close my eyes and start typing (or writing in a notebook). At this point I intentionally stop ruminating and chasing those never ending thoughts that are racing through my head and I write the first words that come to my mind and the only thoughts I focus on are answering the questions:

1. why am I stuck and 2. what can I do to get UN stuck?

The example below is from a recent day when I was having a lot of physical pain and in a period of "stuck". Notice the pattern of thought...and how I found my own solution in this process:

Today is hard. I’m stuck. Again. Still. I’m not moving forward because I’m in pain and I need to exercise. I'm not exercising because I don’t have summer workout clothes and I need new gym shoes. I don’t have those because I haven't done my budget this month. I don't have the budget done because I can't find the bills to pay and I won't go shopping until the bills are paid. I can't find the bills because the mail is piling up again. The mail is piling up because I'm feeling stuck.

2. One thing. Forward movement creates an energy that naturally takes us to the next action. By taking my brain off "autopilot" and "spinning" on the racing thoughts that can come when I'm feeling overwhelmed, I purpose, with intention to simply take ONE action and trust that the next action will come from the energy created from the first.

In this situation, the first ONE action might be to sort the mail and separate the bills from the rest of the mail.

This action would then take me to the next action of balancing my checkbook in order to pay the bills which would free me up to be able to go shopping to buy what I need to take care of myself and get to the gym or go outside to walk since I now have season appropriate clothes to wear - and I feel good because I was able to resolve my own problem and take care of myself.

True - this is maybe a simplified version of how "stuckness" can cause us to "freeze" and feel unable to impact the outcome of our life. It is also a very effective tool for identifying those times when I am feeling "powerless" and "victim" to the "symptoms" that ran my life and kept me dependent on outside solutions.

While going through and doing this kind of self analyzing can be hard when what we really want is someone to take care of us , tell us what to do or how to "fix" whatever is "wrong" with us...it is also the one most self empowering things that I can do to take myself off STUCK and put my life back on the fast track to another opportunity to kind of say "in your face" to a past that left me feeling very disempowered and prove to myself once again that I can - and I am - doing this.

Q: what thoughts or actions have you taken in the past to help coax yourself from STUCK to UNstuck?