Here’s the bad news, getting stuck in life is inevitable. There will be times when you feel stuck and no matter what you do, things just don’t seem to move, and you feel like being trapped where you are. And there’s no way out and you can’t find a solution.
Here’s the good news, getting stuck in life is a normal phenomenon. There will be times when you fall into this trap and feel powerless and inferior, but it doesn’t mean you are stuck forever.
There are many reasons why you feel stuck and can’t move forward in life. Most of the time, people are stuck because they feel trapped in their job, career, and work.
They feel like they are running in the rat race, repeating every day without seeing how things could improve.
And sometimes, we feel stuck because we have no idea how to make something work, like achieving a career or business goal. No matter how hard we try, nothing seems to be working.
There are also times when we feel stuck in our relationship. We feel like we have lost the passion and the zest for the relationship we are in.
Well, no matter whether you are stuck in your business, relationship, or any other area in life, there are methods how you can get out of it and continue to move forward.
And in this guide, I will share with you 7 brilliant ways how to get unstuck and move forward in life…
1. Get a Day Off
When the legendary Steve Jobs was fired from Apple’s board of directors, he felt stuck and have no idea what he wanted to do with his life.
And guess what he did? If you read his biography, written by Walter Isaacson, you will discover that Jobs took 3 months holiday after he was fired from the very company that he started. He knew he needed time off to reconnect and rediscover his inner desire – to get unstuck.
And that was exactly what he did. Jobs was on holiday for 3 months, spent time with his family, and went into deep reflection about his life and what he wanted.
That was the moment that his life changed. Jobs discovered he still loved what he did. And then he went on to buy Pixar and started another company called NeXT computer, which was eventually bought by Apple, and Jobs returned to the company he founded, again.
My point is this, when you feel stuck and trapped in life, you should consider taking some time off.
Like what Jobs did, when you are getting nowhere, perhaps, taking a break, getting recharged, and looking at things from a bigger perspective allows you to get unstuck.
This was what Steve Jobs said about his experience of getting fired from Apple…
“Getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.”
Steve Jobs
But what should you do during your time off? Well, you can check out these outdoor activities for your whole family. Reading a personal development book can help too. Or you can spend time on your hobby as well. Just follow your heart and do whatever you like doing.
2. Reconnect with Your Inner Self
When you are stuck in life, whether you’re trapped with your career or relationship, it is always a wise choice to go back to your inner self.
The moment you connect with your inner self, it empowers you. You become crystal clear with your life purpose and what you are meant to do in this world. It aligns you with your core values and helps you live a more meaningful and harmonious life.
Being connected with yourself means understanding your deepest desire, knowing your core values, vision, and drive that keeps you moving forward in life.
Oftentimes, people are lost and stuck in life because they have lost the connection with their inner self. They feel trapped because they have no idea what they want or they feel inferior about their circumstances.
However, when you are connected to your inner self, you will become clear with what you want out of life. You will have discovered your inner calling.
But, how do you connect with your inner self? Here are a few ways how to do it:
- Accept your current life situation, good or bad.
- Practice meditation.
- Spend time in nature.
- Practice solitude and spend time alone with yourself.
- Journal and release your emotions.
3. Revisit Your Goals and Targets
When was the last time you revisit your goals, targets, visions, and inner callings? Chances are, most people don’t. And you know what, most people don’t even have a goal to begin with.
Your goals are like a lighthouse, it will guide you and show you the way when you are stuck and lost.
But sadly, most people don’t have goals. And even if they do, they don’t review their goals regularly enough.
What most people will do is that they will try to set goals in their heads, without writing them down. And after a while, they will forget about their goals and never do anything about them.
Never let this happen to you. Stop being like most people. Instead, be proactive and commit to your goals.
Write down your goals, create actionable plans to achieve them, and most importantly, take action and make progress.
Remember, when you are stuck in life, revisit your goals.
“The trouble with not having a goal is that you can spend your life running up and down the field and never score.”
Bill Copeland
And if you want to learn more about setting and achieving your goals, you should read this: Ultimate Goal Setting Guide: How to Set Goals and Achieve Them
4. Identify the Problem and Fix It
In my article, How to Achieve More by Getting Rid of What’s Stopping You, I shared a story from the best-selling book, Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less…
“In a hiking journey, Alex’s mission is to take the boys to the campsite before sunset. But as we all know, getting a group of young boys to keep up the pace can be challenging. And Alex has a problem – some boys go really fast while others are slower. And one boy named Herbie is the slowest of them all.
The gap between the front hikers and Herbie, who is at the last of the line, grows farther.
At first, Alex tries to solve the problem by getting the boys at the front to stop and wait for the rest to catch up. This keeps the group together for a while, but the moment they start climbing, the gap becomes bigger again.
And then Alex got the idea of putting Herbie at the front of the line and the fastest boys at the back of the line. He places the boys in line in order of speed: from slowest to fastest.
It may sound counterintuitive to place the slowest boy at the front and the fastest boy at the back, but things begin to work in a single group.
Every boy can keep up with the boy in front of him. The great thing about doing so is that now Alex can keep an eye on the whole group. But the downside is that Herbie is slow and the whole group has to follow his pace.
The solution? As Alex discovers, is to do anything and everything to make things easier for Herbie.
With Herbie at the front, the slowest boy, if Herbie moves faster, the entire group will move faster too.
As a result, Alex focused on Herbie. Any improvement with Herbie will improve the whole group immediately.
This is a great insight for Alex. He then helps Herbie by taking weight out of his backpack, distributing the food and supplies throughout the rest of the group.
This instantly improves the speed of the whole group. Eventually, they make it to the campsite ahead of Alex’s planned time.”
Can you relate to this story?
When you are stuck in life, find out the ‘constraint’, in other words, find out the problem that is making you stuck, and get rid of it.
Just like if you want to start an e-commerce business selling shoes, but you have no idea how to build a website, hence, you are stuck. What you need to do then is to fix the problem – create the website.
Either you can learn how to do it yourself, or you could hire someone to do it. And once you have fixed the problem – getting the website built – you will have no problem moving forward. And that’s how you get unstuck in your life.
5. Reframe Your Perspective
Another way to get unstuck is to reframe your perspective. You want to look at the problem, your circumstances, or your situation from a different perspective.
When you reframe the situation, you can turn a problem into an opportunity.
When Richard Branson was stuck in an airport due to his flight being canceled, he reframed his perspective by turning the problem into an opportunity.
Here’s what Branson did – he chartered a plane and sold tickets to all the other stranded passengers that were there with him. That was how he got the idea of starting an airline business, and Virgin Airline was born.
Reframing your circumstances from being stuck to seeing them as an opportunity is one of the most powerful ways to achieve greater success in life.
If you want to learn how to reframe your thoughts, you should read this article from Self.com.
In the ground-breaking book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, the author, Stephen Covey shared his experience about reframing perspective. And he called it ‘paradigm shift’. This was what he wrote in the book…
“I remember a mini-paradigm shift I experienced one morning on a subway in New York. People were sitting quietly – some reading newspapers, some lost in thought, some resting with their eyes closed. It was a calm, peaceful scene.
Then suddenly, a man and his children entered the subway. The children were so loud and rambunctious that instantly the whole climate changed.
The man sat down next to me and closed his eyes, apparently oblivious to the situation. The children were yelling back and forth, throwing things, even grabbing people’s papers. It was very disturbing. And yet, the man sitting next to me did nothing.
It was difficult not to feel irritated. I could not believe that he could be so insensitive as to let his children run wild like that and do nothing about it, taking no responsibility at all. It was easy to see that everyone else on the subway felt irritated, too. So finally, with what I felt was unusual patience and restraint, I turned to him and said, “Sir, your children are really disturbing a lot of people. I wonder if you couldn’t control them a little more?”
The man lifted his gaze as if to come to a consciousness of the situation for the first time and said softly, “Oh, you’re right. I guess I should do something about it. We just came from the hospital where their mother died about an hour ago. I don’t know what to think, and I guess they don’t know how to handle it either.”
Can you imagine what I felt at that moment? My paradigm shifted. Suddenly I saw things differently, and because I saw differently, I thought differently, I felt differently, I behaved differently. My irritation vanished. I didn’t have to worry about controlling my attitude or my behavior; my heart was filled with the man’s pain. Feelings of sympathy and compassion flowed freely. “Your wife just died? Oh, I’m so sorry! Can you tell me about it? What can I do to help?” Everything changed in an instant.”
That’s the power of a paradigm shift.
Whenever you are stuck, remember this story, and try to reframe your circumstances.
6. Make a Change
Yes, the easiest way to get unstuck when you are trapped in life is to make a change. It is an obvious and most direct solution to getting unstuck.
There are 2 types of change you can make: Big and small.
Big changes or radical changes can be something like moving to a new location, changing jobs, or getting married.
On the other hand, small changes can be something like signing up for a gym training class, learning how to code, or learning a new language.
Small changes may not give you immediate impact or get you out of your current situation, but if you stick to the changes, you will gradually see the changes.
Radical changes will give you an immediate impact. Imagine you are stuck in life, troubled with your job, and are deep in debt. You have no idea how to turn things around. And you decided to quit your job, move to a nice location, and start a business you have been thinking about all the time.
If you make this change, the entire projectile of your life will be different. That’s how you can get unstuck and move forward in life.
Similarly, when you commit to making small changes such as you join a gym club and deciding to train twice a week, after a few months, you will see changes to your fitness and body.
Therefore, whenever you are stuck in life, make a change. And here’s a good resource you should check out: How to Change Your Life in 30 Days – Follow These 10 Steps
7. Seek Help from Others
No man is an island. And you don’t have to go through everything all by yourself.
If you are stuck in your personal life, talk to a friend or speak to a close family member to find a solution together. If you are stuck with your professional life, get a mentor, talk to your superior, or someone credible in the field.
The key is to seek help. You don’t have to face everything alone and help is always there.
Most of the time, people are willing to listen and help whenever they can. But the thing is – you must ask.
And these are the 7 ways how to get unstuck and move forward in life.
