Feeling stuck?

Feeling like you’re not sure what to do next, or how to go about it? It’s a common enough feeling, no use imagining you have a monopoly on it. But think of all the successful, productive individuals, the movers and the shakers, the rising stars, the ones they talk about and will always remember. Do you think they just shrug their shoulders and give up at the first fleeting moment of feeling stuck? Or do they just get on with it? Do you imagine them letting things get on top of them? Or do you think they probably have a strategy for getting things done?

There’s obviously something different about the way people treat this situation. It’s the easiest thing in the world to give up. People do it all the time. You don’t need special training to learn how, you just say to hell wih it and let it go. It’s easy. And that’s the trouble with it … it’s the easy way out. You won’t feel good about yourself when you go down that route. You won’t feel proud of your decision, or the fact that you backed out of whatever it was you were trying to achieve. You’ll just feel deflated. And a little ashamed of yourself. And that’s not a nice feeling.

So how do you make sure you don’t slip into this morass of self pity and shame? Well, the answer’s obvious, you just have to get on with it, right? But sometimes that’s not a good enough answer. You can’t just get on with it. If it were that easy there’d be no reason for me to sit down and write this article, we’d all just get on with things and stick with them till the end, and everything would be fine. But life’s not like that. For most people, much of the time, life consists largely of trying to do stuff and then, due to feeling stuck, just giving up on it.

The value of having a routine to fall back on

Like everything else, the way through this thing is to stick to a routine, and a routine that works. Instead of just shrugging your shoulders and mentally turning your back on what could have been, remember that there is a way through this … if you just follow the routine.

Start by recognising that you’re ‘only human’ (although frankly that’s a strange expression to use, since we’re all truly amazing!). But yes, we’re all subject to essentially the same problems, and feeling stuck is just another one of them. So recognise it, and accept it. You feel stuck. Okay, it’s not a crime, it’s just something to deal with. Next, shake off the urge to just shrug your shoulders and give up. That’s the coward’s way out. You’re not a coward, are you? Good, didn’t think so!

Next, spend a few moments considering how the really productive among us have achieved great things, or are achieving them. Edison, for example, who had way over 2,000 patents to his name before he got through inventing. He didn’t get things right first time, he just kept going, no matter what. Henry Ford, whose ideas on mass production helped shape our modern world, didn’t get it right first time either. Didn’t stop him though. He didn’t have all the answers, but he made sure he surrounded himself with the experts who did. And he wouldn’t accept no for an answer from them once he had an idea in mind. He would just send them back to working on the idea until they came up with a solution.

In a different sphere altogether, the late BB King loved to make music and to perform. In a career spanning something like half a century he is reckoned to have given over 15,000 performances. Astonishing! And I’m willing to bet there were times he’d have rather taken time off from his endless round of touring and performing, but he so loved to make people happy with his performances that he stuck to it, practically till the day he died.

Michelangelo was carving marble in his final years, in his late seventies, when most men had long since laid down the heavy tools of their trade. He had nothing left to prove. He was the greatest artist in the world. His works adorned cathedrals and palaces in all the great cities and was celebrated by people everywhere (and still is, 450 years later). He didn’t sit back and muse on how hard life had become. Life had always been hard. Carving rock till you produce a statue so lifelike that the effect is practically heart stopping isn’t for the faint hearted. But he loved to release the being inside the rock from within its confines, and he relished the challenge.

You need to love the challenge

And maybe that’s one of the keys to this thing, that you need to be so invested in the process that you actually want to do it, no matter what. So maybe that’s the next thing you need to focus on … do you really want whatever it is you’re working towards? How can you find this out? Ask yourself how you’ll feel when it’s finished. When you’ve reached your goal and achieved the result you were going after, how will you feel? Imagine that feeling of achievement, of success, of pride. And weigh it against the feeling of shame that you’ll feel if you give up on your dream now. That’s definitely what’s nowadays called a no-brainer! More than anything, you want that feeling of pride and achievement, and the only way to get it is to carry on and battle through the hard times.

Churchill said it best: “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” Failure is not fatal … we’ve all failed, time and time again, but we still manage to achieve great things. Success is not final … there’s always more to be done, it’s never over. But the key to success and achievement is in the final phrase … “it is the courage to continue that counts.”

Courage and persistence

And that’s the next thing to consider in your little reverie that hopefully will get you back on track – courage. The absolutely essential ingredient in any venture. Whether that venture is an attempt to carve a canal between the two sections of the American continent, or to defend yourself against a surprise attack by a gang of thugs, or to create a home-based business that’s going to give you the chance to finally escape the rat race … in all of these things, and countless others, the deciding factor is courage. There are many other factors, I don’t deny it. Preparation, for one thing. Planning, for another. Others too, lots of them, but the most important of them all is courage.

The one thing that separates the great achievers from the rest of us is that they had the courage to carry on, sometimes against almost insurmountable odds. As Calvin Coolidge famously said, “Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not: nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not: the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent.”

So we come to the distillation of all that is needed to get you over the hump. Courage and persistence, the determination to carry on in the face of whatever life throws at you, that surely is the most essential and most precious talent of the truly successful.

Take a deep breath …

So have courage. Pick yourself up and dust yourself down. Remind yourself that “this too shall pass”. It’s always darkest just before dawn. Slow and steady wins the race. Doesn’t matter that these things are clichés, they’re clichés because they’re true.

You can do this! You’ll feel so much better once you’ve achieved your goal, and any feelings of struggle right at this moment will fade to distant memories in the future. So keep at it, get back to work, and make things happen. If it still feels just too much to handle, break it down into smaller chunks and set to work on the first one.

Take action!

Finally, the key to success and achievement can be summed up in a simple two-word phrase … take action! Even the greatest expert was once a beginner, and the only way success was achieved was through taking consistent and regular action. Work on your project every day. Even if you move forward at only a glacial pace, keep moving. Progress, no matter how slow, will get you where you want to be, but only if you keep moving.

Do not give in to feelings of being stuck. It happens to us all, including the great achievers. But the deciding factor is to take action and to keep moving. If you keep this in mind, and you do this, you will meet with success.