Stuck
Stuck! When I hear that word I immediately envision walking down the road and stepping on gum. There it is, on the bottom of my shoes. I lift my foot and strings of gum hang down. There’s never a bench to sit on, so now comes the decision: do I keep waking and hope it wears off? Or do I stand like a stork with my shoe in my hand frantically looking for something to peel off the gum. Sometimes it feels like neither decision is a good one.
That’s often what happens to us when there is a decision to make. Do I do this or that, go or stay, say yes or no or maybe? Then comes the internal dialogue and it’s probably not going to be useful. I find when I get stuck the more I obsess about the issue, the more obsessing I do. Over time I’ve learned techniques to clear my mind and help me make a decision.
Some decisions require input from others, such as my business coach. Some are relationship based and I need to talk to my partner. Others require me to sit down and write in my journal.
Complicating all this is the fact that I am an external auditory thinker. What’s that? Well, it’s a person who talks aloud to know what they are thinking. Sometimes it takes several conversations to come to a decision and if this is not how you think it can be extremely frustrating to listen to it. If that type of dialogue bothers you then, chances are, you are an internal auditory, talk to yourself come to a decision and announce it, which is confusing to the externals. Often I’m amazed that any decisions ever get made.
If you are in that stuck place you may also believe that other people have it all together and you are the only one who gets stuck. Trust me, you’re not. Others may just be better at hiding when they are stuck.
Regardless of your thinking style and I named only two, there are steps you can take to make decisions easier. The most important one is to be truly clear about what the decision is that must be made. Until you are clear about that, there will only be inertia and frustration.
Say that you are unhappy in your job. A blanket statement “I hate my job” is not useful to you. What specifically don’t you like? Is it your co-workers, the commute, the type of work you do, harassment? The list is endless. Once you narrow it down then you can start to figure out what to do and how to move forward.
Venting to family and friends may release the pressure. The downside is they each have their own agenda for you and whatever choice you make will annoy some of them. That’s where the services of a coach can be helpful, as the coach wants you to have your best outcome, whatever that is.
As for the gum on the shoe, I usually try and scrape it off on the curb. If that doesn’t work I look for a place to sit and a stick to dislodge the gum. And yes, I do think some harsh thoughts about the person who made the decision to just spit their gum out on the sidewalk.