On Tuesday, I told you a story about how a change in perspective helped a client to see their situation in a whole new way. That new perspective offered her a way forward that engaged her creativity and energized her toward action.

Many readers resonated with that story and replied to me with stories about how they had felt stuck until they talked the situation through with a trusted advisor, or, in one case with a rubber duck!

Verified by science!

Psychology researchers noticed something similar and created experiments that show how common it is to get “stuck.”

Even though we recognize how much we’ve changed in the past, we all assume that change is less likely in the future. We can look back and tell stories about how we’ve adapted to all kinds of circumstances, but in this circumstance, our brains think we’re not going to find that adaptation. What we have right now is all we have to work with.

Do you feel stuck?

One takeaway from this is that our brains are lousy predictors of our fate. Show us someone else’s story, and we can see possibilities everywhere. But looking at our own story, we see nothing.

Since that’s true, we don’t have to beat ourselves up! We can just say, “Hey, I’m feeling stuck. That’s what my brain does; it gets stuck. Who can give me that other perspective I need?”

Then find that someone and ask for help.

If you want help getting unstuck, hit reply and let me know. We can find a time to talk and open up some new ways of being to get through your apparent log jam.