On feeling stuck

As to why we feel constrained, like tied even when we have choice.

Examples:

  1. We might at one level powerfully want to leave a job in civil engineering in order to retrain in computer science - but at the same time, remain blocked by a range of doubts, hesitations, counter-arguments and guilty feelings.

  2. Or we might be impelled to leave our marriage - while simultaneously unable to imagine any realistic life outside it.

Friends, colleague or partners suggestions:

  1. Why don't you try to enroll on a course to see if you might like a new area of work?

  2. Why don't you discuss your dissatisfactions with your partner?

  3. Why don't you go to counselling?

  4. What about splitting up?

But we're likely to find that our friend can't make any progress, whatever we say.

The specifics will differ but the principle of a hidden law from childhood explains a huge number of adult stuck-ness. The way forward is, first and foremost, hence to realize that there might be a law in operation when we get stuck, that we aren't merely being cowardly or slow in not progressing; and that we feel trapped because we are, in our faulty minds, back in a cage formed in childhood, which we have to be able to see, think about and then patiently dismantle. We can along the way accept that we are now adults, which means that the original family drama no longer has to apply.

Reference:

Last updated