Your Turn Challenge prompt: “What advice would you give for getting unstuck?”

I know something about getting unstuck. I was stuck, on and off, from the age of about 11 until I was around 43. Move, get stuck, move a little, get stuck a little, break free only to get stuck again. I couldn’t seem to figure out how to free myself — until I did.

The most basic advice I can give anyone about getting unstuck is this: take one small step. That’s it. That’s all it takes. One tiny step, some kind of movement, anything, even just half a step — the half step that will change your life. It really is that simple, even though it isn’t easy.

We get hung up because we are able to imagine that far off distant place where we want to be, or the end result of a huge transformation, or the full scope of the big project we want to accomplish, and we get overwhelmed by the space, the vast distance between there and here. Somehow we think we have to get there in one giant leap, a lone action, a single grand gesture. All or nothing.

This leads to thinking we can’t get there at all, can’t do it because it’s too hard, too far, too much. Impossible. We forget the only way there is one step at a time, which starts with asking ourselves, “What is the one small step I can take in that direction? What can I do right in this moment to move?”

Part two is that as you are taking that small step, you focus on only that. You give what you are doing your full attention. You can’t allow yourself to be distracted by what you think an experience or project should become, where it should land. You can’t be worried about the details of how your effort is going to turn into a healthy body or whole book or successful business. You instead focus on just this moment, just this breath.

Part three is show up without an agenda. Sure you could have some sense of the bigger picture, but for now drop the plan. Allow whatever arises. Let yourself be surprised by the magic of something deeper, something else. If you stay out of the way, give up control, you might find your thing, or rather it might find you — something you never expected and even better than you could have planned.

As you take these tiny steps, as you focus wholly on each one as it happens and drop your agenda, you develop a practice that honors your desires, accumulates benefit, and allows you to make progress.

TL;DR: How you get unstuck — Take one small step. Focus completely on it. Show up without an agenda. This grows into an ongoing practice of movement.