How To Overcome Stagnation

We’ve all experienced periods of stagnation at some point in our lives. Those are times when nothing seems to move no matter how hard we seem to try. We just feel imprisoned in the same routines, seeing the same people every single day, having the same thoughts, and just being so bored of the sameness in everything.

We could’ve been working on a project for a while now and yet, it never came to fruition. We could’ve been expecting some things to happen, and yet, nothing happened. No matter what it was, we just felt like it was an unlucky phase of our life.

And in such ‘phases’ of our lives, the normal response is to blame a person or a situation for our feeling of ‘stuckness’. It’s true, maybe there is in fact someone or something that is responsible for most of our misery — but is it really the case? What if it was something else — something we never could have imagined to be the real problem?

What’s the meaning of insanity already?

I once had a discussion with a friend who had been working out for the last three years. He exercises around four times per week and he is always talking about what he eats on a daily basis, saying that he goes to the best places to shop for the finest ingredients, and so on. He often says that he would love to turn into a robot so that his life becomes even more disciplined. By the way, he works out for around two hours on average…

With all this, you’d guess that he’s in pretty good shape, but do you want to know the truth? He’s not. Actually, someone who doesn’t work out and eats ‘normal’ would probably be in better shape. He’s a friend and I’m honest with him about it. To an external observer, it wouldn’t make sense to live such a life, and the stress that it all generates is eating him alive. Yet, because he’s been doing the same things for many years, he’d rather stay with what’s familiar (and doesn’t work) than try something different that could be more efficient, and healthier.

Even though he told me that he wanted his body to feel better and be in a better shape, he remained reluctant to everything I told him about newer approaches to exercise and nutrition. It doesn’t matter what we say or what we’re being told, just try and notice the initial reluctance (resistance) that comes up whenever something new is suggested to you. This discussion brought something subtle to the surface, and it doesn’t apply only to him, but to all of us and here’s what it is:

Most of us know that our actions generate a certain outcome. We also know, hopefully, that the same actions will generate the same outcome. And thankfully — even if we don’t always apply it — some of us at least know that if we want different outcomes, our actions must change. But here’s the interesting part — what about our thoughts — the guiding principle of our actions? Those mental ‘pathways’ that feel the most familiar to us. Those we don’t question much because we’ve identified with them as being ‘us’. Those pathways through which we think and come to the same conclusions. Those bars that block us from thinking passed a certain limit, what about them?

I want you to take a minute and really process this.

“As within, so without”

I will repeat it again, it’s true that the outer world presents obstacles to anyone who tries, well, anything — it’s something to be expected — and challenges always make us stronger as long as we remain open to solving the problem we’re facing. But, what if the outer world, in presenting us obstacles, simply exposed our mental limitations?

What if there weren’t truly ‘problems’? What if life/event/people were never ‘against us’? What if our mental limitation was just not accepted by life itself because we live in a free will universe and that we do have the choice to test things, like having limiting thoughts, but that this wouldn’t mean we could mess around with universal laws?

Think about it for a minute.

The definitive solutions to all worldly problems

It’s always sad to see when someone blames life, a person or an event for whatever blockage they may be experiencing in their lives. It’s even more sad to see when people allow their problems to consume them to the point that they’re unable to live.

What could happen if the word ‘problem’ and everything that it represents was completely wiped out of this universe? Obviously, problems and challenges do exist in the world, we’re not denying it — when they happen, we do our best to fix them — but what we’re speaking of here is the real problem, the one we create emotionally and mentally, the one that adds more drama to the factual. Why do we turn everything into a dramatic story? Why pollute ourselves with negativity in the process?

We do it because of the thoughts we’ve accepted as being the ultimate truth. They’re often called beliefs. If I believe that I’ll never get a muscular body no matter how much I work out because I don’t eat enough, I’ll underperform in the gym, and thus, I’ll never get this muscular body. If I believe my writing is too complicated and that I don’t take the time to make it easier for my reader, I’ll archive it and forget about it.

If on the other hand, I believed the opposite. Maybe some adjustments would still be needed like getting a better diet or spending more time editing my writing — but, I’d perform to the best of my abilities in the gym and get my writing out there at the very least. And this change in how I think will change how I act, which will have a significantly different impact on my outcomes.

Of course, this is an overly simplified example. Our beliefs function in much more complex ways but this will do for the purpose of this article.

Final words: what to do next

Now that this has been said, what do you believe in? If you look back at all those things you wanted to achieve at some point in your life but couldn’t — what truly stopped you? A person/an event, or, a thought — which comes in the form of an interpretation about the person/event?

Because we host our thoughts most of our lives, they become so familiar to us that we rarely question them. In fact, we’ve come to identify with them. If you ask people who they were, they’d say “I’m this, that and I believe in this and that”. All thoughts.

Therefore, I encourage you from now on to look at those thoughts you’ve identified with whenever they arise. Notice how they dictate your life and your actions. You’re probably working on something or trying to achieve a certain goal, notice the thoughts that come up from time to time and question them — are they factual, or based on an interpretation about a past experience? And do you keep such thoughts because they feel familiar, or because they’re actually useful to your life?

Ultimately, you are your best judge. And your life right now has all the information you need to understand if how you think and what you do is beneficial, or not to your goals. Become your own guru. Different actions, different results. Best of luck!