When 'taking action' weighs you down... shift your perspective

This afternoon I had a wonderful conversation with a lady who had been a client some years back. 

It had been a while since we’d spoken and much had shifted in both our lives. She opened up about feeling ‘stuck’ and almost ‘numb’, like a rabbit in headlights- not fearful but simply frozen and stuck. 

She didn’t understand why.

We dived in deeper and the notion of needing to ‘take action’ became apparent and this was aligned with a sense of needing to ‘do more’ that was likely creating the stuckness in the first place. 

The fascinated me.

I can relate to the idea of ‘taking action’ being a positive method of creating momentum and flow, YET for me this does not automatically align with ‘doing more’. On the flipside, that taking action can also involve consciously ‘letting go’.

I had a sudden sense that there was huge resistance anchoring her down and the vision of someone trying to drag a heavy weight came to my mind. 

I shared a story from the times when I entered lots of muddy obstacle course races and often the trials would involve dragging something like massive heavy tractor tyres across bumpy ground, feet slipping in the mud finding it difficult to gain the traction and build momentum to move forward. 

But there is a beauty when we realise we can step back and approach things from another angle. We can create a powerful shift that requires less effort for a better result. 

If you try to move the heavy tyre by pulling on it with your arms alone, your feet slide out from under you and nothing moves. You just end up flat out on the floor, feeling exhausted, going nowhere. 

Yet if you change your direction by 180˚ and instead, from behind push the weight through your arms by using the force of your legs to drive the momentum, everything changes.

It's often the subtle shifts in orientation, mental awareness and strategy that can get us unstuck.

But, maybe there is also another approach...

When you stare down at the heavy weight you're connected to, ask yourself who put it there? 

Did you walk into the arena willingly and attach yourself to it knowingly, with a greater goal and clear sense of purpose, or was it quietly hooked on when you weren’t looking, without your permission or awareness.

Is it something that no longer serves you or maybe never even did?

In any given moment, instead of aimlessly dragging that heavy weight through the mud we can choose to reconnect with our goal, we can choose to ask for help, we can choose to share the load... or we can choose to let go entirely and conserve our energy to move on and embrace our next challenge.

What does 'taking action' mean for you, and are there places where you feel 'stuck' and might need to change your approach to?

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