Stuck in life . . . how did you get there?

. Ever seen someone who’s stuck in life? They no longer enjoy their life yet they haven’t a clue what to do or how to get out of their sticky situation.  So instead they do nothing except sit there feeling and looking completely miserable.

Stuck, I don't like this. What now?

I know what I am talking about as I was once stuck myself.
As a result I can easily recognize others in the same predicament; it takes one to know one. 
The first sign is total confusion. It’s a dead give away!
The second sign is that the individual is full of ideas, they’re constantly talking about what they intend to do yet they just can’t seem to make anything come to life. 
Their thoughts are all over the place. And there’s no way that they can make up their mind or get into action. 

It feels awful and life sure ain’t fun when you’re in this situation.
Feelings yo-yo; one minute you’re reasonably happy and the next everything is all doom and gloom.
Your head is in a total muddle and you’ve no idea where to turn to or what to do.
And when you actually do something it’s half heartedly, because you’ve no idea if it’s the right thing to do.
Oh I know it only to well being in this paralysed state and it sucks!

I’m very glad to say that I’m rarely in that place anymore. 
Of course in reality, I wasn’t stuck at all, anyone could have come up with numerous options that would have worked for me. 
However when I was in this grim state, I just couldn’t choose anything to save myself.
I honestly thought there was no way out . . . I felt totally miserable and paralyzed.

Here’s what happened?
It may sound familiar as it’s very common.

We bought a house and as we were both earning an income we could easily afford the mortgage.
Life could have stayed like this and we’d have lived wealthily ever after.
However I changed my circumstances. Because I wanted more . . . I desired a baby. 
I got my wish and I gave birth to a beautiful daughter.  

But adorable as babies are, it is also where the trouble started.
Although tiny, babies cause huge change in our lives.
I tried, as best I could to cope with the enormous change, but I got into trouble in the areas of my life where I wanted things to carry on like before. I just couldn’t accept that these had changed also.

Despite the fact that I wanted my baby, I had a hard time facing up to the consequences as a result.
For example I had chosen to be a stay-at-home Mum and wasn’t prepared for the shock of now becoming a one income family!
I knew that I needed to tighten our belts, but I couldn’t get my head round the fact that I could no longer go out for dinner with friends nor could I buy luxuries I was used to. I really struggled with this and I didn’t like it, not one bit.

Then with giving up my career I had to cope with the loss of identity and the fear of losing my expertise; becoming a stay-at-home Mum can be a big deal for a working girl. 
So I thought about ways to keep in touch with my work life while being at home with my baby. 
I wrote psychological assessment reports at night or in the weekends but with the work also came feelings of resentment and exhaustion, because I felt I had no down time. Life had become a juggling act. When could I take a break and get some rest?

The house I lived in and paid so handsomely for was also not playing my game.
It needed maintenance that we didn’t have the money for and it wasn’t long before I felt I was spinning out of control and feeling like I had no options. I was stuck, stuck, stuck!!!
I started to feel that nothing was going my way and there was certainly no possibility of creating a win/win for me anywhere.

I was left to wonder what had gone wrong. My life that once was fun had become a struggle and I even wondered when I looked in the mirror where that vibrant, happy and decisive woman had gone to.  

Lucky for me though I found a way out.
In the end I did have a wonderful time at home with my first baby.
Over the years through courses, reading and more life experience I gained explanations about what happened, so I now have a grip on the phenomenon of getting stuck.  

The first explanation which is extremely useful is to accept the situation you are in by creating a clear picture of what is going on. 
I needed to accept what was so about my situation, I needed to accept how I felt about how being at home had changed my life.
Having less money is uncomfortable, having friends who can spend more money is not much fun and it is okay to feel upset about that in the first instance. 
I cannot tell you how relieved I was to know that feeling all those negative feelings was actually all right.
I had felt so wrong to feel the way that I did, because here I was with a wonderful, healthy baby and yet I felt all these horrible feelings I was so ashamed off. 

Once I no longer felt I needed to deny my upset, I was free to do something about it.
Yes, it was no fun to no longer go out with friends for lunch, but hey since I no longer denied my changed circumstances I felt no longer ashamed about my lower income level.
I could now own up about my situation and invite my friends for lunch at my place. 

It was interesting to see that after I dealt (intuitively at that time) with my denial, how quickly I arrived at acceptance. 
So what, even if I had less money to spend, staying at home with my baby was worth it and my friends could take it or leave it.  
It was also amazing how easy solutions came to me after seeing and accepting what was so.
The idea of getting together at home turned out to be a winner, we all loved it much better than going out. 
After the fog lifted, things started to improve in all areas and this is where I can add in another explanation about choosing.
When I got a sense of what was going on, I felt I actually had a choice and there were alternatives.
I organized myself a lot better around my work and I no longer resented the time I spend on it. Volunteering in my area of expertise was an excellent way to keep my finger in the pie as well and I swapped babysitting with friends to have the time to do it.
I realized we could sell the house and rent for a while. Not owning your own home is not the end of the world if that means I could stay at home.

And that is the story about how I got stuck in my life and more importantly, I can now explain how I became unstuck.