How to Move Forward When You Feel Stuck

Change as a Series of Small Steps, Not One Sweeping Decision

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After a brief pause last month, we’re heading into back-to-school season with another week of advice from my inner guidance.

In our last installment of this “Inner Wisdom” series, I shared how to make progress on what you want most:

But experience has shown me that the opposite is actually true — the more I want something, the more pressure I feel to make it real. And the more pressure I feel to make something real, the more I construct stories (or fall back on old ones) that keep me from actually making any moves toward it.

Underneath the day-to-day of working and relating and reading and scrolling, we’re all operating by innumerable invisible scripts that are directing so much more of our behavior than we often realize.

How to Make Progress On What You Want Most

Today’s column touches on a similar theme — how to move forward when you feel frozen in place; when you know the change you need or want to make, but feel stuck in inaction.

We’ve all been there — myself included . . . on a regular basis — and today, I’ll share exactly how I find my way forward again.

I know I need to make a change, but I feel stuck whenever I try to do things differently in my life. It’s just overwhelming. I don’t know where to start, so I don’t start at all. How have you navigated making a big change in your life? How do I get myself to move forward when I feel frozen in place?

Last week I wrote about moving to Portland after my marriage ended. Our separation, my move, and so many individual transitions in between and after were among the biggest changes of my life. 

And I was absolutely terrified. 

For a while — long before I actually suggested a separation — I knew a change was necessary, but I couldn’t imagine what my life would look like on the other side of such a massive decision. So I stood still. Stuck, like you are now.

I stayed where I was, paralyzed by fear, uncertainty, and the weight of what that change would mean. The unknown felt too big, too overwhelming, and I told myself I wasn’t ready.

What I wish someone had told me then is that feeling stuck is so, so normal. Especially when you’re on the brink of making a big change. The fear, the uncertainty, the sense that you might just stay frozen in place forever and that might somehow be better than moving into the unknown — it’s real and it’s human.

The truth is, we’re rarely ever fully prepared for big changes. Readiness is a myth and change rarely happens all at once.

We are capable of taking small steps though. Most of the time, it’s a series of small choices that gradually create the momentum that feels like moving forward. 

That’s how I made my big changes — not by making one sweeping decision to completely overhaul my life, but by making small moves — some conscious, some not; some good, some bad, but all tiny choices that, over time, added up and started to shift things.

Of course, I had no idea that’s what I was doing at the time. Like you, I also felt lost, overwhelmed, unsure of myself, and frozen in place. If I could articulate now what I couldn’t articulate then, this is what helped me — and maybe it’ll help you too:

• Get curious about your fears. For me, fear was often at the root of feeling stuck. Fear of failure, fear of the unknown, fear that I wouldn’t be able to handle whatever came next. And the only way I’ve ever gotten past fear is by naming it. (I outlined a helpful Fear Inventory exercise here.) When I can finally look at my fears head-on — really acknowledge what I am afraid of — they lose some of their grip on me. What am I afraid of, really? That’s the question I keep coming back to whenever I feel stuck.

• Lower the stakes. I used to think that one wrong move could ruin everything, that I had to get everything "right" on the first try. But in reality, very few things are as permanent as they seem. When I moved to Portland, I reminded myself that it didn’t have to be permanent; I wasn’t committing to a forever decision. I was simply taking a step in a new direction, and if it didn’t work out, I could adjust. So now, when I’m facing a big change, I try to ask myself: What’s one small, low-risk step I can take right now; something that won’t make or break everything, but will at least get me moving?

• Trust the process. This one took me a long time to learn, but sometimes moving forward is less about knowing where you’re headed and more about trusting that you’ll figure it out along the way. You don’t have to know exactly where you’re headed to start moving. For a long time, I thought I needed to have a clear plan before I could act, but honestly? Sometimes, the plan reveals itself after you’ve taken the first step. Trusting the process — even when I couldn’t see the full path ahead — became its own way of moving forward.

• Find your people. I think we often try to navigate big changes alone (::raises hand::), and that can make things feel so much harder than they need to be. Surround yourself with people who believe in you; who can remind you that you’re capable of handling whatever comes next. Having that support — and the right support, even if it’s just one or two close, loyal friends — can make all the difference.

• Regulate your nervous system. “Freeze” is one of four commonly-touted responses when our nervous systems feel dysregulated. It’s a physiological stress response where your body responds to fear by becoming immobile or feeling stuck in place, much like how animals play dead to avoid being attacked. When your nervous system thinks you’re in danger — which it often does if you’re moving out of your comfort zone in any way — your natural response may be that you feel truly unable to take action. In this case, I would first suggest working with a trained professional to process your fear and train a new nervous system response, and I would also offer breathwork or grounding practices (and more resources listed here) to show your system that — no matter the changes ahead — you actually are safe.

• Get to know yourself. Moving toward a big change requires trust in yourself, and trust in yourself requires that you know who you are and what you want. This is part of the reason I so love Human Design and astrology — both have been such incredible meaning-making systems and tools for me as I came back to the truth of who I am in the years following these big shifts. Your resources may look different than mine, but really getting to know yourself — through journaling, therapy, personality tests, etc. — and making big decisions based on who you authentically are is key to making big moves.

Image via @wetheurban

Change is uncomfortable, and it’s normal to feel unsure. But staying stuck? That’s uncomfortable, too. If you’re already feeling like something needs to shift, then that’s your cue to start moving — even if it’s just one small step in a new direction.

And you don’t have to wait until you feel 100% ready. I probably never would have felt ready to leave my marriage and move to a new city. But what I did have was the willingness to acknowledge that something needed to change and to start in spite of my own uncertainty — even if I didn’t know quite where I was going or where I’d end up.

I think that’s what change often comes down to: a series of wobbling, uncertain, imperfect steps that, over time, add up to something bigger; something more cohesive and clear in retrospect. 

And even though it’s scary, even though there’s so much unknown, there’s also something so beautiful about trusting yourself to figure it out along the way.

ICYMI

Last week I shared a personal story about exactly this topic; about the various cycles of our life — cycles that necessitate change in order to move through them — and the moments in our life that catalyze change, whether we like it or not. If you hadn’t had a chance to check it out yet, click the link to “Read full story” below and let me know in the comments there about the big changes you’ve experienced in your own life cycles ✨

Have you ever felt stuck when you knew you needed to make a change? Share the story of how you navigated moving forward in the comments on Substack.