Feeling Stuck? How to See New Possibilities
This is the second post in my series, Creativity in Real Life — exploring creativity not as performance or talent, but as a practical skill for everyday living.
Last week, we talked about creativity as a durable life skill — especially when trying harder isn’t working.
This week, we’re talking about one of the most common real-life experiences of all: feeling stuck.
I’ve had seasons when stuck felt like sludge.
Heavy. Slow. Hard to move.
And then there are seasons when stuck feels different.
More like trapped energy.
Restless. Frustrated. Pinging from one option to another. Thinking constantly, but not actually moving forward.
A few months after I lost my job, I found myself in one of those seasons. I couldn’t go back to my old role. I didn’t want a new version of that old role somewhere else. I wasn’t seeing myself in the corporate world. I wasn’t excited by what I was finding in the nonprofit world. And I had always said I didn’t want to start my own business.
So there I was.
Every option seemed to have a “no” attached to it.
I wasn’t standing still exactly. I was mentally ricocheting — bouncing from one possibility to another, then rejecting each one for a different reason.
That kind of stuck can be exhausting.
Not because nothing is happening.
Because so much is happening internally.
The Sentence That Changed Everything
Around that time, I had a conversation with a coach friend. I wanted to talk through the possibility of starting my own coaching practice with someone who was farther down that road.
I shared ideas. Then I fell back on my old, safe sentence:
“But I’ve always said I don’t want to be an entrepreneur.”
She listened. Then she said something simple, direct, and surprisingly disarming:
“You know you’re allowed to change your mind, right?”
That sentence didn’t hand me a business plan.
It handed me permission.
Permission to grow.Permission to revisit an old belief.Permission to consider that a decision that made sense once might not fit anymore.
And with that, the walls started to move. Not because my circumstances changed overnight… but because my thinking did.
What Feeling Stuck Often Really Means
Sometimes we aren’t stuck because there are no options.
Sometimes we’re stuck because we can’t see the options.
Because we’ve narrowed the field too quickly, deciding what’s “not for us,” what’s “not possible,” or what we’re “not allowed” to consider.
Or because we’re trying to solve today’s problem with yesterday’s identity.
Or because exhaustion has made our world feel smaller than it really is.
Or because we believe clarity must come first, and movement comes later.
Sometimes stuckness is not the absence of a path.
It’s the presence of an old map.
Why Good, Capable Women Feel Stuck
I’ve seen this pattern often — in clients, in friends, in myself.
Women who are bright, caring, capable, faithful, hardworking… and stuck.
Not because they lack intelligence or drive.
Because they are:
carrying everyone else’s needs
loyal to roles they’ve outgrown
waiting to feel certain before beginning
overthinking instead of experimenting
trying to make the first move perfect
so tired they can barely imagine anything new
Sometimes their energy has been spent managing everyone else’s life but their own.
Sometimes we call ourselves stuck when the truer words might be:
overextendedunder-supportedafraidgrievingready for changeusing an old script in a new season
That’s a very different story. And it’s one that can hold a plot twist.
How Creativity Helps When You Feel Stuck
This is one reason I care so much about creativity.
Not performative creativity. Not arts-and-crafts creativity.
Real-life creativity.
The kind that helps when life feels tight, foggy, or blocked.
At the heart of creativity is learning to ask questions that open possibilities.
And one of the easiest tools I know is using simple question stems:
How might I…
In what ways might I…
What are all the ways I might…
Those small phrases can shift us from pressure into possibility.
Instead of:
What should I do with the rest of my life?
Try:
How might I care for others and make space for myself?
In what ways might I make room for what matters most?
What are all the ways I might explore a career shift without blowing up my whole life?
Do you feel the difference?
One set of questions corners us.
The other gives us room to breathe.
When Your Thoughts Feel Tangled, Try a Mind Map
Sometimes stuckness lives in our heads like one tangled knot.
Everything feels fused together and we feel locked up.
A mind map can help.
Put the main issue in the center of a page. Then branch out with thoughts, needs, fears, ideas, possibilities, obstacles, resources, next steps.
When our thinking gets out of our head and onto paper, something changes.
We start to see it differently.
We notice patterns.We make connections.We generate ideas that weren’t available while everything was swirling internally.
Creativity often looks less like brilliance and more like giving your thoughts room to spread out.
Clarity Is Often Overrated
Many people think:
Once I’m clear, I’ll move.
But often movement creates clarity.
After the messy draft.After the first conversation.After one small experiment.
Sometimes we don’t need more certainty.
We need more options.
We need motion.
If You’re Feeling Stuck Right Now
Maybe you are stuck.
And maybe you’re not stuck in the way you think.
Maybe you don’t need to become a different person.
Maybe you need a different question.
Maybe you need to pick your head up and look around.
Maybe there is more here than you can currently see.
A Gentle Invitation
Notice one place in your life that feels stuck right now.
Then try one of these:
How might I…
In what ways might I…
What are all the ways I might…
No pressure to solve it today.
Just see what opens.
Possibility rarely arrives all at once. Sometimes it begins with one better question.
That, too, is creativity in real life.
Next week in Creativity in Real Life, I’ll explore another place creativity matters deeply: navigating uncertainty — when the future feels unclear and life refuses to hand us a tidy plan.
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