The Plateaus of Failure
When you are stuck and want to get past it
Getting Stuck
Everyone plateaus or gets stuck dozens of times during life.
Now if you are OK with being where you are at in life, this article is not for you. However if you want to get past that and go up to the next level, read on.
Being stuck can be in many forms ranging from a stagnant income, stuck with not being able to scale business, stuck having a poor marriage etc.…
You will know if you are stuck by having many thoughts about the topic and no change manifests.
Getting Un-Stuck
First lets visualize your current state.
You made some progress and now you are here.
To make anything happen, it takes effort. Applying effort without a plan is just luck and wasted resources. Assuming that you are working towards a thing that you think is valuable now and will have future value.
To move past the blocker - you should make a Plateau diagram like I have below. I use Figma to create diagrams. In the Plateau diagram brainstorm every possible thing you can do to get past up to the next level.
If there are 30 items, add 30 items. Spend as much time as you can brainstorming. Research, find people who have created these lists for you.
Be a forever learner, this way you will be exposed to more ideas and options for unblocking yourself.
Looking at these points on the line - you should treat these as failures.
That’s right -
you will treat each of these items as things that you fully expect you will fail at.
Interestingly enough, by treating these as failures, you immediately shed the learned behavior of avoiding failure. Our education system and upbringing embues us with a fear of failure.
Those most successful in life, are the ones who have failed the most. You want to fail fast and break through all of these “paper doors”.
At some point you will hit the thing that is restricting your upward movement and you will go up to the next level.
Your diagram will now look like this.
And so the pattern continues - forever.
And that is OK - for we are enjoying the journey, not the destination. Treat life as a video game and focus on your enjoyment. Nothing else matters.
Your Thoughts?
What are your thoughts about how to get un-stuck? Has this happened to you? Are you stuck now - if you are, I’d love to know what on! Don’t be shy!
If you liked anything in this article please restack! It really helps grow the Newsletter!
Thank you - much appreciated.
I've found a really useful technique to get unstuck is to stop doing anything, switch to something else, and come back to whatever it was I was stuck on later after I've made progress with that other thing.
Like you mentioned in this article, our education system has focused so much on establishing limiting beliefs that often times the only thing stopping us from moving forward is our own belief that we can't.
We've been conditioned to believe that if we fail, we're incapable, and that belief creates that self-perpetuating spiral of continued failure.
But if I fail at something, perhaps repeatedly, switching to something else that I know I can gain forward momentum on programs my mind to keep going and not give up.
This is why personal hobbies and recreation are so important, because maybe I'll be stuck on a problem at work and can't figure out what to do, so I play a video game I can win at or take on a small project in my workshop or spend some quality time with my wife and children.
That gives me a new perspective on everything, instead of tainted with thoughts of failure, gilded with the belief I am succeeding.
Coming back to the problem I was stuck on with that renewed perspective almost always helps me think of a solution that eluded me prior.
There's a saying: "How you do one thing is how you do everything."
Hence if you're stuck on one thing, you can get stuck on everything.
Conversely, if you make progress with one thing, you can make progress with everything.