What To Do When You Are STUCK

Hello airlock sir. We're slowly but surely getting closer to that time of year when you'll start saying, "New year, new me." While the new year is a great time to start auditing your life and finding areas that could use improvement, some of you feel stuck, tired, and unmotivated. Look, we hear you, okay? It's been a couple of tough years, but with this video, what we are trying to do is give you a simple to follow framework that should get you out of whatever hole you've dug yourself into.

So with that being said, welcome to a lux. Let's get started.

Number one: figure out what got you stuck. Even though the feeling of being stuck can be complex and hard to decipher, the reason you got there is usually one of the following three: your job. You hate it, it's unfulfilling, and it doesn't pay you well. Your place, whether that's the actual place you're staying in, or the city you're living in, or the environment as a whole. And lastly, the relationship you have with yourself. And a note here; it's never about the relationships you have with others. The world is not out to get you; it doesn't have a personal vendetta against you. Things don't happen to you; they just happen, and you happen to be in the near vicinity when [__] hits the fan.

So take a look at all these three and see where it hits you the most. How do you feel about the things you're doing to pay the bills? What would you change to make it better in a realistic way? Do you feel like you know what you're doing? Do you have all the tools you need to get your job done? Is there a growth path you can follow? Are you actually friends with the people you're working with? These are important questions you need to ask yourself to better understand how your job impacts your life.

And just to note here, we haven't mentioned anything about money. A lack of money is never going to keep you stuck. If you just need 1 million dollars to start moving, you're not doing it right. If the thing you're doing barely pays you enough to cover the bills, you don't have a money problem; you have a skill problem. Some of you might not agree with that, but deep down you know it's true. You may have friends who complain their job barely pays anything, but when you look deeper into it, their job is low skill and low demand. If you were to have a business and them as an employee in the same position, how much would you pay them realistically?

Now regarding your place, do you sleep well at night? Is your bed comfortable? What do you see when you look out the window? Can you go to a park in about 15 minutes' time? Can you go to a concert tonight? Can you go to an art gallery? Do you have a place to walk your dog? You see, when your environment is making you feel stuck, moving into a 10 million dollar mansion won't magically make you happy and productive. Instead, the things that can make or break your environment are the quality of your life add-ons. They're the answers to the questions we asked a little bit earlier. It's the small things that individually make your life better.

So the first step is identifying what exactly keeps you stuck.

Now for the second one, it gets a bit more interesting.

Number two: do you like feeling stuck? Okay, this is the first hard hitter of the video. You see, a lot of people actually enjoy being stuck. Oh, okay, maybe enjoy is not the right word, but they use their hardships as a badge of honor rather than a reason to move forward in life. A lot of people would rather take a second shitty job and be the second job person rather than striving for a better one or a promotion or a different or better skill set.

Now yeah, it's definitely a lot harder to go for the better job, and guess what? It's supposed to be. When people feel stuck, they rush to quick fixes; they apply superficial bandages that actually make their life a lot harder. For example, have you ever had to renovate your place and you hire a team to do the work, only their work isn't that great, and you end up redoing almost everything yourself? We're sure you know at least someone who's done that. Well, that's you enjoying hardship tips and applying a quick fix.

The better play would have been to have the uncomfortable conversation with the renovating team and fire them right away if needed. But you had a moment of, "I'll do everything myself," thinking that somehow makes you look like a hero in your own life. So here you are now redoing the work you already paid for.

Now this example applies to so many areas in life. We bet that if you look behind a month or two, you'll find at least one example where you decided to play hero for no reason. Burdening yourself with pressure that is not yours to handle makes you feel like a savior in the short term, but it holds you back in the long term. You see, a sinking ship can't save anyone; mind your own ship first.

Now, these first two steps are for you to figure out what keeps you stuck and if you actually like sabotaging yourself. Next, let's talk about actionable steps you need to take.

Number three: what is the immediate improvement that will benefit you most? We'll handle these steps from three different perspectives, with the first one being the immediate future. Regardless of what keeps you stuck, there will always be small things you can implement immediately, and we're talking about in the next hour that will benefit you.

Let's take your environment, for example. A bad night's sleep can absolutely [__] your next day. If you're past 30, you know what we're talking about. If you're below 30, you're about to find out, my friend. So what's the immediate improvement that you can do? Buy a better pillow or a better mattress? Set the room temperature a little bit lower? There are actually studies that show you sleep better when you're in a colder room, and these are stupid simple things with an immediate impact.

Now you might say a poor night's sleep is not what's keeping me stuck; it's too little of a thing. When we were younger, we used to be night owls; we enjoyed working at night because it was quiet and there wasn't any pressure. We could take our time and do things at a slower pace without anybody disturbing us. But as we got older and collected a few more responsibilities, we realized just how important sleep is and how much faster your brain works in a fresh morning.

In our experience, what could be done in five hours when you're tired can be done in under two hours after a good night's sleep. That is impactful, and it might be sleep for you or something else for others. The point is, no matter what discomfort you may experience, there's always a little something you can do that will make it better. It's not going to fix it; that's not the point, but it's something that's going to compound with the other steps.

You see, these immediate improvements are by far the most underutilized actions one can take in getting unstuck. For example, if you've gotten a little bit chubby this year and you want to get back in shape, you're not going to start slow with simple immediate things like not having cookies in the house, are you? Now you're more likely gonna jump right into Googling how to get fit in three weeks or less. And look, if you're not a professional athlete, that is just not going to work.

Number four: what are the immediate improvements that will benefit you the most? The previous step was a bit about small things you can do right away; this one's about what will take three to four months until you start seeing some results. If you went through the previous point with an actual desire to fix the things that keep you stuck, you should already have a list. You should know by now exactly what are the most impactful factors that are holding you back.

And while the immediate actions give you some momentum, you need to build up on them. So what are immediate improvements? Think of them like challenges that span between one to three months. You stick to something no matter what. Let's take the most basic example with sleeping; you get a new mattress once, but you can't keep buying a new one every day. The intermediate improvement here is setting up a wake-up hour and sticking to it. It doesn't matter if you go to sleep at 10 PM or 5 AM; you always wake up at the same hour.

Now this does two things. One, it builds discipline. If you want things to go your way, you need to make them go your way through sheer resilience and willpower. And secondly, if you do happen to have a bad sleep, you'll eventually start seeing massive improvements once you stick to this new routine. Your internal clock will slowly adjust, and your sleep problems will fade away. And we're speaking from personal experience here.

Now obviously, a poor night's sleep alone is not the thing that keeps you stuck. But this one thing can be extrapolated to everything. You see, if you really think about it—and you don't even have to think about it too much—you know why you're stuck, and you also know what will get you unstuck. Information is not the problem; everybody knows how to get a six-pack, but not everyone has one, right? The problem is not having something simple and clear to follow.

Then that's why intermediate challenges are so powerful. It's December right now; you have until the end of February to end a challenge. Create three challenges for yourself and pick just one that seems the most doable, and then stick to a day. Look, sir, February is not that far away; you can do it!

But these two steps are not enough to get you fully unstuck, and this is where the final step comes in.

Number five: the not-to-do list. For most people, getting unstuck is not the real problem; instead, it's the not getting stuck again. Now here's a statistic that will blow your mind: roughly 90% of people who lose weight eventually regain most of it, and it's the same for so many things. The problem is people go through the effort; they take the immediate actions, they adopt intermediate behavior, but they are missing the crucial thing—the not-to-do list.

This is a list of things that you will never, absolutely never in your life will ever do again. It's the list of things that got you stuck in the first place. You see, when you manage to get unstuck and improve your life, you get kinda comfortable. Things are not that big of a deal anymore; you're at ease and at peace with yourself. And that's when people get stuck again. You know the saying: "Simple times create weak people." Well, that's why it's so important to make a not-to-do list, and it doesn't have to be too complicated.

Also, don't add vague stuff like not trusting people; be specific, okay? And only concerning yourself. Now here's a couple of suggestions: never allow yourself to get above X weight; never buy something that's more than X percent of your budget; never lose more than one night's sleep in a given month. You can take it from here and make it totally your own.

If you follow all these five steps, you should have a very realistic chance of seeing major improvements in your life in less than six months. We hope you found this video valuable. Alexa, we'll see you back here again tomorrow.