How To Get Unstuck: 25 Small Ways To Spark a Breakthrough In Your Life
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Do you ever feel like you’re not moving anywhere in your life?
Ever wonder “How to get unstuck and finally do something that counts?”.
If you’ve been in a slump for too long and don’t have the motivation to do anything, it may be time for necessary changes.
The first thing to do is to review your current routines.
The next one – add things that can help you change them.
In this article, we’re exploring all the ideas on how to get unstuck, successfully.
Review Your Current Routine
If you’ve been in the same routine for a long time, it may be really hard to get unstuck and move past your blues.
You may feel lazy, depressed, irritated, and at the same time – angry that you’re feeling this way and that you have to do anything at all.
Being stuck in a repetitive routine feels like a Minotaur’s labyrinth – you want to find a way out, but you’re just too tired to keep looking for it.
It’s best to take things easy and, instead of making huge changes, to change up a few smaller things instead.
Surprisingly, it can work pretty well!
A few simple tweaks start the engine going and from that moment, it becomes so much easier to move on.
If you’re looking for simple, practical, and tried ideas on how to get unstuck in life, here’s what helps
How To Get Unstuck: 25 Practical Ways To Start Moving Forward
1. Try changing your song playlist
Sometimes even a small thing – like changing your music playlist – can help you to get unstuck in life.
We tend to get lost in our routines, repetitive work, and home tasks daily, so if you keep listening to the same tunes, it simply lullabies you to boredom.
Especially if you like slow, melancholic songs!
Changing your playlist and adding more cheerful, energetic songs can help you to feel more active and inspired.
2. Help yourself to get unstuck with a new planner
If you never had one, a DIY planner can be one of the most effective tools to help yourself get moving.
If you feel like there’s too much to do, too many tasks or information to handle…
Planning your time, routines, goals, and to-do lists can help you to sort everything out and turn those problems into actionable steps.
Related: How to set up a DIY planner that fits you
3. How to get unstuck by adopting new habits
It might seem paradoxical, but we ourselves can also be a reason for being stuck.
If you’re living a life filled with bad habits, you are sabotaging yourself every day.
On the other hand, getting rid of your old ways and implementing a set of new, helpful habits can inspire you to start fresh and with a new attitude.
Healthy habits can help you to feel more energetic, motivated, inspired, organized, and self-dependent.
Positive changes can give you a strong push to wake up and start changing your life.
Related: 99 habits for a better life
4. Rearrange furniture around your home
Does that sound funny?
It probably does.
Yet for some people, it’s also one of the simplest ways to get a needed change in their surroundings and a breath of fresh air.
It’s not a secret that spending time in new places helps us to rest and detach from daily monotony.
This is why we feel so great after fun trips and vacations.
Changing your surroundings at home can also breathe some freshness into your life.
P.S.
Can’t rearrange?
Fill your home with lush, green plants!
5. Get unstuck by starting a side hustle
Starting a side hustle or a new business venture can be a wonderful boost to your mindset and a perfect way to get motivated, especially if you’ve been having bad mood spells due to financial problems.
Having a new financial interest, and completing new, unfamiliar tasks can help you to feel powerful and motivated – and a boost in motivation can be just enough to help you.
6. Read a new, inspiring self-improvement book
How to get unstuck if you need to reshape your mindset first?
Buy a new book.
Just choose one that is supposed to help you get motivated and inspired to make changes.
Here are some of the best books for times when life seems to be bringing you down: 3 powerful books that make you stronger immediately
7. How to get unstuck mentally
Journaling is one of the best ways to deal with mental health struggles like anxiety, depression, apathy, and PTSD.
On top of it all, it’s one of the best ways to see your life from a perspective.
By writing your thoughts down, you can dig deep into your mindset and find the actual reasons WHY you feel so stuck.
Knowing a reason makes finding a solution a lot easier.
On the other hand, writing your thoughts on paper, and then reading them can be a helpful way to notice negative feelings and emotions that might be playing in your head on autorepeat.
Let’s admit that feeling stuck is not a pleasant situation, and any psychological self-help you can give yourself is useful.
8. Find a new thing to learn
A new passion, hobby, or skill to learn can also breathe some fresh air into your life and help things move.
Now, it’s not that easy to find a new thing to be passionate about, but there are ways to do this:
- You can learn new things by taking online courses.
It’s a nice way to introduce yourself to absolutely any topic in a matter of a few hours and you can quickly decide if the thing is what you like.
- You can listen to various Podcasts until you find something that resonates with you.
- You can follow people on Twitter to get great ideas on what else to do with your free time.
9. How to get unstuck by going on a trip (even a small one)
As mentioned before, changing your surroundings can be incredibly helpful if you’re looking for fast & effective ways to get inspired.
This is why taking a fun trip or even a one-day vacation can help you to open up your mind to new ideas and opportunities.
If you can, go somewhere you can completely forget about your daily burdens.
Maybe there’s a small town near the sea or a hotel room with a bath?
If financial resources are low, can you visit a friend for a day or two?
Maybe your sister or mom?
It’s worth investing a little bit of time to find the best option.
10. Change your style or hair color
How to get unstuck AND improve your looks at the same time?
Have a makeover!
It’s not a secret that outer appearance change can spark a change in your mindset too.
Maybe that’s why so many people love changing their hairstyle so often.
It’s like a “refresh” button that allows you to start fresh and take your life with force again.
Plus, it’s one of the fastest ways to have a big, fun change.
11. Get unstuck by choosing gratitude
Another reason to feel unhappy in life is being unsatisfied with what you have or where you are.
It’s especially easy to feel like this if you’re constantly comparing yourself to others.
Try improving your mindset with a gratitude practice.
Gratitude is so powerful that it can change the way you see life around you.
You can find a way to be happy with what you have right now.
Feeling content with what is can help you to get unstuck and focus on moving on.
Related: How to feel grateful when life gets hard
12. Find a new way to exercise
Exercise is notoriously effective at busting bad moods and low energy.
Not only can it help if you’re stuck on your weight loss journey, but it can also be a nice push to be more motivated – all thanks to those happy hormones that get released every time you move.
Finding a new physical activity awakens your body and makes your life a little more interesting.
It’s a positive change, and positive changes are just a perfect way to get unstuck faster and easier.
13. Give yourself a challenge
If you’re stuck, bored, lazy, and unmotivated, you can also try to get unstuck by starting a fun or meaningful challenge.
It could be anything: a healthy eating challenge, workout challenge, beauty challenge, gratitude or journaling challenge, walking challenge…
Anything that can help you add something fresh into your life and spike up your motivation.
Here are some challenges you can try:
Glow up challenge: how to become prettier in one month
The “NEW ME” challenge: how to build your personality from zero
And you can also track your progress with a printable challenge calendar, like this one (free).
14. Try becoming more influential
An interesting way to explore your abilities and meet new people.
Also, the most useful for people who feel drained by social responsibilities.
If you feel stuck in life because you’re always doing things for others (and feel unfulfilled because of that), learning to be influential can really help.
Not only does it help you to become more confident, and outgoing, but it can also teach you how to be assertive and open a lot of doors in your life gracefully.
15. If you’ve been feeling low for too long, therapy might help
Let’s admit it – one of the main reasons to feel stuck is depression.
It can sneak into our lives unnoticed and leave us tired, sluggish, and unmotivated.
It can even last for so long that you don’t even feel your depression anymore (“I’m just that melancholic type of person”).
If changing up your life, routines, surroundings or habits doesn’t help, consider talking to a therapist.
A professional can show you how to challenge unhelpful beliefs, distorted mindsets, and irrational anxieties – all of which can be keeping you stuck for a long time.
16. How to get unstuck by decluttering your home
Clutter, mess, dark and dusty rooms, jammed drawers, and overflowing closets…
Is this your life?
No wonder you feel like you can’t move.
An unorganized home can make you feel bad even when everything is okay.
It happens because even the simplest daily tasks take a lot more energy than they should.
Your clutter exhausts you.
Making your home organized can have an extremely refreshing effect on your life and also help you to get unstuck.
If you want to try it yourself, here are a few guides on it.
17. Decide on a simple, realistic goal and start slowly working on it
Finding a new goal, or a dream to work on can help you to gently get moving.
Think of the things you desperately want to change in your life, set up a plan for it, and start with a small task you can do today.
You can use these goal planning tools to create an achievable goal plan or get this free printable weekly goals planner to start with.
18. Try yoga & meditation
Our minds can get so jammed these days!
There’s an information overload everywhere we go, and the work-life-work regime is incredibly hectic and exhausting.
A perfect way to get unstuck is by having a yoga or meditation session.
Meditation is an especially powerful tool that can help you to declutter your mind and find some balance within.
By practicing meditation daily, you can actually find an answer for how to get unstuck yourself – deep inside you probably know it.
It’s possible that you are already aware of what keeps you in the same place and what you need to change in order to get relief.
Meditation, along with yoga are a few helpful ways to listen to yourself and find your answers.
19. Improve your hydration
It might sound funny, but you might feel apathetic just because you are dehydrated.
Even mild dehydration can make you feel tired, sluggish, and lethargic, which also contributes to a sad mood.
20. Try changing up your nutrition
It’s similar to hydration – if you keep eating the wrong foods that are making your body tired, bloated, and inflamed, you will have less energy to do anything.
Healthy eating can give you the opposite effect by boosting energy levels and bodily functions.
Try it yourself!
Take up a healthy eating challenge, eat mostly healthy for 90 days, and see how you feel.
It’s okay to have occasional treats too!
21. Try a vision board
Vision boards are awesome.
Building one can help you in so many ways!
- It can be a meditative, motivating, and inspiring process that boosts your mood.
- It can help you to materialize your dreams in a physical form (which makes them more real).
- It can remind you what you want, what your dreams are, and what you should do in your life.
- It can be a helpful push to stay positive.
- It can be a great way to explore your deepest desires.
22. How to get unstuck by having a “get your life together” day
Having a “get your life together” day is a sure way to get unstuck for a lot of people.
It helps you to take care of some clutter, recharge, and decide on your next steps in life.
It’s perfect when you’re practically angry that you’re not getting anywhere with your life (cleaning will burn all those anger hormones).
Read our guide to GYST day here: How to have a perfect “get your life together” day
23. Achieve more control with a DIY life binder
If you tried planning, you can also take a step forward and build a full DIY life binder.
This binder can help you to organize your life from A to Z and tackle all the negative mindsets that are keeping you clung.
You can get a lot of free, printable planning and self-help tools in our printable tools section.
24. Try establishing a normal sleep routine
How to get unstuck in life?
Try fixing your sleep.
Seriously, going to sleep and waking up at the same time can do wonders for your mental and physical health.
Another thing to try is waking up earlier.
Waking up earlier and having a balanced morning routine can help you in many ways:
- It helps you to start your day slowly, therefore you feel less stressed throughout the day;
- You have enough time to set priorities and plans for your day, so you don’t waste your time on various shenanigans;
- You have more hours in your day so you can easily find enough time to work on your goals.
On top of it all, it’s so soothing to greet the morning sun with a cup of coffee – it’s like a perfect morning ritual…
Related: How to become a morning person (without suffering!)
25. Talk to someone you love
Sometimes, all you actually need to do is simply talk to someone who understands you.
Sharing your feelings, talking about your burdens, and learning how others see them can make you understand your situation better.
Even if you don’t find the exact answer on how to get unstuck in YOUR particular situation, talking about it is still very helpful and therapeutic.
Conclusion
Whenever you find yourself feeling stuck, lazy, and unmotivated, try to do one or more things from this list.
It might stir your rut a little and spark up excitement for something new.
And if nothing else helps, consider trying natural supplements that increase serotonin – happiness hormone – production in your brain, like 5-HTP.
… Or talk to your mental health counselor about other ways to help yourself.
Sometimes the problem is purely biological, not motivational.
We hope you found a lot of interesting ideas on how to get unstuck in this article.
Stay well and remind yourself that bad days are not bound to continue.
Life has a way of getting back to normal, and so does our motivation.
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