How To Get Unstuck

In this episode, I’m giving you six of my favorite ways to get unstuck. These are the tools I turn to when I’m feeling stuck…and if you know me, you know I like things that I can start applying right away. So, if you’re ready to get unstuck and start seeing transformation TODAY, this is the show for you!

Transcript

Hello,

Everybody,

And welcome to the Adult Share Podcast.

I am Michelle Chalfant.

For those of you in the United States,

Happy Thanksgiving.

I hope everyone is having a lovely holiday and everyone is safe and sound having your turkey today.

Today I'm talking with you about a topic that is one that is,

I think,

Near and dear to everyone's heart.

Who doesn't feel stuck sometimes,

Right?

We've all felt stuck.

So today I'm going to be talking with you about how do you get unstuck?

I'm going to give it to you straight and simplified.

You know how my brain works.

I simplify everything.

It's just how I think.

So I'm going to give you six practical tools to help you to get unstuck and then create a new reality for yourself.

So moving forward,

How do you not only get unstuck,

But how do you change your future?

How do you manifest?

How do you create a new future reality for yourself where you're not stuck?

So we're going to jump right into it.

This is one I gave you guys last year.

You all loved it.

So we're going to run that one again for you today.

So enjoy.

Happy,

Happy holidays,

Everybody.

Here we go with how to get unstuck and change your life.

Hi,

I'm Michelle Chalfant,

Psychotherapist,

Holistic life coach,

And human,

Just like you,

Learning to navigate life's challenges.

With over 25 years experience,

I teach people how to get healthy using the adult chair model.

The adult chair model is where simple psychology meets grounded spirituality,

And it teaches us how to become healthy adults.

From anxiety and depression to codependency and relationship issues,

You can use the adult chair to get healthy.

You can use the adult chair for just about anything.

Each week,

I share practical tips,

Tools,

And advice from myself and a wide range of experts on how to get unstuck,

How to live authentically,

And how to truly love yourself,

All while sitting in your adult chair.

Welcome to the adult chair podcast.

Hello,

Everybody,

And welcome to the adult chair podcast.

I am Michelle Chalfant.

It is wonderful to be here with you,

As always.

Got a really good show for you today.

One of my,

Again,

Favorite topics.

I say that a lot,

But I really love what I do.

I think I like all these topics,

But this is a good one.

Today,

I'm going to be talking with you about and teaching you how to get unstuck and change your life.

Yeah,

You're getting a two for one today,

Getting unstuck and how do you change your life?

This is something that I have done many times over in my own life.

It was inspired by someone very near and dear to me that I was having a conversation with,

And she felt very,

Very stuck.

I started sharing with her some of these things,

And I thought,

Hmm,

I really want to share these with more people because these steps to getting unstuck really are game changers.

They're easy.

Again,

You know me.

I like to have things that I can apply today.

These are things you can apply today in your life,

And you will start to feel movement today as soon as you start to apply these things.

Let's talk about feeling stuck and not knowing what to do.

Many of us,

I was one of these people,

And again,

My dear friend that I was just speaking to,

She's in this place,

But I've been here.

I was someone that suffered with a lot of sadness,

Even depression in my 20s and early 30s.

We just feel sometimes really hopeless.

We don't know what to do.

In order to get out of the place that we're in,

Whether it's feeling a little bit bad or really bad about our lives,

How do we get out of that place and create movement forward in our lives?

Here are six ways that we do that,

Six ways to get unstuck and move forward.

Number one,

We need to accept ourselves.

I invite you to accept yourself exactly who you are today in your life,

In your family,

In your job.

I also invite you to look at your past and just accept it.

Accept all of it.

I'm not saying that you have to like it or love it or approve of it.

Accepting it is just looking at what's right in front of you and saying to yourself,

Okay,

This is it.

I'm looking at what's in front of me and I'm saying,

This is my life.

Fill in the blank,

Whatever it might be.

I'm in an unhappy relationship or I'm unhappy in my relationship.

I have an unhealthy relationship.

I hate my job.

I'm going to work every day and yes,

I might make a lot of money or make some money,

But I don't really like what I'm doing.

I'm not happy.

Or I remember having a private practice for so many years,

Clients would come in and say,

I've got to admit something to you.

It's time I own up to this.

I am so stressed when I get home after my long day at work,

I'm coming home and I'm not drinking too much.

I don't know what to do.

I'm having too much wine,

Too much vodka,

Too much of whatever it is.

Or I don't like that I'm coming home and needing to smoke pot every day,

Whatever it might be.

And I'm not saying this,

There's no judgment here.

I'm asking you and inviting you to accept whatever is in your life right now that you're not happy with.

What's in front of you that the life that you're living and you're going,

Gosh,

I just need to own this.

I need to accept that this is my reality just for right now,

Just for this very moment.

But what we do is as humans,

I find that we instead go through life and we kind of put our blinders on like,

I don't want to see that.

I don't want to look at that over there.

I don't want to look at the pink elephant that's in the middle of the room.

I remember working with a lot of clients that would just say,

They just wouldn't want to admit it.

I remember working with people that had even cancer and they wouldn't say the word.

I'm like,

Just accept it for right this second.

So then we can work on healing,

But you've got to own what's in your life.

And when we avoid it and we wear the blinders so we don't see what's going on in our lives,

Again,

Whether it's the relationship that you're in or the friendship,

That's just,

It's time to end this thing.

It's like,

When you live like this,

It takes a lot of energy to avoid seeing what's right in front of you.

So just accept it.

It just means,

Okay,

I'm going to accept it,

That life is what it is.

This is in front of me,

Take the blinders off and look at all of it.

This sounds so simple,

But it can be really a little hard actually,

When we don't want to accept something that feels bad that's in our lives or because we go into fear and think,

Oh God,

But if I accept that,

What does that mean?

Don't give it meaning.

This is not about giving anything meaning.

We're just accepting what's right in front of us.

So that's the first step.

That alone,

Believe it or not,

Creates movement forward.

Acceptance starts to move our energy out of a stuck place.

Okay.

All right.

That's number one.

Number two,

In order to move out of a stuck place,

You've got to think about where you want to be instead.

So are you in a job that you don't like?

We tend to talk about very easily what we don't like in our lives.

I'm in a job I don't like.

Let me tell you all the reasons why I don't like my job.

Or I'm living in a place that I don't like.

Let me tell you all the reasons I don't like the town where I live in.

Or I'm in a relationship.

My partner is such a jerk and here's why.

They don't do this,

This,

This,

And this,

Or whatever it might be.

We talk about what we don't want instead of what we do want.

So you've got to come up with what kind of life you want instead.

What is your goal?

Where do you want to be?

If you think about today on November 9th,

2024,

Where do you want to be in a year from right now?

November 9th,

Excuse me,

We're in 2023.

Where do you want to be in 2024?

Where do you want to be in one year from today?

And what I mean by that is what job do you want to have?

What kind of relationship do you want to have?

What kind of friendships do you want to have?

What aspect of your life are you feeling stuck in or do you need to change or do you want to change?

How do you want it to look in a year?

So here's how you work with goals because it's one thing just to think about,

Yeah,

I want a better job.

No,

You've got to get,

In order to really get unstuck and create change,

You've got to get really,

Really clear about what you want instead.

So let's take,

For example,

I don't like my job.

So,

Okay,

I don't like my job.

Then in a year,

I'd like to be working in a job where I'm making at least X amount of money,

Where I am going to work and I am,

Whether it be I'm at home or I'm driving to work,

But I'm really excited to get to work because I really enjoy what I do.

I'm passionate about what I do.

Here's how you do goals.

So you,

How you manifest,

Excuse me,

Goals is you see yourself in that reality.

So as if you're watching a movie of your future,

See yourself in it.

And then after you see yourself in that movie,

You can close your eyes and actually start imagining,

Wow,

This is what my life will look like in a year from now.

This is my dream life.

This is where I'm going.

This is what I'm going to manifest.

This is what I'm going to create.

This is my goal.

Think about it,

See it in a movie.

The next thing you do is you feel it.

So when you think about yourself in that future self,

In a year out,

How does it make you feel?

What comes up for you?

What feeling comes up for you?

So you might feel an expansion in your body.

You might feel joy.

You might feel elated.

You might feel passionate.

You might feel all of these things,

Or your body just might,

You might feel this little expansion in your heart.

Anything you've got to feel what the image or the movie looks like.

Okay.

The third thing that you do is you then think about what will people say to you when you're living in this new life,

When you have this dream job and you're happy and you're going to work and you come home from work and you just,

You're just really fun to be around because you're so happy.

What will people start saying to you and about you?

Things like this,

Wow,

Michelle,

I just noticed you're so much lighter to be around than you were a year ago.

Or wow,

Michelle,

You seem to be smiling all the time.

What's going on with you?

And I might say,

Well,

I'm just really happy.

I love what I do.

It feels so good.

So start thinking about what will people say to you when you're living in your life that you have created your new dream life.

And even though it sounds like a dream life,

My friends,

We can manifest anything,

Anything at all,

But you've got to use your mind.

If you feel stuck to get out of the place that you are in,

And this is a,

An incredible way to do that.

Okay.

Next thing,

Number three,

Stop talking about your life and how awful it is.

And instead you want to start choosing empowering thoughts.

So piggybacking on the second thing we just talked about,

Which is the goals and living in your future self.

You've got to have yourself laser focused on that self.

That's where you're going.

Don't turn around and look in the past.

Do not look in the present.

You are going into the future self when you're in conversation with people.

So what I'd want you to do is not talk about your current state.

Yeah.

Well,

I hate my job.

It's so bad.

I can't stand my boss.

I want you to remember something.

Your thoughts are very powerful,

But the spoken word is even more powerful.

So when you speak about your limitations,

You're anchoring in to your current reality,

Your limitations.

Okay.

Instead,

What you want to do is say something like this.

If you're in a situation that you're not happy with,

If someone says,

Hey,

How's your job going?

You can just say something like,

Yeah,

It's going okay.

And I'm actually looking for a new job and I can't wait until it gets here.

It's on its way right now.

Or I'm actively looking for a new job.

This current job is just not a match for me.

So think about the amount of energy that you're giving the thing that you don't want anymore.

So if you say something like,

Yeah,

I'm just,

I'm really excited about the new job that is coming on in because the current one isn't a match.

Do you hear how much energy I'm giving the current job?

I'm not going into all the details around why my job is so bad.

Well,

My boss is a jerk.

I don't like the people I work with,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

Blah,

On and on and on.

We want to talk about what's coming.

So if you're,

If you're in a relationship,

Let's say that you're not happy with,

You might say something like,

Yep,

We are,

I'm working really hard on this relationship,

But I know we're moving into this much better place.

I'm really looking forward to being there.

See where I'm going here.

So where are you giving your energy and your attention?

You don't want to give too much energy and attention to where you are.

If you're not happy with it,

You want to give more energy and your attention to where you're going.

And so it's your job.

You're the only one,

My friends that can monitor your thoughts and allow the thoughts that are going,

You're going to have thoughts that are going to rise up because what happens is we have these neural pathways that are formed in the brain and they are called it's a,

It's part of the default mode network in the brain.

So what happens is if you're not being intentional with your thinking,

You are sliding back into these yucky thoughts,

Into the thoughts of limitation,

Into the thoughts of,

You know,

All my,

All the things I'm not happy with all the things in the areas of my life where I feel stuck.

So be very,

Very,

Very intentional about what you're thinking,

What you're saying and who you're saying it to.

You don't want to go into all of these negative thoughts and all of the negativity that you're speaking to people.

Cause it's anchoring you where you are today.

Okay.

Number four.

Okay.

This is a big one.

Sounds so simple,

But most people do it incorrectly.

And that is gratitude.

Number four is all about having gratitude.

So as someone that was depressed in my past,

When I remember reading about this in my twenties,

Like I was like,

Are you kidding me?

I have gratitude.

No,

Thank you.

When we feel really stuck or overwhelmed or sad,

Or it's like,

That's the last thing that we want to do.

So I invite you to pick things and I'm talking,

Do this.

If you can do it five minutes a day,

Set the timer on your phone.

The way that you have gratitude is you think about something like right now,

I'm looking out the window.

I can look at like,

The leaves are changing on the trees.

So beautiful.

I love the fall.

And then I think it,

I'm so grateful for these beautiful trees in my yard and all the leaves changing color.

And then you pause and you allow your physical body to feel the thought.

It's just like we did with the goals.

You feel what you're thinking.

So I'm grateful for these beautiful trees.

I'm grateful for the rain that we're getting today.

I'm grateful for the sun coming up.

I'm grateful for the moon.

So when you're in a really bad place,

Sometimes it's hard to think about these big,

Oh,

I'm so grateful for my whole life.

We're not,

We're not.

Now,

If you are great,

Do that and also feel it.

But if you're not happy,

Let's say in your job,

Again,

You can have thoughts about,

I'm really grateful for my dog.

And then think about your dog and then feel it in your heart,

Feel it in your body,

Feel it,

Feel it.

You've got to drop the thought,

Which we're working with energy here is what we're doing.

So,

So the thoughts,

Your thoughts are,

Have,

Have energy to them.

And then you bring it into your body and that anchors in.

And that's what changes the neural pathways in the brain.

That's what gets you unstuck.

That's what starts to change your vibration from one of,

Again,

Feeling so stuck to then moving forward or instead moving forward.

Cause what happens is you're going to move up the scale of feeling stuck.

And then if you feel a little bit of gratitude for,

Let's say the sun or the moon or something so minuscule,

It starts to move you from this.

For me,

It was a depressed place into a place of neutrality.

I eventually got there.

And then I got,

Went from again,

Hopeless to hopeful.

I started moving up the scale using gratitude and some of these other things that I've already shared with you.

So as we move up the scale,

All of a sudden you'll realize,

Oh my gosh,

I'm not so stuck anymore.

This is really weird.

I can't believe this happened.

So very,

Again,

Easy concept.

You've got to really practice the gratitude.

If you can even do three minutes a day,

Five minutes a day,

They say is the magic number really works.

The brain starts to change the brain.

Next thing,

Number five,

Journaling,

Journaling,

Man,

That's one of my go-tos.

You know,

Many studies have even shown that journaling can be similar or feel similar to even going to a therapist or a coach.

Because what happens is when we're journaling,

We're purging.

It's very cathartic to,

To just write things on a piece of paper.

You don't even need an official journal,

An official journal,

Write it out,

Type it out,

Whatever you need to do.

If you want to burn it at the end,

Burn it,

But get your thoughts out,

Get your feelings,

Get your emotions,

Get everything out of you so that then you're able to be more center,

Centered.

It helps you to get unstuck.

So if you're feeling stuck,

If you feel overwhelmed,

Write about it.

And at the top of the paper,

A lot of people will say to me,

I don't know what to journal.

At the top of the paper,

You write,

I feel stuck.

I feel overwhelmed.

I'm not sure what I'm doing.

I don't like doing this.

I don't like journaling,

Et cetera,

Et cetera,

Et cetera.

Whatever you need to write,

Write it.

Just write what comes to your mind.

Don't worry about the grammar.

Don't worry about spelling.

Don't worry about handwriting.

Doesn't matter.

Get it out of you.

There's an energetic transformation that happens when we take something from the ethers of the mind out here,

And we bring it down through the physical body,

Through the 3D,

Into our current reality.

It actually purges these thoughts,

These emotions,

And this energy that's blocking us and keeping us from moving forward.

It's keeping us stuck,

Basically.

And you know,

We have 30-day journaling challenge the month of November,

Every single year.

That's a wonderful way,

Of course,

To,

Again,

You get journaling prompts every single day of the month,

And then you have something to write about.

There are many,

Many ways to journal,

But do journal and get your thoughts out.

It's great to journal,

Whether it be in the morning or at night,

Or even in the middle of the day.

When I journal,

I love to even light a candle.

I make it a ritual for myself.

I light a candle or some incense.

I make some tea,

And I sit down,

And I'm like,

I'm just going to create this space for myself.

It's beautiful self-care.

And it just is a time just for me to purge and get out on paper exactly how I'm feeling.

So that is journaling.

Okay.

Let's move on to number six.

Okay.

This is the last one.

This is a big one.

This is about choosing the path that you want to go down as you move toward,

Again,

Your ideal self,

Your future self,

Yourself in a year.

So if you imagine driving down a road and you've got a break in the road,

A big V in the road,

You can either go left and go toward the victim,

Or you go right toward empowerment.

Which one are you going to choose?

Because life,

My friends,

Is a choice.

What are you going to choose for yourself?

Are you going to choose to go into that victim seat,

Or are you going to choose to feel more empowered?

And the way that we choose which path we go down,

Again,

It's with our thoughts.

What thoughts?

We have up to 90,

000 thoughts a day.

Many of them are not even ours.

They're floating through our energy field.

They belong to other people.

So do you want to grab on and believe those thoughts,

Or do you want to then instead create empowered thoughts and have intentional thinking,

More conscious thinking,

Which is the path off to the right?

That's the empowered path.

So we get to witness our thoughts.

We get to look at the thoughts as they're floating through,

Like clouds passing by,

And we can go,

Gosh,

I can't believe I'm thinking that.

That's so silly.

I don't choose that thought.

This is what I realized with us humans is we forget we have choice over what we think.

Did you know that?

You actually get to choose.

Thoughts continue to flow into our mind just all day,

Every single day.

Which ones are you grabbing onto?

Are you grabbing onto the ones that make you feel bad,

Stuck,

Disempowered,

Hopeless,

Overwhelmed,

Stressed,

Et cetera?

Or are you saying no thank you to those,

And you're letting them float by like a cloud?

And are you instead choosing the thoughts that go down the path of empowerment,

Abundance,

Intuition,

Self-care,

Self-love,

Intention,

Right?

You get to choose.

So have some conscious thoughts and say,

You know what?

I'm going to choose that path.

I'm going to look at where I feel right now on the emotion scale.

If you picture an emotion scale in front of you,

From love to fear,

If you're way down in the fear end of the spectrum,

What I just went through with you today is going to help you slide more toward the love end of the spectrum.

This was my takeaway after so many years of doing tons of personal work,

And I'll never stop because I love doing my own work because it always leads us,

And it's like it peels back layers of the false self and helps us to step more fully into the true self.

But something that I've noticed over all these years of personal work is that the way we change our lives is to be intentional with all of our choices and to make sure even everything I just gave you today,

All six things,

It's a choice.

It's a choice to get up and journal.

It's a choice that we have to make in order to choose to have five minutes of gratitude.

It's a choice to stop what I'm doing right now and get an idea of where I want to be in a year,

Where do I want to be in six months even,

And get an image of that person.

Watch a movie of myself.

What is my life going to be like?

Allow yourself to dream and go there.

Imagine.

Allow yourself to accept yourself.

All of these things are choices where you're going to take time and put yourself first because you're the only one,

Only you.

You're the only one that can transform your life,

But you just have to take time and choose to put yourself first and to get unstuck and change your life.

You can do this.

Let me tell you something.

I know you can.

I believe in you.

I am with you because I've done it.

I have done this.

I was in a horrible place.

Nobody knew it,

Of course,

Because I was functionally depressed,

As they say.

Back in my 20s,

I functioned very well,

Had a boyfriend,

Dressed well,

Did the hair and makeup,

All the things.

But inside,

I didn't like myself.

I definitely had depression.

I would cry spontaneously.

I did not feel good.

Then over the years with codependency and some other things that I had going on,

Everything that I've turned around in my life has been because of choice.

I've had to choose.

Let me tell you what,

That victim seat,

It pulls us in.

I just want to be in the victim.

I want to get the attention.

I want to be Eeyore.

I want to do that because I like when people come and they go,

Oh,

I'm so sorry,

Michelle.

It feels good for a minute.

Then I'm like,

Ugh,

Think about that.

If you're someone that's sitting there,

I've been in that seat.

That's why I'm saying I get it,

But does it really feel good?

It's an energy that we get from people that people feel sorry for us and let me help you,

But we are keeping ourselves stuck there.

What we forget is that we are incredibly powerful.

We are such powerful creators.

I'm hoping that today's show gave you some skills,

Some tools,

Six of them that will help you to remember just how powerful you are.

When you apply these things to your life,

I promise you,

In fact,

I will guarantee you,

You will turn your life around.

I really guarantee you because these are the things that I did.

Again,

I did a lot of other things too,

But when I think back over all these years,

These are the things that continue to come back to me over and over and over and I reapply them all the time.

These are things that I live by every single day.

All right,

My friends,

Thank you for joining me today and always,

It is always a pleasure to be here with you.

I love you all so much and do not forget,

Please share the show.

These are tools and steps that I know that other people need and that are looking for that feels when they are stuck,

When they feel overwhelmed,

When they feel hopeless,

All the things.

Again,

If you enjoy the show,

Not only share the show,

But also please,

Wherever you're listening to the show,

Drop a review,

Five stars would be phenomenal.

I love you.

All right,

You guys,

Thank you so much.

I'll see you seated right here in the adult chair next week.

Have a beautiful week,

Everybody.

Talk to you soon.

Reviews

Thank you

Wow! This was so empowering! Thank you, Michelle! I wrote the 6 tools down and really want to use them. I'm excited where I will be in one year 😉☺️

I love listening to your talks! You always sound like you genuinely believe in anyone’s power to transform. I really believe you! And it was like a hug when you mentioned you’ve been in our shoes. I loved the reminder that we often think other people’s thoughts, so we have to check ourselves not to grab onto those ones by letting ourselves choose our own true voice. 🥰