Why am I feeling stuck? I was making great progress on my personal growth journey but now I just feel like I am hitting a plateau…
I can’t be the only one who has thought about this while on a personal growth journey… For the past few weeks, I have been talking about having writer’s block. I chalked this up to me thinking that any ideas I had for posts weren’t good enough or that my mind was “somewhere else” due to things going on in my life. It wasn’t until yesterday when I was talking with a friend did it hit me…
For the past 3 years… Each and every week I write about things that I am working on or have worked on in my personal growth journey. But these past few weeks I have been feeling stuck. Feeling like I wasn’t making any progress. I was self-reflecting and racking my brain on what could be going on. Often asking myself am I doing enough?
That stupid fucking question… Am I doing enough? Of course, I am! But that doesn’t stop me from feeling like I am at a standstill I started to doubt myself and everything I was working towards. When those thoughts creep into my mind. My thoughts always go to how could I write about personal growth topics every week if I am NOT doing enough. I feel stuck and I feel like an imposter?
Feeling stuck
So what finally hit me is that maybe I hit a plateau. Kinda like when you are trying to lose weight, in the beginning, you might lose weight very easily but then all of sudden you went from losing 3 pounds a week to 1 pound every couple of weeks or non at all for a month.
There comes a time in your journey when everything you have been doing and working on comes to a slight halt. You might not realize you are feeling stuck and start thinking as I did and question everything you have ever done on your journey.
We need to have an open and honest conversation to make sure you and I and everyone else who reads this post knows that it is okay if you are feeling stuck and what you can do to kick start your growth again.
In the beginning…
When first starting a personal growth journey it kind of becomes a little obsession. You think about all the things you can do to become the better version of yourself. Every day you are trying to tick all the boxes of what you think personal growth is. It was a very long list. Doing a quick search you find some aesthetically pleasing YouTube videos of people who seem to have their shit together. So you start with all the popular basic bitch shit.
You live by the words fake it til you make it. You work on your productivity, and self-care, forcing yourself to read self-help books. Because that is all the things you think you need to work on. You get into this obsessive state of trying to become your higher self in a matter of days, weeks, or even months. You want to be so woke you lose track of what your real purpose was. What the real reason for bettering yourself was…
All of these outside forces make you think you are less than others because you don’t know how to romanticize your own life. Let’s say you get over that initial hump of not living up to the social media expectations of personal growth. You find your footing and figure out what YOU need for YOUR personal growth journey. Then one day or it could be over a period of time… You wake up exhausted, burnt out, unhappy, or maybe even unfulfilled despite all of the hard work and growth you have experienced… That is when you know you are feeling stuck…
Feeling stuck
For weeks now I felt I was stuck. Like I was falling back into my old mindset. When you think about being on a personal growth journey some people make it out to be all rainbows and sunshine. You are supposed to be happy all the time, you always have encouraging words. But us real ones know if you are actually doing the work… THE REAL WORK. The Self-reflection, shadow work, healing generational trauma. Getting down to the nitty-gritty of it all. Working through everything that made you who you are today.
When you are doing all of that trauma dumping and analyzing you have to choose happiness, and words of encouragement. You have to fight every day not to be sucked in by all the shit you had piled on you for all these years. It is so easy to just fall back into old habits and mindsets because it’s comfortable. Sometimes it is way easier to just say fuck it and just accept what life gives you. It takes a bigger person to choose light over being tied down in the shadows.
How to work through feeling stuck
The first thing I did and this is how I knew I had grown from who I was before. Because you just read me saying that I felt like I was falling back into my old mindset. When I was thinking about my situation (my writer’s block) internally my first thought was am I doing enough? Evaluating myself internally wasn’t working. Those pesky intrusive thoughts were getting in my way of seeing what was really going on.
But as soon as I said it out loud to my friend it hit me like a wave of relief. I have worked so hard these past 3 years to find my footing in my personal growth journey and I set all of these habits, practices, and events in motion. This could be the time when I sit back and let everything I have worked towards come to fruition and catch up to who I am as a person today.
So right now I am going to embrace hitting this plateau as a much-needed break and let my past self catch up to my current self.
Journaling
If all else fails journal it out…
I have a bunch of journal-related content that you might be interested in like:
The Beginners Guide to Journaling
25 simple questions you never ask yourself, but should
Life Audit Questions
How to Start Today – Manifesting the life you want
10 interesting October journal prompts for Self-discovery
World Mental Health Day – Checking In With Yourself
Healing your inner child
Vacation Journaling
Shadow Work
Other reasons for feeling stuck
If you are just beginning your personal growth journey and you hitting a plateau this might be because you are not pushing yourself out of your comfort enough. I know shaking things up can throw off a life that you are used to living. But you wouldn’t have started this journey if everything was all fine and dandy. You started this journey because you were becoming more self-aware of yourself and your surroundings that something was off.
I am going to toot my own horn for a bit and list some of my blog posts that I think will help you with your journey.
If you want to know what started my personal growth journey
Self-Improvement Journey: How I inspired myself to start my own.
If you are unsure where to start…
Where to start your self-improvement journey?
The ABCs Of Personal Growth from A- Z
Are you looking to create new habits?
Creating New Habits – how to start today
I have a series on getting out of your comfort zone.
1. Comfort Zone: Finding who you truly are in the unknown
2. Comfort zone: How to stop it right now from affecting your goals
3. Comfort Zone: 3 reasons why your comfort zone is holding you back
4. Is fear standing in your way of getting the life you deserve
I think I have a lot more good blog posts to offer, but that is for you to decide. Definitely check out the personal growth tab in the menu bar to read all my posts.
In the end
In the end, I want you to know that it is okay if you are feeling stuck on your personal growth journey. We all hit a plateau at some point. Sometimes it is just because we need to let all the amazing things we have been working on catch up to us. Take this time as a little breather because you don’t need to worry about doing personal growth stuff all day every day. It is perfectly fine to take time for yourself to just enjoy life. Hitting a plateau is normal and everything will eventually realign when it needs to.
Until Next Time, Have a great day! Remember you are a badass!
Yes I love the honesty!!! Not all rainbows and butterflies for sure.
I feel stuck all the time. I think most people do, although they may not admit it. Thank you for the tips!
Sometimes it’s hard to admit we are stuck. You have those who CHOOSE to be open about where they are in life and those who choose to keep it close to home. You don’t have to air out your laundry for everyone, but if you know you may need a little help. Just reaching out to one or two people may help you when you are in a slump.
Sometimes making successful changes in your practice requires making changes in yourself as well.
Absolutely Barb! I agree. I wouldn’t be where I am now if I didn’t change along the way.
I can hear you. I have been blogging for two years and there are days when I say to myself: Am I going to make it? Am I good enough? Then I wake up tomorrow and just go on and push myself harder.
That makes me a little emotional. So glad I am not the only one who feels that way. Thank you, Marina!
It’s so easy to feel stuck when you’re trying to improve yourself. There are times when you feel like you’ve plateaued or simply hit a wall. The trick is to find a way to keep moving forward.
Absolutely. But you also must take a break to let all the things you have been working on catch up to you. It is okay to slow down and take it all in. You don’t want to be go go go all the time.
Yes, there will always be obstacles along the way to any growth journey. But they will be gone before you know it and you can resume.
Absolutely Bryan. Your current situation is not your final destination!
I can relate! I sometimes experience mental blocks that prevent me from writing in my daily journal. I start off strong but then begin to taper off, making up excuses and saying the common line, “I swear I’ll do it tomorrow.” Consistency, consistency, consistency!
Me too Natalie! I have to make sure my journal is on my desk front and center to make sure I write in it.
I agree with you. We will all feel stuck on our personal growth at least one in life. That a factor that makes us growing up. And the more stuck we face, the stronger we are when we pass it.
I agree with you.
I have been through that experience – the plateau thing. Better, I was able to overcome it. I have no choice.
I am so glad you overcame it!
It can be very easy to fall into old habits. Many do this unfortunately. You need to look at the progress you’ve made for inspiration.
I am always self-reflecting. It lets me know that have made progress.
Very informative post, I had been through this before. For me, some days I feel like I’m not doing anything at all even though I’m working a lot to improve. So, I had to pause and revise what am I doing and what was wrong. Took me time but figured it out and now doing better.
Sometimes you need to step back and re-evaluate.
Thanks for giving a very raw view of what hitting a plateau is like. Personal growth is something I’ve yet to work on myself :’D
It’s hard, but so worth it. I have learned so much about myself.
It’s hard but so worth it. I have learned so much about myself.
I can totally relate with you. There are times that I feel so stuck too and honestly, I don’t know what to do next. Thank you for sharing these links/ resources. Will find time to read them all.
Let me know if there is anything I can help you with!
Yessss! Sometimes I feel this too! Thanks for sharing this. It’s so helpful!!
You are so welcome, Faith! I appreciate your comment.
I’m kind of feeling this sometimes
Is there anything I can do to help you? Let me know.