2 Jan 2023 · 8 min
David Holman talks through a client conversation with Sarah, who felt stuck after a breakup. He shares a framework: create multiple compelling pictures of your future and build strategies that increase your sense of control and leverage.
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Sarah says, my life feels stuck. It's hopeless, and it's just not going to get better. Hello, and welcome to the Self Belief Chief Podcast. You're here with David Holman. Make sure to subscribe to the podcast. We're releasing episodes all of the time, regularly to make sure you get as much value and information as possible to help you with the changes you want to make in your life. And let's begin. So I was speaking with Sarah. She was a client of mine, and she's come out of a relationship and her whole world has collapsed. She says, david, I had this picture of what the future was going to look like, and now it's gone, and I'm never going to get that back, am I? And I feel stuck. I don't know what to do. I'm in so much pain. But yet it's been a year. I feel like I should be able to kind of move on and get beyond this, but I just can't see a better future. I can't. And it makes me feel like I can't get out of bed, and I just don't want to wake up in the mornings, you know, because it's just gonna be a hard day. And, you know, there's nothing really that gives me a level of energy, and I'm just dragging myself through this, and I just. I can't get unstuck. Now. What's beautiful when people talk about feeling stuck is there's actually a very, very simple solution that I talked to Sarah about. It's not beautiful to be stuck, but it's beautiful in the sense that it's actually quite simple. There's only two reasons why we get stuck, and they happen together. The first part is life doesn't match the picture of how we think it should look. And the second part is we feel like we don't have the control to change it. So I'll go through that again. The first part is life doesn't match the picture of how we think it should look. And the second part is we feel like we don't have the control to change it. So it makes my job really easy. And that's why I say it's sort of beautifully simple, because I've either got to do just one of two things. Either I help people change the picture to a better one, or I show them how they can leverage more control. I've only got to do one of those two things, but I might as well do both now. Here's the thing. Sarah's got this one picture in her Mind of what the future looks like and a million pictures of how it can go wrong. But if you really think about it, there is more than one picture you'd be perfectly happy with. There's so many varieties of this picture of the future that if you thought were possible, it'd actually be fantastic. Not just one. Not just one. Now, the difficulty is, when you go to real pain is it's hard to let go of that first picture, isn't it? I've been there. I know how difficult it is. It's not a case that you necessarily have to let go of it straight away. It takes a bit of time. But we need to design what's called a compelling future. Because when you have a compelling future, it pulls you out of bed instead of you pushing yourself all the time. And when you're being pulled by life, it gives you energy. So I started to help her design 5, 6, 7, 8 other pictures, all of which should be perfectly happy with. Just so she's got a realization that there are eight other pictures that are better than the picture she has in her head. Because truthfully, a lot of people, the picture they're holding on to, it's actually not even that good a picture. There are pictures that are much better that they would much rather have. They're also easier to achieve. We hold on to a picture that we don't even really necessarily want. That's really difficult to achieve. Almost impossible when there are eight other pictures that are better that we would actually like more. There are also easier to achieve that we can find control and leverage for. And I can do this for pretty much everyone that they create these new pictures. So I want you to think about it. I said, you got Sarah to do is tell me what these other pictures would look like. And Sarah starts to go, okay. So I'd love it if my career looked like this. Oh, actually, you know what, David? I've always wanted to do this in my career. So maybe I can go and, you know, go for that promotion or I can start to weave into a different department. I'd really love to do that. And you know what? I'd love to maybe be able to provide more for my children in terms of time and resources, not necessarily money, but just to be more available for them. So carve out a little bit more time for them. And I'd also love it if maybe I could go on an extra holiday a year, just for two or three days. That would be nice to go to some places I keep. I've been putting off for years. And she keeps going on and on and on. And that's just one picture that she can think of, another picture with possibilities and opportunities, and another picture with possibilities and opportunities where maybe wants to do with growing a social circle and being out in nature more and actually meeting someone that's more ideal for her. And more and more of these different solutions and options, imagine what that does for her. She starts having a big smile on her face because she's now unstuck. There are better pictures that she could have. And then what we do is we create strategies to, you know, go after one of those. And as life goes, she might end up with that strategy. It actually takes her to a slightly different picture, which is better, or a slightly different one. But we have a, you know, a focus point, which she now thinks she can achieve because we give her a strategy where she has control and she can create, you know, get enough leverage, and that's how we get unstuck. So I want you to have a think about what these other pictures might be for you that would be more compelling, more exciting, and realize that there are, you know, four or five different ones you could create, that you'd be perfectly happy with any of them and that you go after one of those, but it might veer off in one direction as you go through the journey, and you might see something you like even more or just different, and you go, I'm perfectly happy with this one. That's one of the things I had to do to get unstuck in my life, is I had this one glorious picture, but it was so difficult and so impossible to achieve because it relied on too many external things to happen that I started designing pictures where I was in control, where I could find more influence or control my influence at least. And I went after one, but it started veering in different directions and I went, oh, that's an opportunity, or that's a possibility. And actually finding new and new pictures, that's what gave me the idea to be able to help people like Sarah. Now, if you want some help with this, feel free to visit the Self Belief Chief website. We'll put a link in the description as well so that you can schedule some time with me if you'd like to, for free, so you can discuss what it would look like going forward. And make sure to subscribe to the podcast. We release new episodes all of the time, every day. Make sure to share your favorite ones. My name is David Holman. If you change today, today will change your life. So enjoy the rest of your day. Enjoy the rest of your life, and I'll speak to you again soon.