You can't get out of a rut from inside the rut.
"You can't get out of a rut from inside the rut."
These wise words were said to me recently when I was dithering about whether or not to book a trip to Brisbane for a writers' festival. Don't know about you, but for me, one of the symptoms of being stuck in a life rut is a co-dependent relationship with my never-ending to-do list - I can't possibly go anywhere or do anything different or interesting because look at this list, it needs me.
The inside of a rut feels like it's coated in glue. It's sticky and gets on everything and makes it really hard to climb out. Or maybe it's like wearing a velcro suit - less messy than glue but the effect is the same.
The hardest part is the first bit, the bit that happens inside your head. Deciding to get out, and meaning it (the hardest part of many things is making the decision to do it). And then taking the first step (a real, tangible step, not just thinking 'I've decided. Tomorrow I'll do the thing' in your head - I did that for several tomorrows, and strangely it wasn't helpful).
It's got to be a big enough step that you can't weasel out of it and un-make it, sliding back into the rut and rolling around in the glue some more.
This time, I booked a flight, a hotel, a ticket to the event. And then I felt uncomfortable about it until I was actually sitting at the airport waiting to board my flight. Leaving ruts is uncomfortable. Change is uncomfortable, even when it's needed and healthy.
It's funny, I have a health tracking ring that measures a bunch of stuff. Sleep, activity levels, stress. As soon as I got to the airport, my stress levels, which had been fairly high for weeks, plummeted. Turns out that travel is hugely restorative for me. So clearly I need to spend more time sitting around listening to people talk about writing (for those who don't know, when I don't have my "Art Therapist and Somatic Experiencing Practitioner" hats on, I write whimsical, fantastical fiction*).
It's one of those things that's so obvious when I'm no longer in the rut - of course going to new places and experiencing new ideas and giving my eyeballs lots of new details to look at is good for me. But when I'm on the to-do list hamster wheel, it's easy to lose sight of that because the wheel is in front of my face and I can't see anything else.
Which is why friends who tell me to stop sighing over how I have too much to do and book the damn flight already are worth their weight in gold (thank you - you know who you are).
So to wrap all this musing in a nice little parcel - are you stuck in a rut anywhere in your life right now? Is the siren call of your to-do list blocking out the voices of your bigger dreams and longings? What are you wishing you had time for?
For anyone who needs to hear it: book the damn flight already - or whatever that action is for you. And if you want, send me an email and tell me what you did, and I'll write back and tell you you did well ;)
* If you're curious about the whimsical, fantastical fiction, I have a podcast called Can I tell you a story?, which you can find at the links below, or search for it wherever you like to get your podcasts:
Click here for Spotify
Click here for Apple Podcasts