How Do I Get Unstuck? (Coaching Session Breakdown)

Joe: The thing that we're avoiding is usually the most direct path to our freedom, especially when you get into that place that's like an abyss, that is our freedom. 'cause what we're essentially scared of most is deep love and when someone really allows themselves to fall in there, something beautiful is on the other side. 

Brett: Today, on the art of Accomplishment, where we explore how deepening connection with ourselves and others leads to creating the life we want with enjoyment and ease, we're gonna do a little bit of an experiment. We have, we've done a lot of rapid fire sessions where Joe has done rapid fire coaching for people in our courses, and recently we started doing them for the public and graciously people have agreed to allow us to record those sessions and use them in podcasts.

Joe: Yeah. 

Brett: So today we're gonna run an experiment with one of those sessions. 

Joe: Cool. So first of all, yeah, I agree. Thanks for everybody who's willing to take the risk to do these rapid fire coachings and allow themselves to be seen in this way so publicly. I think it's awesome. Thank you for all the people who did that.

And then what do you want to do with our time today, Brett? Like, what's the experiment we're running? 

Brett: Yeah. So the experiment here is I'm gonna play the session and we're gonna pause the session and talk about it whenever we see something 'cause whenever you're doing coaching a lot of times, like an epiphany will happen and will be in it emotionally with the person with you in this process.

But then a million questions come to mind about what was actually seen there, what was the pattern here? How did you see that? And you know what else could we harvest from this in a more general sense to apply it to our own life? 

Joe: Cool. I think that's a great idea.

The one place that I would say I want give warning about what we're doing and the place I don't want to go is I don't really want to talk about the technique that I'm using. I'm happy to talk about the patterns. I'm happy to talk about what's seen and what's going on underneath that kind of thing, but what I noticed is that there's like a certain number of people out there who very much want to be able to do what I do or something like the way that I do it. Not a lot of people, but some people, and my answer to them is, don't watch this and look for my technique. That's a horrible way to go.

And also a somewhat dangerous way to go. What's far more important is to just work on your own self-discovery, understand yourself deeply and everything else will come to pass. Rather than I think what typically people do is that they think it's like some skill to learn, and though there is some skill to it, the essence of what I'm doing can't be done without really taking a lot of time and looking at yourself and experimenting and really working on your own self-awareness.

So start there. If you want to do this, start with your own self-awareness and spend years and years and years on that. 

Brett: Yeah, beautiful. And I'd also add just that what we're doing here, this is coaching, this isn't diagnosing or treating anything mental illness related.

This is just an exploration of what someone's experience is in the moment. And the invitation and why we bring this to the podcast is for others to learn from that and experiment in their own experience. Not to. As you just said, learn a new technique that they can use on someone else. 

This is for, this is fodder for your own self-inquiry. And the intention of the conversation around the session that we're gonna have is just to help illuminate further path of exploration. 

Joe: That's right. Yeah. See if you can see the patterns that are happening here, how they happen in you. So that's great. Yeah. Fantastic. Let's do it. 

Brett: Awesome. Let's do it. 

Joe: Okay. Wait, hold on hold on. Before we start what are we looking at? Gimme like a little summary. I do a lot of these, so I have a hard time remembering what are we looking at? 

Brett: Yeah, so the session we're about to watch is with a woman who came feeling stuck. She started to feel stuck around the fear of taking risks in her life. 

Joe: Ah, okay. Great. 

Brett: All right. And here we go. 

Coachee: Yeah. I feel scared to take the actions that I wanna take, and I feel stuck because the known is more familiar. 

Joe: How long, what percentage of your life from 20 years old till today, would that sentence be true?

So can we pause? I remember the conversation now, it's great and I really enjoyed this conversation. She's such an amazing woman. So just to say one of the main things is that like and that I don't believe any of the stories that I tell to myself particularly, or I haven't in a long time, or maybe there's some left, don't get me wrong, but most of them I don't believe.

And so I also don't believe the story that somebody else tells me in this world of, oh, this is the problem. So part of what I'm seeing is this really the problem? If I we're looking at it, she's telling me she's stuck. And she's here. Asking me a question, which tells me she's not stuck.

It means that she's, not only is she not stuck because she's taking action, she might not be getting the results that she wants, but she's taking action, which means she's not stuck and she's taking a risk by coming here and doing this all verbally. So just to say right away there, there's a thing about all of our patterns where we tell ourselves, we have this problem but oftentimes that's an old story that we used to have, or it's a way that we tell ourselves and we don't really look to see if it's true or not.

Brett: Right. 

Joe: So immediately for her, and I would say for most folks who come and do something with me immediately, the question that arises is this really the pattern or is this the story we tell around the pattern?

Brett: Yeah. And this is something that I've learned through coaching as well, is that, people show up with exactly the whole picture often in the first few sentences in the way that they show up. And this is another way of seeing how, if you're working in a company, oftentimes if a company or a team is stuck, it's because the way that they have defined the problem is actually creating the stuckness. And it looks like that's what's going on here is it's, she's brought you this, the story of how she's stuck and that story is actually the thing that is driving the feeling or at least recycling that feeling of stuckness. 

Joe: Yeah. 

Brett: And so I love the question, the opening question of how much of your, you know, life have you spent feeling this?

Joe: Yeah. And also what's happening there is I'm saying that this is a feeling, that you might feel stuck, doesn't mean you are stuck. You might feel scared, doesn't mean you're under threat. You might feel sad, but it doesn't mean that it's not love. That the sadness is there because of a love that you have.

So what we feel doesn't mean that it's our reality. Okay. So let's see. Let's see what's going on. 

Brett: Yeah, let's continue. 

Joe: What percentage of your life from 20 years old till today would that sentence be true? I am not happy with the state of things and I am scared to take the risk of going into the unknown. 

Coachee: Maybe 30 to 50?

So I've taken a lot of risk but I still keep finding myself in this space. 

Joe: This what space? Of being unsatisfied with the way things are? 

Coachee: Yeah. Feeling stuck, but feeling so terrified of making the next move that it's more familiar and safer to be in the stuck and unhappiness. 

Brett: Right there. I love what she just said. The recognition of that, it feels safer to be in the stuckness. 

Joe: Yeah. 

Brett: So all these things are happening in her life. She spends this amount of time, she says in the stuckness, but that it's not necessarily that stuckness is what's happening. It's that stuckness is where she's going to feel safer.

Joe: Yes. 

Brett: From all of the other feelings that are happening. 

Joe: Yeah, exactly. Except the only thing I would add to that is that we're safe where we're identified. So she's also telling me at this moment, she's identified as someone who doesn't take risks, who feels stuck. Who's on a regular basis unsatisfied with life.

So it's safe because this is part of the identity. And she's announcing it early on, as most people do early on in the session, telling us what's really happening for her. And you can see, what, there's also like a tremendous amount of compassion and love that I have, because I see her really wrestling with this and really wanting to have freedom from it.

And she's clearly done a lot of work to think about it and consider it. And she's explored herself enough to know that this is where she feels safe, which is cool. 

Brett: Yeah. Yeah. So far she is, she's come with the story that recreates the painful feelings for her. And then also that she sees the key. 

Joe: Yeah. 

Brett: And so now I'm curious where this goes next as far as like putting the key in the hole and turning it. 

Joe: Let's see. 

Brett: So let's see. 

Joe: Yeah, again I just wanted point out that you are, you just took an action of going into the unknown and proving that you're not stuck.

Coachee: How's that? By being in this conversation? 

Joe: Yeah, so my question is how much of this stuck is a feeling and how much of it is it actual? Are you actually stuck? Are you actually taking the actions of a stuck person or do you just think you're stuck? 

Coachee: I'm not sure I could identify the difference. 

Brett: Now that's interesting to me as well.

There's like a confusion. It feels like a defense to me. I'm curious what you see there, but it feels as though, 

Joe: I see a smile. 

Brett: Yeah. Yeah. There's some smile. 

Joe: I see a little bit of a smile. She sees it. Yeah. 

Brett: But there's something she'd have to feel to let that fully through, let that fully be seen.

Joe: So my perspective whenever I'm working with somebody is that they have the answers, they know what's going on and I'm following them, but I'm having a conversation with the part of them that knows, not the one that's telling the story. And so that smile tells me there's something she knows there, she sees something and I'm gonna wanna follow that.

And it doesn't mean she's not confused. It doesn't mean everything she's saying isn't real and I want to take that into account. But this is very typical, right? When you're working with somebody, what's very typical is that they see it and they don't. If they're talking about it with me as an issue, it means that they already have more consciousness on it because if they didn't, then they wouldn't even know to talk about it.

Brett: Yeah. And looking back through my life here, there's so many situations that I felt stuck in for so long that all of them, I actually knew the way out of it. Like you just said, if I knew I was stuck or if I knew I was in a pattern, I was already separated enough from the pattern to not be identifying as it on some level. 

Joe: That's right.

Brett: To see that it is something that is not me, that's not mine, that could be seen through. 

Joe: That's right. And when somebody sees that they're having a problem, it's inevitable that they will get through it. It might take them a long time, but it's inevitable. And there's something that's really nice if you find yourself in a pattern and you realize oh, I'm in this pattern to, it happens in my system. If I say I'm in a pattern, there's no question I'm gonna get to the other side of it because I'm already halfway through by the time I can see it, I'm halfway through it. Yeah, great. So let's see what happens. 

Looked like a year ago. 

Coachee: Very different. I was looking 

Joe: There we go. That would be not stuck. 

Coachee: Yeah. But for the last year, it's felt stuck. So a lot of things in my life changed last year and, 

Joe: oh wait I'm with you.

I'm not gonna but you said you, so you feel stuck. You just said it felt stuck. 

Coachee: Okay. 

Joe: If your life looked a lot different than it's not actually a stuck, I'm just saying, are we working on the fact that you're stuck or are we working on the fact that you feel stuck? 

Coachee: I think feeling stuck. Yeah. 

Joe: Yeah.

Coachee: Yeah. 

Joe: Great. And how does stuck feel? 

Brett: Yeah. I love the recognition there that okay, yeah. It's actually the feeling that I'm working with. It's not this, it's not the condition going on in my life, which we've identified actually isn't true because there's been so much movement over the past year.

Things are different. Things are changing, things are evolving, but yeah. Okay. It's the feeling of stuck and then going into that feeling. I'm curious where this goes now that she's with that feeling or as the capacity right now to be with it. 

Joe: And so I think oftentimes when people are stuck, it's because of a thought pattern.

It's not because of reality. And another part is that it's like, there's also means like stuck is often stuck in your head. And so let's get into the emotion 'cause that's where oftentimes if you find yourself stuck, oftentimes it's emotional movement, emotional fluidity that's gonna actually change something.

It's not figuring something out. Typically so that for anybody out there who's listening, who feels stuck, it's a great thing to know move some emotion, see if you still feel stuck. Okay. Let's see.

Coachee: It feels like I'm unable to move. Like I'm stuck in like a mouse trap. My feet are stuck to the ground.

Joe: Great. I want you to feel more stuck right now. I want you to increase the feeling of stuckness. 

Coachee: Okay? It feels like every time I try to do that, my body wants to spend more energy getting out of that feeling. 

Brett: Ooh, okay. Yeah. One thing I love right there is she's just pointed to the fact that it's not actually the feeling of stuckness, it's the wanting to leave the stuckness that is actually the discomfort. 

Joe: Yes. I would say even more accurately, it is the stuckness, like it's, you have to want to get out, for you to be stuck. 

Brett: Yeah. 

Joe: God, I was stuck. I was stuck in heaven. It sucked. I wanted to get out, 

Brett: right. 

Joe: Like I was stuck feeling awesome. I was stuck in joy. The struggle to get out is required for stuckness. Which is what we're doing right now is like we're going against that pattern. Instead of trying to get out of it, let's go right into the middle of it. Which is emotionally generally for anybody in any kind of emotional pattern, trying to get out of the emotion is not as effective as going right into it. So that's what we're doing here. 

Brett: All right. Let's see how that goes. 

Joe: Great. I want you to go even more stuck then. I want you to feel so stuck that you can't even talk. You're so stuck. You can't even describe it to me. You're so stuck. And then even more just go, even more stuck. 

Coachee: It feels like I'm going to explode.

Joe: Keep going. 

Coachee: I feel helpless. 

Joe: Yeah. 

Brett: One thing I wanna point out there is, earlier she was describing the feelings in terms of what it feels like is going to happen? 

Joe: Yes. 

Brett: Like she just right there transferred from it feels like I'm going to explode to it feels like helplessness. 

Joe: Yes. Yeah. 

Brett: Which to me says that she's more, with the raw data, the raw sensation of the feeling than the implications of the feeling. 

Joe: Right or a feeling resisted shows up as a different feeling. Resisted anger feels very different than embraced anger. And so this is what's, like in her particular case, what stuckness feels if you are not trying to get unstuck. Like this is the thing that's really at the bottom of this particular pattern, but there's no bottom exactly but the next level down. 

Brett: Let's see where it goes. 

Joe: Ooh, what just happened? Look at that. 

Coachee: It feels like I'm gonna get sucked into this black hole and never be able to come out. 

Joe: Go in, go into the hole.

So if we can stop for a minute. I'm saying go into the hole like with incredible cavalier yeah, do that. And she's I'll never gonna get back out. The way I would, the reason that gives me such joy to be able to say, jump into that crazy scary thing is that the thing that we're avoiding is usually the most direct path to our freedom.

The thing where, it's the Luke Skywalker in the cave. It's like going in and especially when you get into that place, it's like an abyss. Oh my God. It's endless. That is our freedom 'cause what we're essentially scared of most is deep love, deep pleasure, deep freedom.

And so typically and when I say typically, I think every single scenario I've seen, when someone really allows themselves to fall in there, something beautiful is on the other side. 

Brett: The audience in my head is asking a million questions right now about what could go wrong? Whether this is somebody who's going straight into the center of it in the presence of a coach, or if it's somebody who's listening to this and then goes straight into the center of what they're feeling is alone. What are, if any what are the pitfalls here? What would be something to like, how does somebody feel comfortable knowing that this, that what they're going to feel is going to bring them to their freedom?

Joe: They're not going to. It's not like someone's okay, go into this big black hole. It's not scary and you're gonna have freedom. It's go into the big black hole because it's scary. What's on the other side of freedom is that the identity starts to crumble.

The idea of I'm stuck, starts going away. And if that's your safe spot, it's not safe, right? I wouldn't give people the answer to that. I would say, let's jump in and find out what's happening. And you don't have to like, if you don't want to, don't, you're welcome of course never to jump in.

Brett: And to titrate. 

Joe: Yeah. 

Brett: Yeah. All right. Let's see. Let's see what happens. 

Coachee: Okay. 

Joe: Yeah and you're smiling. 

Coachee: Because when I went into the hole, 

Joe: yeah. 

Coachee: Suddenly there was a different way and I just came back out again. 

Joe: Yeah, that's right. That's how it works. Beautiful. The avoidance of the hole is the stuckness, the abyss.

Brett: Now I wanna pause here for a moment as well, because on one level it looks like almost nothing happened. And on another level, something has deeply happened here, and you can see it in her face. 

Joe: Yeah. 

Brett: For those of us who are watching this on the YouTube, but yeah, I just wanna, I wanna point to that. What do you see there? What do you see that occurred in this moment where she went into it and came out on the other side? 

Joe: It is a mix of emotions and it's gonna take a while for her to integrate everything. There's like a relief and there's a sadness, like I've been running this from this thing my whole life for no reason. That's below it. That's like kind of the natural progression through something like this is there's a relief, there's a oh my, sometimes like a huge laughter and then oh, this is ridiculous. Like how has this been the case? And then also some sort of grief usually needs to occur, but that'll happen over time. In this moment right now, it's just mind blown. What the fuck? And then the freedom that comes with that epiphany. 

Brett: It's like stepping across the electric fence and being on the other side of it and not getting shocked and being like, wait a minute, I was afraid of this.

Joe: Exactly. Exactly. 

Brett: Yeah. All right, let's keep going. 

Coachee: What do I do with this? 

Joe: What did you just do with it? 

Coachee: I just came out of it. I went in and then I came out of it. 

Joe: That's how you do it. The stuckness is the resisting. It's not the actual abyss black hole. Give me a moment in your life when that black hole wasn't there, like maybe it's way out in the background. Maybe it's, but like just notice that's like a, you said I'm dissatisfied with life often, like that tells me that big black hole abyss is there a lot. 

Brett: I like how one thing that's happening here is that. Like one of, one of the common pattern might be to have an experience in a coaching session and then isolate it to the session, be like, that was just then. That was just that one time. 

Joe: Or what do I do about it? Yeah. 

Brett: Yeah. So there's the, what do I do about it? And then there's also what I love that you just did there was preempted that this doesn't apply to the rest of life, like you're looking through where else in her life has this, has this been present? And has that escape hatch been right there? 

Joe: Yeah. 

Brett: Which is a, that's a powerful recognition.

Joe: Yeah. Let's see what she does with it. Yeah, it's great that I can't remember. It's like, I do so much of this and so many I don't have a distinct memory of everything, so it's like a little surprise when I'm listening to it. I'm like, Ooh, what happens next? It's fun. 

Brett: Yeah. Let's see what she does with it. 

Coachee: It's been present a lot in the last while. 

Joe: Yeah. 

Coachee: Yeah. 

Joe: And it's your, it's the thing you're looking for. It is the way to be unstuck, and you've been avoiding it.

Coachee: I feel like the way I try to solve for it is to try and create the perfect circumstances so I don't feel it again. 

Joe: Right? 

Coachee: Which keeps me in the feeling because I don't know what those circumstances are going to be to never have this feeling. 

Joe: Right instead of, yay, there's the feeling that's my unstuck place.

Brett: Another beautiful recognition that she has seen this pattern. Like she had that answer in her system already about how this works. 

Joe: Yeah. Yeah. I love what she's doing. Like I love to watch that integration and her bravery is awesome. 

Brett: Yeah. 

Joe: Yeah. 

Brett: And continuing, 

Coachee: yeah. 

Joe: You are avoiding something that is your relief. You are running away from the thing that brings you freedom quickest. 

Coachee: Yeah, I'm wondering why I'd do that. 

Joe: It's a human thing. 

Okay. That moment, do you see? Do you see, that's a moment. That's something that happens, right? So somebody sees their pattern, they see through it, and then they beat themselves up for having the pattern.

I wonder why I do that. Yeah. There's some wonder there, but the question is why? And there's like the beginning of the self abuse. And I say to her at that moment, this is a human thing. And she goes, Ugh. There's nothing wrong with me. I'm not fucked up. But the reason I speak it is 'cause that's a pattern generally for people is one of the things we do to like slow our transformation is when we see something, we have an epiphany, then we beat ourselves up for not having it sooner or not when we were younger or anything. Like why do I do, that's horrible that I do that? Instead of just oh fuck yeah, cool. There's freedom right there. 

Brett: Yeah. And on what level was this the thing that was keeping the pattern stuck? Because she came into the session seeing the stuckness pattern and seeing the way that, that it's a defense.

And if she's not allowing herself to actually be there because she judges herself for it, then she won't allow herself to go into the feeling, into the abyss. So on some level, it seems to me that this self-judgment has actually been the thing that's been supporting the whole house of cards, so to speak.

Joe: Absolutely. And definitely one of the pillars. 

Coachee: Yeah. 

Joe: The more we avoid something, the scarier it gets. 

Coachee: Yeah. 

Joe: And typically the thing that we're avoiding is love. 

Coachee: And the exercise, the thing that we talked about was, why do I keep resisting the feeling of loneliness? 

Joe: Yeah. Let's do that one too, then.

Coachee: Okay. 

Joe: Feel the loneliness for a minute. Go, just jump into the loneliness. Yeah. No reason. Yeah. How is that not love? 

Coachee: It feels like a disconnection and a longing more than love. 

Joe: Great. So go right into the middle of the longing. Keep your eyes closed. Go right into the middle of the longing. Don't disconnect from your longing. Be intimate with your longing. 

Coachee: It's so big. 

Joe: Yeah, love is really fucking big. 

Brett: I'm just loving all the smiles and laughs on her face in this last segment. Like just constant like recognition oh, I see what the game has been all along. 

Joe: Yeah. Yeah. And again, it's the story of the sensation has been run away from, because there's a story that it's loneliness, so the sensation never gets fully investigated. And as soon as it's investigated, it's it's so big. That's the first thing she says. 

Brett: Yeah, I love that. And then the exploration of what actually is it? Because if that feeling is identified as loneliness, then that also means stories like I'm alone. 

Joe: Yeah, exactly. 

Coachee: I feel if I connect to it, like it might absorb me whole. 

Joe: It will. That's what love does. It rips away our identity.

Coachee: It feels if I give into the longing, I might be just like bare, like a little baby, like totally helpless. 

Joe: Yeah. That's how it works. But you don't give into it. You just be intimate with it. 

Coachee: I want control. I want control and taper this feeling to my comfort level.

Joe: Great. You can do that if you want. You can just spend a little time with the longing tomorrow. You can spend a little more time with the longing the next day. You can taper if you'd like. 

Coachee: Okay. 

Joe: There's no problem with that. 

Brett: This part also looks like another important piece for once somebody's had an experience like this, a recognition like this to not go into self-attack about it later. To give themselves permission, to give ourselves permission to be like, yeah, sometimes I don't want to be in the abyss. Sometimes I want to avoid or resist the abyss. Sometimes I'm just gonna do that and that's, as you said earlier, a totally human thing.

Joe: Yeah, exactly. 

Brett: And it's okay to want to have some control or feel a sense of control over it. It's natural. 

Joe: Yeah. 

Brett: And we don't have any control over it. 

Joe: Yes. 

Brett: But it's natural to want that. 

Joe: Yeah. The thing is, it's like you can either be fighting with yourself or not be fighting with yourself, and it's like you can taper no problem or you can fight with yourself. You know what I mean? It's just, we don't need an idea of how we should be. We can be good with who we are. Yeah. Let's see what happens. I think we're close to the end, if I recall correctly. I don't know. 

Brett: I think so. 

Joe: And yeah, you don't get to control love. That's not how it works. You just get to, you just get to be heartbroken from time to time, increasing your capacity to love. 

Coachee: Yeah. 

Joe: What a pleasure to work with you. 

Coachee: Thank you, Joe. 

Joe: You're so welcome. Thanks for coming up. Yeah. 

Brett: Yeah. All right. Yep. That was it. 

Joe: That was fun. I have no idea if this will actually make a good podcast episode, but it was really fun to, to do it. 

Brett: Yeah. We'll find out.

Joe: Let's see how it goes. 

Brett: I'm going to rely on our listeners to tell us what they think about this episode. Should we do more of these? Should we do less of them? What do you want? 

Joe: You can tell us on Twitter at Art of Acomp or FU Joe Hudson if you want it. And what else? What else should we, or is there another place they can tell us? 

Brett: They can email us at? podcast@artofaccomplishment.com. 

Joe: Yeah. 

Brett: Or just hit up our website and use the contact form. 

Joe: All right. 

Brett: Yeah. Or if you're on Circle and you've taken one of our courses, you can always DM us there too.

Joe: That's right. 

Brett: All right. 

Joe: Alright, that was fun, Brett. Thank you. 

Brett: Thank you everybody, and thank you to our guest who will leave unnamed for privacy purposes, but you know who you are. Thank you so much. This was really beautiful. 

Joe: Yeah. Amazing work. Yeah. I really hope also if you end up watching this, please let us know how this was for you to have this analysis of your session and I really wanna make sure that this is something that's really helpful for the people that we do this with. So please let us know, and I wanna make sure that it's something that's beneficial for everybody. 

Brett: Yeah. 

Joe: All right. 

Brett: All right. Thank you, everybody. Take care. ‘Til next time.