The Mel Robbins PodcastHow to Get Unstuck: Do This to Create the Future You Want
EVERY SPOKEN WORD
110 min read · 21,826 words- 0:00 – 3:28
Introduction
- MRMel Robbins
I'm ready to have a breakthrough.
- AADr. Adam Alter
I'm ready to help you have a breakthrough.
- MRMel Robbins
Why is this feeling, that you haven't reached your full potential, you know, we kind of say we're stuck, why is it so common?
- AADr. Adam Alter
The way life is structured for us today, there is a lot of emptiness. A lot of what we spend our time doing does not build on the other moments we spend so that we're building towards something that feels meaningful, that is substantial. The problem with being stuck is it feels very personal, it feels very uncomfortable, and it feels like it's a bit of a mess. But it turns out we're all stuck in some respect.
- MRMel Robbins
What is the first step, Dr. Alta, to getting unstuck?
- AADr. Adam Alter
The first one is to f-
- MRMel Robbins
Hey, it's your friend Mel. You know, every once in a while, you need someone to roll on up beside you, tap you on the shoulder, and remind you that there is so much untapped potential inside of you. You know, I- I don't think you even realize what you're capable of. And so, I'm gonna start off by dedicating this episode to you and to the potential that is lying dormant inside of you, because that's gonna end today. We're gonna tap into that potential. And look, if you're already at a point in your life you're like, "I have achieved so much s-success, Mel. I surprise myself. That's how I feel about myself," guess what? This conversation, still gonna ignite a breakthrough. Because regardless of what you've accomplished, you have not reached what you're capable of yet. Neither have I. Or if you're listening right now and you're like, "Ugh, I feel blah, unmotivated and unproductive," boy have I been there so many times in my life. I have been so sick of my excuses, but I had no idea what to do about it. Here's the thing, after today you are gonna know what to do about it because you already know that you have this extraordinary potential. That's why you're frustrated. The issue is that you don't know how to unleash it. Well, that's gonna change today because one of the world's most respected researchers and professors at NYU is in the house today, and you will leave this conversation with a three-step roadmap that makes leveling up your life easier than you think. Dr. Adam Alta, welcome to The Mel Robbins Podcast.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Thank you for having me.
- MRMel Robbins
I'm ready to have a breakthrough.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Good. I'm ready to help you have a breakthrough.
- MRMel Robbins
Okay, great. So, you've just spent all this time researching the anatomy of a breakthrough.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
And so there's actually a whole process that you can break down for us?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, so, you know, I think the problem with being stuck is it feels very personal, it feels very uncomfortable, and it feels like it's a bit of a mess.
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
And that's the way people describe it when they have it, when they feel it, but I, the- the whole point of this book was to say there is a roadmap, and if you follow the steps, you will get unstuck. It's just that most of us don't know what those steps are. That's what the book is designed to do.
- MRMel Robbins
Oh. (claps) Where the hell have you been my whole life-
- AADr. Adam Alter
(laughs)
- MRMel Robbins
... for crying out loud? I want you to start, before we get to the roadmap, talking directly to the person who is listening to this, and they're either listening for themselves because they're going through this moment in life where they're like, "Ugh," or just kind of blah, or they're feeling stuck, or they're listening and someone in their life that they love is really stuck. What can they expect to learn from you today and how might their life change based on really learning this research about the anatomy of a breakthrough?
- 3:28 – 6:38
Why it’s normal to feel “stuck” in your life.
- MRMel Robbins
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, so the first thing to understand is that getting stuck and being stuck is universal. It's part of what it is to be human, and that's liberating for a lot of people because it feels like this very personal affront. You don't recognize how many other people around you are stuck, but it turns out we're all stuck in some respect. That's the first thing to understand. The second thing to understand is that there are actually things you can do systematically, one after another, to get unstuck. It may feel like a mess, it's complicated, it's hard to understand how you can get through it, but in many, many cases there is a path through and I'm gonna try to share some ideas about how we can get from being stuck to making progress, to hitting breakthroughs.
- MRMel Robbins
So, Dr. Alta, let's talk about what the word stuck even means.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
So, when w- we throw that word around, "I feel stuck, I am stuck, I'm stuck in life, I'm stuck in this job," as a researcher, what do you want us to think about when we hear the word stuck or what it actually means or feels like?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, I think there's the, there are two kinds of stuck. There's the one kind where you say, "I wanna be at point Z and I'm in point A and I need to figure out the path from A to Z that's as short as possible."
- MRMel Robbins
Uh-huh.
- AADr. Adam Alter
And- and the destination is obvious, right? I've got a goal, there's something specific I need to reach. It might be a job-related goal.
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
It might be a relationship. Whatever it is.
- MRMel Robbins
Might be a g- like, "I want to, uh, get my nursing degree," or it might be, "I'm sick of being single." Like, so-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... that's when you have a goal and you feel, though a little overwhelmed, like, why would you be stuck if you know what you want?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Because you haven't been able to get from A to even B-
- MRMel Robbins
Oh.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... on the way to Z. So that's the one. I think that often is easier to solve. There's the other kind of stuck that's just like blah.
- MRMel Robbins
Yes.
- AADr. Adam Alter
"I just, I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing. I, things just feel kind of dull and gray and I don't know where I'm suppo-" I- it might be your career or relationship or friendship, uh, life just feels like it's kinda being leached of all the things that make it really rich-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... and interesting. And that's a very sort of diffuse kind of stuckness where it's not attached to one specific thing, and that's incredibly common. So those are very different. One is, "I can't complete this goal." The other is, "I don't even know which way to turn to create the next goal." And so they're a little bit different but tho- those both exist and I'm gonna talk about what I think best interventions are.
- MRMel Robbins
There are listeners to this podcast in 194 countries.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
And if I had to boil down the kind of universal sentiment on the looking for help or needing inspiration and guidance, the complaint of feeling a loss of direction-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... eh, is- is I think one of the biggest things that people struggle with.
- AADr. Adam Alter
I think that's right. I, it's a, it's an incredibly common response that I've had to this book and to talking about these issues, that the way life is structured for us today, there is a lot of emptiness. And, uh, a lot of what we spend our time doing does not build on the other moments we spend so that we're building towards something that feels meaningful, that is substantial. And, uh, I think, I think a lot of people feel that. There's an emptiness to what we're doing a lot of the time.
- MRMel Robbins
So is that what we're basically saying if we say we're stuck, that we don't have anything meaningful going on?
- AADr. Adam Alter
I've been
- 6:38 – 10:30
What does it mean when people feel stuck?
- AADr. Adam Alter
running this survey on thousands of people around the world asking them exactly these questions. "What does it mean to you to be stuck?" And, "Are you stuck?" First thing I'll say is everyone says, "Yes. I am stuck in at least one respect." And then they can articulate it very quickly. They can write to me in the response what they're stuck with and what's affecting them. A lot of them, it's very narrow, you know, "I've, I've been trying to learn this piece on the piano for the last six years and I can't do it and it frustrates me every day." And then for other people, it's much broader. It's like, "My whole life is one big sticking point."
- MRMel Robbins
(laughs)
- AADr. Adam Alter
Like, "I don't even know where I'm going, and each day goes by and I'm like, 'What, how was this day building on the day that came before?'" It's a sort of meaninglessness to, uh, to life.
- MRMel Robbins
Yeah. Um, which is so overwhelming-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Very.
- MRMel Robbins
... which only makes you feel more lost. Are there particular areas in your research that come up over and over in people's lives where they tend to get stuck?
- AADr. Adam Alter
A lot of it is, um, creativity based, so I think it's hard to be creative. You know, you're asking a lot of a human being when you say, "Come up with something new," or, "Have a good idea." And we all assume that that's something we should be able to do and, uh, our work often requires that of us. And so for a lot of people, it's in that domain. For a lot of other people, it's not work-based. It's about relationships. It's about being stuck in a situation where you have to deal with someone you don't wanna deal with or you don't know how to extract yourself from a situation. And then for other people, it's the broadest kind, which is exactly as we've described as, "I don't even know why I'm stuck. I just know that I feel like things aren't the way they should be."
- MRMel Robbins
Dr. Alter, I take it that based on the research, this is something that you're gonna experience over and over and over again during the course of being alive.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. A huge part of it is accepting the discomfort that comes from being stuck, and recognizing that this is universal, that everyone is in this position at some point, often many points of their lives. There's this incredible research talking about how often these things come up for us, these major changes in our lives-
- MRMel Robbins
Uh-huh.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... that make everyone feel stuck. Bruce Feiler has done some research looking at what he calls lifequakes. Lifequakes are these huge major life events that affect all of us and we're almost always blindsided by them, and they're very often not things we wanna happen in our lives.
- MRMel Robbins
Like what?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Like a change in a marital status, a divorce, uh, the death of a loved one, illnesses, things like that. They come up, they happen to us, and that, they are universal. It's part of being a human being. Some of these are really good things, by the way, but they still force you to change what you're doing.
- MRMel Robbins
Like, what's a good one?
- AADr. Adam Alter
A good one might be, like, a job promotion, or you move to a new town or a new state or a new country and you're excited-
- MRMel Robbins
Yep.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... about it. Uh, maybe a marriage is a good one. Having a child could be, obviously, a huge positive, but also-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... brings complications and change and you've gotta figure those out. So you can be stuck by a good change too. So if your broad philosophy of life is there will be ups and downs and there will be times that are tough, then when those times happen, you don't spend time saying, "Why me? I can't believe this is happening." You know, there's a whole lot of sort of rumination that goes on-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... if you are surprised by the fact that you're in this position. But if broadly speaking, you recognize that this is what it means to be human, you're just a couple of steps ahead. So it liberates you to start acting and to start making the next steps you need to make to get through that, that part of life in that moment.
- MRMel Robbins
I love that. You know, it does make me wonder though, Adam, the thing that I've noticed about people in my life or when I've been really stuck is that it becomes part of my identity.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And I argue-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... to stay where I am. And so, I would love to have you speak directly to somebody who may be really needing a breakthrough-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... when it comes to relationships.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
Or a breakthrough when it comes to their career or their health. And if you're in your own head in the echo chamber and you're like, "But it's hard. But I've dated all these people. But my, all my bosses are jerks." And you kinda have that story, right?
- 10:30 – 16:51
Do THIS to get out of your own way to get unstuck.
- MRMel Robbins
of, like, to even just get over yourself and the way you're standing in your own way?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. There's this, uh, really interesting paradox that when you are stuck, the thing you most want is kind of freedom. "I just wanna move. I wanna, like, get unstuck."
- MRMel Robbins
Yes.
- AADr. Adam Alter
It turns out that constraining yourself and having very prescribed steps is really useful. So one process I use with people and with companies as well is a process called a friction audit, and a friction audit is a big part of the book.
- MRMel Robbins
Friction audit?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Friction audit. You basically-
- MRMel Robbins
What the heck is that?
- AADr. Adam Alter
A friction audit, you know, when you audit, if you're an auditor and you go into the books of a company to audit the books, you're basically, like, saying, is, "Does this all make sense? Let me pore through each line of the, of the books and make sure I understand it all." And a friction audit is an attempt to find the friction, so what is it that's slowing me down? What is it that's not making me move forward or that's stopping me from moving forward? There are three steps to a friction audit. The first one is to figure out where the friction is, and that takes a bit of doing sometimes. And even asking the question is a first very important step 'cause when you feel like you've just described, "My bosses are jerks. Things just aren't working for me," you're not, you're not being thoughtful about it. You just feel things.
- MRMel Robbins
Yes.
- AADr. Adam Alter
It feels bad. So the friction audit, basically, the process says, "Figure out what the biggest sticking points are." They could be, you know, every day, there's a part of the day that I look forward to least, makes my life least happy, l- it's the biggest, you know, downward force on my wellbeing. That's a friction point. Or, "I'm trying to get from A to Z in my career, and I know that po- p- I k- can never get past C 'cause pa- C and that step, that particular step, is a major friction point that I can never get past." It might be a particular boss I have to deal with. It might be an aspect of my job that I can't kind of refine and improve-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... whatever it is.If you do that process of introspecting and finding the friction point, you are much better positioned to make forward motion 'cause the next step is intervention. Is there a way that I can either weed out that, that friction point altogether or sma- sand it down, smooth it down? And what that means is, for a lot of people, it means spending a bit of time, energy, and sometimes money, and saying, "This thing is such a big problem for me, it's such a thorn that I need a way to, to eradicate it, to remove it, and I'm gonna throw resources at this problem, whatever resources I have." And so it depends on the, on the context, but if you intervene and you remove that, that friction point, then you're much better placed to move forward. And the third stage is confirmation, is just making sure that you've actually done a good job.
- MRMel Robbins
I can share a personal story. So I was crazy stuck, probably, oh God, uh, 2019.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
Super, super, super stuck. And things were going fine. Like on the outside, my life looked great. Uh, married, longtime, kids. Like I finally had gotten to a point where we were making the money and it paid off our bills and, you know, we can live our life, and I was happy in the work that I was doing.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
But not. And I felt guilty that I felt stuck. Like I, I almost had this sh- this shame-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... about the fact that I had a house, I had a marriage intact, I had my health, and yet I felt empty. And a dear friend of mine, Peter Sheehan, who I'm realizing just friction audited me-
- AADr. Adam Alter
(laughs)
- MRMel Robbins
... we were, um, I don't even remember where we were, but I was griping to him, and he's been a huge mentor and very close friend of mine, and he is a renowned business strategist, and he said, "Take out a piece of paper." (smacks lips) And I said, "Okay, what the hell is this gonna do?"
- AADr. Adam Alter
(laughs)
- MRMel Robbins
'Cause, of course, when you're stuck, you're kind of a jerk-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... 'cause you're in your emotion, right, and you don't know how to get out of that stage one in your emotion. And he said, "I want you to write down absolutely everything about your life that creates friction."
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
That was his exact word. And so I was like, "What do you mean by friction?" And he said that, "You just feel all this resistance and negative emotion to. You resent it, you, you're annoyed by it, you're frustrated. It's hard." And so I took out this piece of paper at him, and it was like vvv just vomiting on the page.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
"I hate packing on a Sunday. I hate being away. I hate..." and just the word hate, hate, hate, hate. "I hate how much I miss my kids when I'm traveling. I hate how much I'm working. I hate..." like da, da, da, da, da, da. Like it was just like... And the second that somebody gave me permission to write it down in that language-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- 16:51 – 18:51
The best thing you can do to make your life better.
- AADr. Adam Alter
your life is a series of friction points, but you also, on paper, have all these other good things, the best thing you can do is not add more good things. It's to take your time and attention and deal with those friction points and, and often your money and other resources that you have. So that's what I would counsel people to, to generally do, is focus on bringing the lows up a little bit rather than always focusing on the next flashy vacation, the next f- expensive thing that I'm gonna buy. Those things will help a little bit, but they're never gonna help as much as lifting up the, the lows so that they're not quite as low.
- MRMel Robbins
(clicks tongue) You know, again, a personal story, I have been shocked by how much of an impact therapy with my husband... Like so we were going through just a really terrible time probably four and a half years ago, and we went into counseling, and holy cow, it was like a crypt creeper digging up the dead bodies everywhere-
- AADr. Adam Alter
(laughs)
- MRMel Robbins
... kind of awful, painful thing. But on the other side of it, I had no idea how incredible the relationship could be.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And it wouldn't have been had we not hit that really painful moment of feeling stuck and just in a standoff. But it is hard to take that step to face the friction. I guess that's what we did.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
We went and sat with a therapist and did a friction audit on each other and on the marriage, and it was awful.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
But...But the dividends that it pays on your life when you go through something like that, it just creates tremendous meaning.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
So, do you think part of the issue with the reason why it's so easy to get stuck is that life just kind of is the same thing over and over again?
- AADr. Adam Alter
I- I think that's part of it. I think the other thing about being stuck, you just described it, is that when
- 18:51 – 20:00
When you hit difficulties in life, this is your instinct.
- AADr. Adam Alter
something is a friction point, the- the natural instinct is to turn away from it.
- MRMel Robbins
Yes.
- AADr. Adam Alter
It's to say, "I'm gonna focus on something else."
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
You know, I- if you're having difficulties in your relationship, the natural thing is to say, "Well, let's just give it a bit of distance." You know, "I just- I gotta do some other stuff." You know, you figure out other areas of your life that are more appealing, you throw your attention and time there. And that's a mistake, 'cause those- those friction points, they kinda nag at you, they become traps, and unless you figure them out and actually deal with them, you're not gonna be able to raise them up and they can end up being problems for decades. And so I think that's a large part of it, is- is that there's a kind of sameness and a repetition to life, and the repetition comes from ignoring those little things that are niggling, that are sort of pulling at your ankle, saying, "Hey, do you wanna look at me?" And you're like, "No, I don't wanna do that. There are some other things I'd rather do instead that are more fun and more appealing." And- and that's why a friction audit is so useful, because it forces you to pay attention to what's not working, which we generally, as humans, don't have the instinct to do.
- MRMel Robbins
No, i- i- in fact, we not only don't have the instinct to take a sober look at what's not working, we have the instinct to turn away from it.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. Exactly.
- MRMel Robbins
So if- i- is-
- 20:00 – 23:20
These are the ages when people tend to think deeper.
- MRMel Robbins
was there anything in the research about particular periods in life or ages where you tend to get more stuck?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah (laughs) . So I've s- have some research with a colleague of mine, Hal Herschfield at UCLA, where we ... I- I was- I was 29, and I felt like I was about to be 30. This was a number of years ago now. I'm- I'm much older than that (laughs) now. But at the time, I was 29, about to be 30, and I felt like I had to do something just to kind of show myself that I was still just as vibrant as I'd been when I was younger and so on.
- MRMel Robbins
So did you feel stuck?
- AADr. Adam Alter
I felt stuck. In various ways, I felt stuck. And what-
- MRMel Robbins
How so? Like describ- put me at the scene. I wanna meet the 29-year-old Adam.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
You're not where you are yet. You don't have, like, international best-selling books, like, all this renowned research. Tell me who Adam, at the age of 29, stuck, was.
- AADr. Adam Alter
I had just finished grad school. I was just starting a new career. I wasn't sure if I wanted to be in the United States still. I was missing people in Australia. I was single. I felt kinda lonely and unmoored in New York City. I didn't really know if I had a place there yet. And I just felt globally more blah than anything. Like, things were going well on paper, but I just wasn't sure where I was headed. And I wanted to do something that kinda showed me that I had drive and that everything was working well. So I- I signed up to run a marathon, my first marathon, my only marathon. And I did this at 29. And Hal and I were talking about this and saying ... We were thinking about the idea that the way we count using this base 10 system-
- MRMel Robbins
The who?
- AADr. Adam Alter
... the decade ... The- just we count in tens, so-
- MRMel Robbins
Oh, got it. Okay (laughs) .
- AADr. Adam Alter
So the way we count using tens-
- MRMel Robbins
Yeah.
- AADr. Adam Alter
We- we think of decades as meaningful, right? So turning 30, 40, 50, 60 is a big deal in our culture.
- MRMel Robbins
Yes.
- AADr. Adam Alter
There's no inherent reason why 39 to 40 should be different from 35 to 45- uh, 35 to 36, but it does feel different. And because of that, we wanted to investigate whether every 10 years when your age ends in a nine and you're thinking about a new decade, does that push you to think more deeply about your life? And that's what we found. So what you find is there's a little spike in questioning the meaning of life around the nine ending ages. It's like a little end-of-decade crisis. And you see some interesting things happen on the back of that. So one of them is more people are likely to sign up for marathons, the way I did. If they-
- MRMel Robbins
At the age of ending a nine?
- AADr. Adam Alter
At- at- at nine ending ages.
- MRMel Robbins
Like, 29, 39, 49, 59?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, they're more likely to be interested in things like reading books on aging. You see a little bit of a- a gr- people are more likely to buy those kinds of books. They become more focused on aging. You also see some negative things if they have a crisis when they have that- that questioning of meaning. You see a rise in extramarital affairs. So if you look at the data, there's a- a rise with nine ending ages for those kinds of affairs, and you even see a small rise in the suicide rate.
- MRMel Robbins
Hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
So th- there are profound things that happen at the end of the decade for people, and this is a time when we tend to have these little moments of questioning and when we feel quite stuck.
- MRMel Robbins
So is that called a temporal landmark?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
Where there's, like, this sort of almost marking of time that makes you then assess the span of your life?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, I think it's similar to how we do this thing of creating resolutions between December and January. It's a- it's a moment that just pushes us to think more broadly and abstractly. And because of the way we count, it happens to be just before those new decades.
- MRMel Robbins
How can you use this research to your- your advantage? So you're kinda cruisin' into the 29th, 19th-
- 23:20 – 25:00
How to approach these difficult ages where we overthink.
- MRMel Robbins
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... 49th, 69th birthday. How do you use this to your advantage?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, so there are a few things you can do. One thing is to say that there's something very arbitrary about picking those years. You know, you could be 34, you could be 44, you could be 54, 64, and say, "This is when I wanna do this little audit process." I don't have to ask myself whether my life's meaningful only once every 10 years. And actually doing it more often is better for you than doing it once every 10 years and having this huge, you know, event where it feels overwhelming.
- MRMel Robbins
Right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
So do this often. Just ask yourself maybe once a year, maybe it's your birthday, maybe you don't wanna do that on your birthday, you wanna do it on a different day.
- MRMel Robbins
I think it's the perfect day.
- AADr. Adam Alter
It is. That's what I do, but oth- other people might not wanna, you know, have their birthday be about this process, but do it once a year.
- MRMel Robbins
But hold on a s- I wanna push back on that-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Please.
- MRMel Robbins
... because the single best thing that you could do as a gift to yourself-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... is to pull out a blank piece of paper and go, "Where is there friction in my life?" Because what I know, based on Adam's research, is that if I were to turn my attention to the friction in my life and make it a project to either remove it, smooth it out, or face the stuff that I do not wanna face that I know is in the back of my mind and it bugs me but- and it's gonna bite me in the rear end someday-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
If you did this ... Because here's the thing. I'm thinking about this list that I did with Pete. I do it every year.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
My business, my life, very different-... right now than it was even, like, six months ago. And so, I think this is, like, the greatest thing you could do for yourself, is to wake up to where are those places in your life where there's th- like, it's almost like stuck is this signal and this flag from your internal, like, navigation GPS going, "Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding."
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
"Turn toward
- 25:00 – 28:13
How to create more meaning when struggling with the meaning of life.
- MRMel Robbins
this."
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. I mean, you could do it on your birthday, absolutely. I think for some people, it's a kind of overwhelming moment, and so they don't wanna do it on their birthday if they prefer not to, but I'm totally fine with it being on a birthday. The one thing about doing it consistently every year is the list should change. If you're doing a good job of intervening, then that's a moment of confirmation when you can say, "Hey, look, there were these things that two or three years ago I was writing down. I kind of fixed them. I figured out a way past them." That is incredibly reaffirming. It's the opposite of feeling stuck. It's feeling that you've got forward motion. So there's great value in doing that more regularly. The other thing is, if it does happen naturally when you're 39, 49, 59, that's okay. The research suggests that to make meaning and to deal with these moments in a way that's productive, you can do a few things. One is to set yourself a goal, which is why running a marathon or an ultra or a tri or whatever, that's a good goal, 'cause it's an extended goal, it's very defined, it has steps that get you closer to the goal. That's very reaffirming. It's also about connecting with people. So one way we get meaning in our lives is to feel a sense of community, to feel a deep sense of connection with other people. And so if you can do that, if you can make sure that you, you reach out to all your friends that you've been meaning to reach out to, that will also be very productive on those d- those times when you're questioning the meaning of life.
- MRMel Robbins
Okay. So doc, I'm gonna play the role-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Please.
- MRMel Robbins
... of the stuck family member.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
And I have been in a string of jobs that just blew, and I've been through a breakup, and my life is boring, and meh is kinda how I feel. How the hell is running a marathon or setting a goal going to change my life?
- AADr. Adam Alter
So the, the thing itself is not... That's not the issue. It's not that you run a marathon and suddenly you're gonna become a person who makes all their money and, uh, spends all their time running.
- MRMel Robbins
Okay.
- AADr. Adam Alter
That's not what it's about. It's about demonstrating to yourself through the way you're behaving certain things about who you are, that your life has a kind of purpose and that you're the kind of person who can seize an opportunity to approach a goal and to reach a goal and to succeed. There's something tremendously valuable about signaling that, especially when you feel globally stuck. So it doesn't actually matter what the goal is. It's not the goal for goal's sake. It's the fact that you are moving towards something that says, "I have achieved. I have done this thing." So that's what the value of, say, a marathon is. It's not for everyone, but for some people, it's very useful. It was very good for me. It did make me feel much better about where I was.
- MRMel Robbins
What are some examples of things that you found in your research that people would pick as a goal to signal something else, like that, "I'm moving forward. I'm not gonna be defined by this stuckness." Like, the fact that I can say, "I'm going back to school," or-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... "Blah blah blah, I'm losing weight. I'm li-" like, whatever.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Right.
- MRMel Robbins
Like, you know, if I'm playing the disgruntled family member-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... because I think you feel so stuck-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... that there's so much resistance to even, first, the belief that it's gonna change.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And also, resistance to moving yourself in a different direction. I mean, you're up against-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... inertia. We're talking physics here.
- 28:13 – 31:26
Goals you can set to help yourself through difficult times.
- MRMel Robbins
So do you have examples of other goals that you've seen in your research or just even in the interviews that you've done for-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... the book that really have helped people?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. And these things, because it's not about the thing itself, it's just what it signals, they're kind of like palate cleansers that get you ready to do the thing that actually needs to be done. So for a lot of people, that's a very valuable step. The things are often of one of three types. There are, uh, athletic pursuits-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... so something like running a marathon, running a tri, whatever it is, and that has the benefit of often getting you moving, which has its own benefits that are separate from all of this. Second kind is intellectual. "I wanna learn a language. I wanna learn a new skill. I wanna learn to code." It doesn't matter what it is, but it's something that's important to you. It can be directly relevant to your job, so it might actually push you forward, but it could just be like, "I don't know how to do crosswords. I wanna get to the point where I can do the Saturday crossword in the New York Times." And then you do that.
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Whatever. And then the third kind is creativity-based. "I wanna paint a picture. I wanna create a piece of music. I wanna create a film. I wanna take photos. It doesn't matter what it is, but I wanna get better at a particular skill that matters to me." All of those are very valuable in showing you that you can have forward motion, that you can make movements towards a goal. It doesn't matter. Everyone has their own preference about which one works, but they all seem to work pretty well.
- MRMel Robbins
I can give you a bunch of examples from my family. So my husband, Chris, has completed that online fitness challenge, 75 Hard, four times now. My daughter's done it twice. Both times, they committed to doing it simply to shake up their life and tap into their potential. Here's another one. So just yesterday, my husband got up at 6:00 in the morning to go to a National Park Service website so he could reserve a campsite for six months from now to the date. And believe it or not, by the time he logged onto the website at 6:00 in the morning, his top two choices were already reserved. He got his third choice for a, a campsite up at the national park so that our family can climb Mount Katahdin. Now, here's what's cool about that. We're not doing it yet. (laughs) It's just something that we have put out into the future. We made it a goal over the holidays that our family wanted to do that this year as a family. And Chris marked his calendar four months ago that this was the date he needed to log on. Yesterday, he logged on at 6:00 in the morning. He got the campsite. These are all small steps forward towards something out in the future that is deeply meaningful to us.... that really keeps you feeling like you're tapping into the bigger potential of your life.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And I wanna see if I can't, um, really make sure that for you as you're listening, whether you're listening for yourself or somebody that loves you who's a pain in your rear end sent you this episode because they think that you're stuck-
- AADr. Adam Alter
(laughs)
- MRMel Robbins
... and they wanna see (laughs) you moving in the right direction and happy and vibrant and no more friction in your life, I wanna make sure that you really get the power of what he is telling you.
- 31:26 – 33:50
The connection between feeling stuck is like feeling lost.
- MRMel Robbins
Because I think when you are stuck in your life, it's like being lost, and when you're lost and your GPS is not connected, you get that spinning sensation where it's like waiting to reconnect, waiting to reconnect, so you don't know where to go.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And so, I think about the goal, listening keenly to you, as if you saying, "I'm gonna climb, uh, Katahdin in Maine, or Mount Kilimanjaro. That's my goal." Or, "I am going to learn how to play the piano, and I am going to even dare my friends and bet money that I'm gonna play at the local coffee shop in a year." Or, "I'm going to learn Spanish," or, "I am going to, uh, learn more about AI and get this skill for work." Like y- y- when you do that, it's as if that internal GPS reconnects-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... and all of a sudden you have put a destination point out in the future, which the destination doesn't fricking matter. What matters is that that destination signals it's time to stop spinning, move in the direction, start getting in shape to go up Katahdin, register your rear end for the A- uh, the AI class, take up the painting course. When you start moving toward it, it's like the road trip to a new you has begun.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And it's that sort of new direction piece that must be changing something. Is that why this works?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Exactly, yeah. And so as you go through a friction audit, you list all the points of friction. The other thing to list is, "What are all the things in my life I'd like to be able to do that I can't do now?"
- MRMel Robbins
Mm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
That's what you start picking from when you do this, because it signals not just that you're getting friction out of the way, which is really external to you. It's like saying, "This thing is outside of me. I wanna move it away and-"
- MRMel Robbins
Yeah.
- AADr. Adam Alter
"... make forward motion." This is something much more personal. "I am the kinda person who can take on a goal and achieve it. Whatever the goal is, it's something that's on my bucket list." And when you do that, then you are prepared to move forward with the thing that perhaps really matters to you in that moment.
- MRMel Robbins
You know, what's also fascinating about this research is it confirms something that I have certainly felt when I've been stuck in my life or my marriage or my job or with my body and my health, is that you feel like a victim.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And the act of setting a goal and then starting to work toward it, it proves that you're not a victim.
- 33:50 – 35:22
Why is it so critical to have something that we are working on in our life?
- MRMel Robbins
Why is it so critical to have something meaningful that you're working on in your life?
- AADr. Adam Alter
It's exactly as you've s- as you've described, because we, we spend a lot of time asking ourselves, "What kind of person am I?" And it's very disempowering to be stuck, right? You feel like you are not the best version of you, whether it's a particular stuckness, "I'm trying to do this very narrow goal and I can't do it," whether it's, "I just feel kinda blah and I'm not making forward progress," either way, you're not looking at yourself in that moment saying, "I'm an efficacious person who can get stuff done." You know? It doesn't feel good-
- MRMel Robbins
What does efficacious mean? That-
- AADr. Adam Alter
I make things happen.
- MRMel Robbins
Got it. Okay.
- AADr. Adam Alter
I, I have efficacy. I can make things, uh, the outcomes that matter to me happen. That's not how you feel in that moment. You feel kind of disempowered and powerless and not very good. And so the thing about creating a goal that's maybe meaningful to you, it's on a bucket list, and succeeding is that it tells you that you are actually someone who can get stuff done. It, it counteracts and contradicts that feeling of helplessness. And once you know that about yourself, you are in a much better position to try something, tackle something that's really big and meaningful, that's maybe been a sticking point sometimes for months or years, rather than being in a position where you're like, "Oh, I feel terrible. Now I'm gonna just try this thing that's really overwhelming." You're not in the best position to do that in that moment of, of powerlessness.
- MRMel Robbins
Um, you know, I have this interesting question that I wanna ask you, and I don't know if you researched this, but given that so many of us are gonna share this episode-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... with somebody that we love-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- 35:22 – 38:30
How to deal with feeling stuck when everyone around you is trying to help.
- AADr. Adam Alter
- MRMel Robbins
... when you're the person that's stuck and it feels like everyone around you is trying to change you-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... or pressure you to change or help you get out of that rut, is your own almost, like, fear to admitting that they're right also a big barrier? Like, I'm thinking about, like, if you have somebody in your family that's drinking too much or that has really let their health or their weight go-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
... and admitting that it's a goal to deal with this also means admitting that other people are right. Did you see any of that sort of social pressure aspect to why people also stay stuck?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah. So I, I really firmly believe that you can't make people care about a goal or an outcome.
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
You can't say to someone, "You're stuck and you have to care about getting unstuck." That's really gotta come from the person. You can guide them there, you can show them why it's important, you can have them introspect about it to the point where they say, "You know what? I'm now seeing the light. I understand why it's so important to do this." But you can't bully people into saying, "This thing that's sticking here is a problem and I need to do something about it." So I think the best thing you can do as a, as a loved one, as a friend, as a family member is, is to make it, without being judgmental, is to make it as clear as possible why this thing matters, and, and kind of gently guide this person along in that direction. Show them that it matters and have them answer some questions about it. That's the best thing you can do, is ask questions. "Do you want this thing to change?"
- MRMel Robbins
Mm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
"Do you think it could be better?" The, the friction audit is a great example of this-
- MRMel Robbins
Yeah.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... 'cause it's, it means it's not about them. It's not confronting. It's, you just say, "Hey, this is not about you, but tell me all the things that are kind of annoying to you right now. Like, what's, what's a friction point?" And-And by pouring out all of those things onto the page, you then have something you can latch onto and at least say, "Hey, this seems like it's an issue for you. Let's work on it together."
- MRMel Robbins
Yeah.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Rather than telling them, "Here's your problem, we're gonna fix it together," which often leads people to push back.
- MRMel Robbins
You do a lot of work with companies, so how does this work apply if you feel like you're on a team and the team's stuck?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, so I mean, it- it- that's originally where I started doing this work, was with companies. It wasn't with individuals, but it was the same idea that companies, either in the way they interact with customers or internally in their operations, have sticking points. You know, every company, no matter whether- whether it's big or small, even more if it's big, will have this series of bottlenecks and sticking points and red tape and bureaucracy they need to deal with. And so, this is an attempt to figure out where those points are.
- MRMel Robbins
Mm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
It's also when you're dealing with customers, a lot of my work is on consumer behavior and human judgment and decision-making. Humans don't like stuff that's hard, and if you are losing people in a sort of funnel, in your- in your interactions with them, in a sales funnel, moving towards, uh, making a particular sale, all of those points where you lose them, you can almost always put it down to friction. Like you're-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... asking them to do an extra thing, an extra click on a website, go to an extra page, make a phone call, make a text, send an email. And so I work with- a lot with companies to say, "Let's figure out where those friction points are and- and see if we can track what sort of effect it has when we remove those from the process."
- MRMel Robbins
Can you speak directly to somebody who
- 38:30 – 51:58
The best advice for someone to go for it after going through a hard time.
- MRMel Robbins
feels stuck? They wanna change jobs.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
They wanna put themselves out there again after a breakup, they wanna really go after their financial security, but they're scared.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
Like they're scared that if they- they won't find the job, they're scared that they're gonna just meet somebody else that breaks their heart. Could you just talk a little bit about what the research says about why it's so important to do it anyway?
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, so the one thing we haven't really talked about is the third section of the book, which is habit. It's actually doing something, it's acting. The single best thing you can do if you feel stuck is to take a minimally viable action. In other words, the smallest possible action that moves you in the right direction. Try to think of what that tiny little action would be. It might be, if you're in a job you don't like, it might be just learning what the alternatives are. Making a list of alternative job options, alternative industries you might wanna work in, maybe go even to the point of making a list of specific companies that are your goal companies and- and then you can go through the sort of pros and cons exercise of figuring out what are the strengths and weaknesses of each one. But even that small act, doing something, moving in the right direction is enough to signal that you've got forward progress, and then you can do the bigger stuff later on but getting the ball rolling is the biggest trick. It's doing the small things so that you're not static, you're actually moving in the right direction.
- MRMel Robbins
(smacks lips) Why is that important?
- AADr. Adam Alter
It's important, in part, because you're signaling to yourself that you are the kinda person, again, who can move.
- MRMel Robbins
Mm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
The same issue comes up again, but also because, uh, moving from zero to any action is really- really important in getting the big action to happen. You have to do that step anyway and once you start doing it, you're m- more likely to do more. Um, there's this classic story of, um, Jeff Tweedy, the front man at the band Wilco, who talks about how when he's trying to come up with creative ideas, it's incredibly difficult and so what he does is this minimally viable action. He says to himself, "When I wake up in the morning and I don't wanna be creative..." He writes books and he writes music, sometimes he doesn't wanna do either one. He says to himself, "I'm gonna spend 10 minutes coming up with the worst sentences I can, writing the worst, most boring music I can," because what he's doing is he's lowering the bar all the way to the ground and saying, "I'm gonna be non-judgmental. I just need to do something." And that has two effects. One thing is, again, it gets the ball rolling and so when he's trying to do good writing, it's more li- more likely to happen. But the other thing it does is, um, it's sometimes means that the things you think are not good in those moments actually-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... turn out to be better than you think. They actually are-
- MRMel Robbins
Mm-hmm.
- AADr. Adam Alter
... more important than you think and that process of being non-judgmental and just letting little things happen and not saying it has to be perfect is a very useful way of moving forward.
- MRMel Robbins
Um, I love this 10-minute rule.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And I also love assume it's gonna be the worst because you've lowered the bar- bar. Do you have other quick examples 'cause I know the person listening's gonna be like, "Okay, so what's an example in a job? What's an example with a relationship?" What is the minimal viable action that you could take just to get somebody thinking? 'Cause based on the research, without doing this, you're gonna stay stuck.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
This is step three.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah, exactly. So this is the thing is- is the- the smallest action is the good one. Uh, one thing I really like that I find very valuable and this is what got me unstuck when I was doing a degree I didn't wanna do, was experimentation. Figure out the list of options and then start working through them, compare them to each other. You will never know what is the right option if you don't know what the set looks like and you haven't tasted a little bit of each one. So set up that array and then spend a week on each one and line it up and do that and maybe that itself won't get you moving forward much, but it will teach you what you do like and what you don't like, what does work and what doesn't work and that's a great minimally viable action, is to say, "I'm gonna treat at least this part of my life like a long experiment and then once I figure out the best thing forward, then I can be single-minded and focused on exploiting that one opportunity, that one thing. That's all I'm gonna do." But you can't make forward motion until you know what that thing is.
- MRMel Robbins
Okay, I wanna make sure I translate that 'cause that was genius.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Sure.
- MRMel Robbins
So basically, let's just say your goal is to start working out and if you take on the mindset of being curious and don't turn it into I'm getting six-pack abs-
- AADr. Adam Alter
Mm-hmm.
- MRMel Robbins
... and I'm exercising seven days a week. Create a experiment of curiosity. I'm gonna spend the next month figuring out what kinda workout I even like.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.
- MRMel Robbins
And I'm only gonna spend 10 minutes every other day, I'm gonna try jump roping, I'm gonna try Pilates, I'm gonna try a HIT class and if you turn it into an experiment, this is no longer about getting it right.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Right.
- MRMel Robbins
It's about getting yourself moving.
- AADr. Adam Alter
Yeah.And you know that when you do an experiment, some conditions are gonna be bad.
Episode duration: 51:58
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