Three Ways to Get Ideas Flowing When You’re Feeling Stuck

“I feel stuck. I’m not sure what to say, so I won’t say anything.”

Do you know that feeling? So many of the people I work want to develop big, exciting ideas. But the process to get to those ideas can be long and frustrating. Sometimes, even the most prolific thinkers start to feel stuck.

And when we feel stuck, our natural instinct is to retreat. To lay low. To stop trying so hard. To procrastinate.

We stew and hesitate instead of moving forward.

I get it, and I’m often in the same boat. And time and again, I find that stopping and stewing gets me nowhere.

But doing something — experimenting, playing around with a new idea, talking to someone, reading someone else’s work about a similar idea — always gets me unstuck, or at least less stuck.

If you want to develop big ideas but you’re feeling stuck, here are three ideas to nudge you out of inaction and into DOING mode.

Force the practice

Hi, it’s me again, here to remind you that thought leadership (reflecting on your work and sharing your insights with others) is a p-r-a-c-t-i-c-e. That means you have to do it over and over again to get better at it.

Don’t be surprised if genius ideas don’t flow out of you every time you try. Just keep practicing.

Here’s how to establish a structured thought leadership practice:

➡Plan to reflect on a recurring timeline.

Every Friday morning, you’ll set a timer for 30 minutes and write about what you’ve learned at work during the past week. What are you thinking about? What are you working on? What are you still trying to figure out?

➡Decide how you’ll share.

Part of the practice of thought leadership is putting your ideas out there in front of other people. You could share publicly on social media, in an email newsletter, or on your company’s blog. Or, you could share your ideas in an email with a few close colleagues or with your team on Slack. But no matter where you share, giving yourself a tangible output (for me, it’s this Friday newsletter) forces you to complete your practice. 

➡Find an accountability buddy.

Do you have a friend or coworker who is also working on their thought leadership practice? Find someone who can hold you accountable and cheer you on.

➡Get in the way of new ideas.

You’ll need fuel to power your practice. Make it a habit to “get in the way of new ideas,” or expose yourself to thinking and perspectives you don’t normally come across. Check out a new book from the library. Bookmark an article you’ve been meaning to read. Watch a weird movie. Talk to someone new. Keep looking for fuel.

Give yourself a constraint

Sometimes, if you have too many ideas or you’re overwhelmed by too many potential paths of thought, it helps to impose an arbitrary constraint.

Make yourself write for a long amount of time (say, 40 minutes) or a short amount of time (4 minutes). Challenge yourself to explain your idea using a lot of words (1,000) or just a few words (100). Write your idea as a poem. Write your idea in only questions. Forget writing and force yourself to explain the idea out loud (and record it!). Explain your idea like you’re talking to a second grader, or to your grandfather, or to someone who lived 100 years ago.

Flip the idea

Try arguing against yourself. Take the other side. Play Devil’s advocate. Explain why your competitor’s approach is better. Explain why the world doesn’t need your approach.

When you flip your idea upside down, you can often find new nooks and crannies you hadn’t considered before.

No matter what, don’t stop thinking, practicing, and working through your ideas. By participating in the grueling, frustrating practice of expressing your ideas over and over until you get it right, you join generations of thinkers who have also put in the hard work.

I’m cheering you on!