On Being Stuck, Part 1
By: James Schwabach
Tags: Teaching, Learning, Coaching

Stuck, like right now. I have this really clear idea of what I want to do in my head, and yet it just took me 4 minutes (I have a timer going on my watch) to write this first sentence. Ugh. Why does that happen? We have this vision in our heads of EXACTLY what our minds think something should look like. It makes sense, we are confident we have the knowledge, we KNOW it can work, and then we get to the actual doing of it, and…crickets….frozen…nothing flows how we want it to. Obviously, this doesn’t work very well. But, why? No, back up…fuck “Why.” Everyone who tries to understand the why of everything is destined to become stuck. It’s not that why isn’t a good question in certain contexts, in certain situations, but why doesn’t move us anywhere. We, by definition, are not moving forward if we are attempting to seek an answer of why…Why is that? Ok, breaking my own rule here but it’s my blog post and I’m choosing to not move toward my main goal of this essay, so deal with it, or stop reading…You already clicked on the link so according to Medium you have nothing else valuable to offer, ;). Anyway, where were we? Ohh yeah, why does asking “why” get us stuck? Because why is an invitation, if not a demand, to look toward the past. Why did this happen? Why can’t I do this? Why won’t my 16 month old go one night without peeing so much that he completely saturates his diaper and needs to be changed at 3:30 am? Important stuff, yes, but past tense. Not future.

Ok, we are 287 words in, and I haven’t actually said anything. Actions taken and words typed, yes. Progress made? Not sure on that one. Time to get down to business. I want to get some ideas on paper about what happens to make people stuck, unable to move in a productive direction, and more importantly, what can get people unstuck. I’m not going to get into the why, because your why is unique to you and potentially unhelpful for moving you forward (see above). This essay is a description, not a judgement or a creation of a new theory. It’s not attempting to even look at why. It attempts to describe what, and maybe a little how of being stuck, and getting unstuck.

Being stuck, it sucks to feel stuck, and it sucks even more to see someone else who’s important to us get stuck and be unable to help pull them out of the proverbial quicksand. Stuckness (stickiness?, no I’m sticking with stuckness for now) can take on many forms, but for the purposes of this essay, I want to talk about students and teachers, or, if it helps, coaches and coachees. Hmmm, you know what? It does not help. The term coachee is terrible. Bleh. That does not role off the tongue. Someone being coached shall hereby be referred to as a student. They are, after all, learning something, aren’t they? Well, hopefully. But what’s going on when they don’t seem to be learning something? What’s happening when the teacher/coach and student can’t seem to get on the same page and work together toward a common goal? Ohh, that’s a perfect place to start. See, it only took me 568 words to get started.

Where are we going?

You want to see a frustrating interaction and no progress be made between a teacher and student? Throw them into a situation with no clearly defined (AND COMMUNICATED!) value of the relationship. You know who has trust issues in relationships? EVERYONE! You know how to keep the barriers to trust strong? Never discuss the direction you’re trying to move in. For instance, a young baseball pitcher might think that his pitching coach is trying to get him to change a part of his mechanics because he doesn’t think he’s good enough, when, in reality, that pitching coach knows that this pitcher has the chance to pitch in the major leagues for years, and wants to equip him with the tools to reach his full potential. So, the direction is being a big leaguer for years. You know who probably doesn’t know that unless it’s said out loud every day? The 19 year old pitcher! Without the clearly stated direction, that pitcher and coach will become, you guessed it, stuck. Teachers, you want your students to get frustrated? Then never remind them of the common direction and let them stay in their heads. Speaking of being in their heads…

Out of body experience

Overthinking. The enemy of smooth thoughts, smooth actions, and forward progress. There’s not too much to explain here. Coaches, teachers, parents, you know what I’m talking about. And I don’t even mean from an athletes’ perspective here, necessarily! I’m talking about overthinking as the teacher! Talk about being stuck! If you’re thinking so much and getting lost in your thoughts, it’s hard to be present for your students who may be right in front of you, ready to learn! But that opportunity could be missed if you’re trying to come up with the perfect thing to say and perfect way to say it. That moment will pass by quickly and you’ll have made no progress at all. You’ll remain stuck. When we are in our heads, we are not in our bodies, and our bodies do all this cool shit. They see, they hear/listen, they NOTICE stuff! Yeah, ok, life requires some thought processes in our heads, but just remember, you can’t take any action in your head. You need to come back to your body for that.

Just say No

You want to know how to get better? Practice. You want to know how to get better at teaching? Practice teaching. You want to know how to stay exactly where you are? Just say no to new opportunities to practice and gain experience. When we avoid experiencing things, be it situations, feelings, confrontations, difficult students, we will never get better at overcoming those challenges. This is not to say that saying yes to everything a la Jim Carrey in Yes Man leads to automatic success. But, you want to know where you need to improve as a teacher? Make a list of things that if given the choice, you avoid doing. Then, figure out why you…Just kidding.