Stuck
QUESTION:
Hey Sheasby
I’ve been faced with some hard decisions lately and have found myself feeling stuck in the limbo of indecision sometimes. It feels like I can't tell the difference between my fear and what's my gut instinct. Sometimes I feel like there isn't a wrong choice and I have to simply make one, but these prove to be even harder decisions. What sort of process can I rely on to decipher what my gut is saying?
Love, Martin Scorscissors
(name changed for privacy sake)
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ANSWER:
Thank you for sending this one through Mr Scorcissors
“stuck in the limbo of indecision”
Ironically
I have been sitting in a cafe
Completely stuck as to which question to answer this week
There are so many fantastic ones that have come through
So many bloody options
And I genuinely feel stuck in limbo
Which one do I choose?
Which one do I invest the next few hours of my life into
They all require a lot of energy
They all require a lot of thought, intention and effort
And precious, valuable time
But no matter which one I think about picking
There’s a sense of
“oh god, what if I invest the next several hours or days of my life and then realise three quarters of the way that I made a mistake”?
I feel tight in the chest
My shoulders feel glued to my ears
And I just want to kind flop over and go do nothing.
In a moment like this
I want to bring it back to what I know best
One of the few things I can be absolutely certain of
(of which there are very few)
Death
I will be dead soon
35 years have already gone by in a blink
And with each year being proportionately smaller in the context of a lifetime
It’s only going to go faster
How bloody beautiful!
Imagine if there was no death?
Imagine if there was no finite time to live one’s life?
The answer to doing anything and everything could be:
“I’ll do it in a couple hundred years from now”
I say this not to emphasise a sense of haste
But the exact opposite
As a brilliant director once said
“We have so little time, we must slow down”
In a hundred years from now
No one will even remember my name
So if all I did in this moment was close my laptop
Sip my coffee slowly for 20 minutes with no phone
The world will keep turning
And that big decision I feel like I HAVE to make…
When I zoom out
Is almost never as big as it feels.
I see it over and over again
(In fact, I still often catch myself slipping into it)
Thinking that a decision needs to happen now!
Often, it comes with a forceful or pushing kind of feeling in my body
And interestingly, a judgement
What do I mean by judgement?
That the feeling of confusion or being unclear is somehow a bad thing
It is not.
To feel confused or unclear about a decision
Is a perfectly normal thing
I was in a museum with Kenzie Baby the other day
We were looking at skulls of apes
All the varies species (including us) from the passed 4 million years
You know what each of those species have done?
Made choices
Which direction will food be?
Where is best for safety tonight?
Which valley do we cross next?
Which direction to head for water?
Which berry is safe and which one poisonous?
Who is safe to be around and who is not?
These…
These were important decisions which meant life or death.
I really cannot emphasise the following point enough…
The industry will try convince you that every decision is both important and urgent
It’s not
I promise you
It is not
There are so few decisions in this industry which are both truly important and require immediate attention
I genuinely am finding it difficult to think of an example right now
Getting that new agent right now… no
Giving a clear yes or no so the production can fly you across the world to prep for that new series which starts in 6 days time… nope.
(You can still just have a nap and take care of it in an hour or two)
OOO
Okay
I have one!
It’s not acting related
But here goes
Once upon a time
Two twelve year old boys were washed off the rocks into the ocean outside my house
There was a secret track down the cliffs which no-one knew about but me
So I clambered down there in a jiffy and it ended up being just me and them
I stood on those rocks
About 10 metres away from these two screaming young boys
Thinking I was about to watch them drown in front of me within minutes
And I had to make decision
A decision which, in my opinion, was an important and urgent one to make
Do I jump in and risk drowning myself?
If I do jump in, which one do I go for first?
Do I run and find a floatation device (and risk them going under whilst I’m gone)?
When I realised the situation I was in
And the decision I had to make
I froze
I became paralysed with not knowing what to do next
But something I learned from an incredible human many years ago came to mind
A fascinating thing occurs when humans are under pressure when caught in a rip in the ocean
They think they have two choices
Sink
Or swim
Can they swim as hard as they can to get themselves out of it?
Or do they go under?
Of course, it’s fighting the current which sadly causes most to end up drowning
But there is a third choice in this moment
One which goes against many people’s instincts
To float
Huh?
Yup
Do nothing
Simply lean back and breathe
To give up on fighting nature
And simply go with her
Means one can float for a while to the end of the rip where they can then calmly swim back to shore
Back to the kids
I realised in that moment
There was a third choice
So I took a breath
Sat down
And started chatting
I told them help was on its way
And that all we needed to do was just hang out for a couple minutes
Float around
We spoke about the weather (It really was a beautiful day)
How their swim was going (they laughed at my lame dad joke)
How school was going (they were about to start high school!)
And a few minutes later
A jet-ski came around the headland and plucked the two kids up to go have some ice cream back on the shoreline
Why do I say all this?
There is a third choice
It’s not always a black or white, two option kind of deal
Sometimes
Floating is the best option
But remember
Floating is a biproduct
What’s the process that helps you float?
Leaning back and breathing
This requires a sense of giving up
A sense of surrender
Faith (No, religion doesn’t own the concept of faith)
You’re allowed to lean back, breathe, and take your time with making choices.
I have never regretted taking my time with an email, text or difficult conversation
But I sure as hell have regretted rushing these things
I sure as hell have regretted doing these things while my body is still in a place of push, force or should
Now
Back to your question:
What sort of process can I rely on to decipher what my gut is saying?
There’s many things here
You can do plenty of decision making courses or exercises
You can use tonnes of frameworks or systems
(I’m sure google will provide you with hundreds)
For me
Over the past decade of trying my best to consciously make decisions in regards to performance
I have only found one that I find sustainably reliable
Nature
Go back to nature
I don’t care where you live in this world
If you’re reading this
You have access
Somewhere
To nature
A park
A beach
A night sky
A boat
A forest
A valley
A horizon
A sunrise
A sunset
Create space for nature
Go to her
There is not a man-made structure on this earth which Mother Nature can’t destroy in a matter of seconds if she wishes to do so
Better to be on her side than against her
Better to listen to her than ignore her
And if you want a more logical reason as to why nature?
Being in nature will shift your physiology
Which in tern will influence your emotional state
Which influences your thoughts
And thus, shifts your choices.
Now
I’m three quarters through my article
Almost done with the choice I made hours ago
Did I mess up?
Do I regret the choice that I made?
Do I regret this article?
Was it the best choice I could have made?
I have no idea
I will never know
But it doesn’t matter
Death is coming
I tried something
And just the fact that I tried it my way
Is enough
Hope this helps
X