You know that feeling you get when you’re stuck between a rock and a hard place, and you don’t know whether to fall down or run away?? When something you planned out so carefully crashes into the brick walls of REALITY so hard it’s astonishing—and not in a good way?? It can feel like you’re trapped in a Mental Maze—with nothing but dead ends and false turns.
OH YEAH—and it’s so easy to get there!
Despite all my practice of Everyday Communication Sorcery, that’s exactly where I was the other weekend.
Fortunately, I knew precisely what to do to get out.
This week’s Playbook is your cheat sheet to get out of your own Mental Maze when it happens—and here’s why:
Last week I discovered something surprising when my Creative Partner, Cindy Ho, and I delivered that Masterclass, Mid-Year Crisis? Kick Its Butt! that I mentioned in last week’s Playbook.
Cindy and I were BLOWN AWAY by two things:
- How recognizable the idea of being caught in a maze was to everyone (check out the first couple of minutes of this Youtube video from the movie, Harry Potter & the Goblet of Fire to see what I mean) and
- How deeply and quickly everyone in the class got results when they used our antidotes to vaporize their own Mental Maze (more about that in a minute).
AND
Even though it’s much more effective to experience this ‘in real life”—we discovered that merely finding out about it had a huge impact.
Your Turn to Find Out
Wouldn’t it be awesome if you could instantly snap your fingers and vaporize any Mental Maze you get caught in? Cindy and I knew how to do it when we put together this Masterclass—and—we discovered that anyone else can do it, too, as soon as you know the secret (it’s actually so simple it feels like magic…)
Your first step is to simply meet yourself where you are—and that is, accept the fact that you’re stuck in a Mental Maze.
Odds are high that you’re feeling some version of anxiety—or even panic—and that includes feelings of anger (or even disappointment) among other things.
This is TOTALLY NORMAL,
because the whole purpose of a maze is to TRAP YOU.
It’s built for that; confusion and uncertainly are normal responses to feeling like you’re trapped in a maze. More importantly, when you’re feeling like this, the next feeling that hits you is BEING STUCK—so all you want to do is escape (or give up). That’s because:
You have ALL THIS ENERGY—
and it has nowhere to go
but to tie you up in knots.
So here’s your instant way out of a Mental Maze: STOP.
Stand still—wherever you are, whatever you’re doing—and give that energy some more space with our three-step strategy:
- Put your palms on either side of your face (like you’re blocking out the sunshine to see better). This is a very tiny amount of space for all the energy you’re feeling right now, eh? Your mission this instant is to give it more space.
- Now take a slow breath in (a count of 4 works well for most folks). Then, as you release your breath out for twice as long—a count of 8 is a good place to begin—move your hands just a little more widely away from your face. It’s like opening a window; you can feel the relief immediately!
- Repeat this practice with your breath—breathe in, and then take longer and longer breaths out, widening your hands bit by bit until you’ve created the widest space possible for you to breathe. (Odds are high that your Mental Maze will vaporize along the way—you won’t even miss it.)
Once you get skilled in this practice, you can vaporize any Mental Maze very quickly by simply stopping—and breathing—and visualizing that maze gone. (This is what I did to vaporize my Mental Maze the other weekend.)
Now What??
The best news is that you’re not stuck any more—and that’s your Big Win here.
Meanwhile, now that you’re no longer stuck, you still want to move forward in some way—and that simply requires clarity.
More good news: you’re only three steps away from it.
Ready to get some clarity? Great!
Next week I’ll give you the 411 on those three steps—and I promise you it’s a game changer.
PS: Who do you know who would really benefit from all this good news? Thanks so much for passing it on and helping me to get the word out.
Until next time–
Keep on vaporizing those Mental Mazes!