Are you feeling stuck in what feels like a “too-small-for-you” life? Like a pair of britches from your adolescence, maybe they once fit. But now a deep breath feels impossible.

Perhaps the charge I used to hear from my mother has been leveled at you: “you’re too big for your britches.” No doubt, this was not meant to empower me. My mother wanted compliance, because encouraging my expression felt like more than she could handle. Compliance was easier, and in the midst of her own struggles, anything that seemed easier was a good thing.

Compliance was easier for me, too as a way to hide under the radar. But you can only hide out for so long.

Because compliance strangles. You cannot breathe in life’s fullness, nor express your soul’s voice.

Image courtesy of Angela Hawkins on Visual Hunt

Stuck Inside the Cage

What do you do when you feel stuck in something? A job that swallows your talent. A soul-killing relationship. Even (or especially) your own expectations of what you can and cannot do.

Do you feel yourself a “victim of circumstance”? You may not know what to do to change direction. Maybe you expect someone else to take action first, so that your situation changes.

How do you move beyond this feeling of being stuck? 

Here is how you begin: crack the cage door open. Even just a fraction creates space for the light to get in.

And for yours to emerge.

Then you get to question, and to explore. Notice if your pictures about what’s possible in life are open-ended. Are they limited by your expectations? Have you only considered actions that others would approve?

Have you forgotten the truth of who you are?

This is so important. You are so much more than your self-judgments and your imposed limitations! Yet in a moment of forgetting, you hand over validation to outside forces, firing up self-doubt and self-judgment.

A downward spiral of destructive thinking begins, your thoughts fueling a picture of yourself with no options.

These false beliefs become the whip you can use to punish yourself.

The downward path will continue as long as you believe in things that are not true. That you cannot rise above your situation, your obligations or your sense of limitation.

You have a choice to let go of self-critical beliefs. However, you must be ready to release your grip on self-denial.

Find the desire to be responsible for your own well-being. It’s there, even if it’s long been hidden in mothballs. Replace blame—of you or of anyone else—with a sense of curiosity about your patterns of thought and behavior.

Curiosity creates space for you to see. Once you see them for what they are, you can move on!

Trust that there is something more than you can see now, even if you have forgotten the details. With trust comes a recognition and acknowledgment that another place exists.

Image courtesy of Cornelia Kopp on Visual Hunt

Self-Discovery

Remember the feeling in your body when there was a sense of flow. You’ve felt it before, that clarity and sense of direction. Feel back into it. Breathe your way in, in order to give it life in the moment. This intimate relationship with yourself brings a deep feeling of connectedness, opening new possibilities for moving forward.

The light exists within you. Open yourself to experiencing it and you will.

When you surrender to the life force within you that keeps you alive, you will remember. Believe me, it will come. @TheBacaJourney (Click to Tweet!)

You will swing open the door.

And you will find yourself. This is what you have been searching for, isn’t it?

Laurie Seymour is a mentor/guide, #1 best-selling author, host of the Wisdom Talk Radio podcast and founder of The Baca Journey. She helps women and men who are in the midst of great change to have a direct experience of their inner wisdom, dissolving self-doubt. Then she provides the strategies to sustain their inner connection so that they live the life they know is possible with confidence. Start now with a complimentary exploratory session (virtual tea!). Let’s explore where you’ve been and illuminate where you’re heading.  

Feature Image courtesy of fusky on Visual Hunt.