Why You Feel Stuck in Life

Summary

Summary of "Why You Feel Stuck in Life" – The Mindset Mentor Podcast by Rob Dial

Introduction In the April 21, 2025 episode of The Mindset Mentor titled "Why You Feel Stuck in Life," host Rob Dial delves deep into the psychological and societal factors that contribute to feelings of stagnation. Drawing from his extensive background in neurology, psychology, and cognitive behavioral therapy, Dial provides listeners with profound insights into understanding and overcoming the mental barriers that keep them from achieving fulfillment.

Understanding the Feeling of Being Stuck Rob Dial begins by addressing a common misconception: the belief that what one desires must be attained through additional achievements or external accomplishments. He challenges listeners to reconsider this notion by asserting, “everything that you want is already here in front of you” (04:45), suggesting that the source of stagnation lies not in the absence of opportunities but in the inability to recognize and embrace what already exists.

Conditioning and Societal Programming A significant portion of the discussion focuses on how societal conditioning shapes our beliefs and behaviors. Dial explains that from a young age, individuals are taught to defer their happiness and fulfillment to future achievements. He states, “We've basically been conditioned from society and from our parents and then our grandparents and just generations to believe that the good stuff… has to come after you” (09:15). This generational programming instills the idea that love, joy, and peace are rewards to be earned rather than inherent states to be experienced in the present.

The Metaphor of the Plane Crash To illustrate his point, Dial shares a compelling metaphor: a plane crashes into what survivors believe is the ocean, but it is actually a massive lake. They miss out on drinking fresh water simply because they are unaware of its presence. “They were in this massive lake and they couldn't see land and they don't know how they got there except for the plane crash,” he explains (05:20). This story symbolizes how individuals often overlook the abundance of joy and resources available to them, mistaking their reality for something lacking.

Living in a Trance Dial describes the state of being stuck as living in a trance—a state where individuals are physically present but psychologically disengaged. He notes, “most people are not living in their life. They're just surviving… drifting through days with just enough stimulation to keep the existential dread at bay” (07:30). This trance-like existence is maintained by constant distractions and the pursuit of external validation, preventing people from recognizing and utilizing the resources they already possess.

The Process of Waking Up Transitioning from the problem to the solution, Dial emphasizes the necessity of "waking up" from this conditioned state. He asserts, “The only reason why we feel stuck is because it's a that mental treadmill that we're stuck in” (13:54). Waking up involves a profound shift in mindset—questioning ingrained beliefs, letting go of outdated identities, and embracing new truths, even when they challenge long-held perceptions.

Challenges in the Transformation Dial acknowledges the difficulties inherent in this transformation. He highlights that true change requires confronting and letting go of deeply embedded beliefs and identities, which can be both frightening and destabilizing. “To wake up, you have to lose who you thought you were. You have to let entire layers of your identity just kind of fall away” (15:48). This process often leads to discomfort as individuals dismantle the very foundation upon which they built their sense of self.

Practical Steps to Get Unstuck Towards the end of the episode, Dial offers actionable advice for listeners seeking to break free from their feelings of being stuck:

1. Self-Reflection: He encourages listeners to write down their most cherished beliefs and question their origins. “Write it down. What's the thing that you feel is the most true? And then ask yourself the question, where did I first hear this?” (20:15)
2. Identify Borrowed Beliefs: Recognizing which beliefs are genuinely yours and which have been imposed by others is crucial for authentic personal growth.
3. Embrace the Present: Dial emphasizes the importance of living in the moment and appreciating the existing abundance in one’s life. “The miracle is happening right now in front of you” (18:40).
4. Willingness to Receive New Truths: Being open to new perspectives, even when they disrupt your current worldview, is essential for awakening (19:25).

Conclusion Rob Dial wraps up the episode by reinforcing the central message: liberation from feeling stuck comes not from relentless striving but from a profound internal awakening. He urges listeners to recognize and embrace the wealth of joy, love, and fulfillment already present in their lives. “You don't need to be better. You don't need to do anything differently except for wake up” (22:10). Dial’s invitation is clear—shift your mindset, question inherited beliefs, and unlock the latent potential that lies within and around you.

Notable Quotes

• "Everything that you want is already here in front of you." – Rob Dial (04:45)
• "We've basically been conditioned from society and from our parents and then our grandparents and just generations to believe that the good stuff… has to come after you." – Rob Dial (09:15)
• "They were in this massive lake and they couldn't see land and they don't know how they got there except for the plane crash." – Rob Dial (05:20)
• "Most people are not living in their life. They're just surviving… drifting through days with just enough stimulation to keep the existential dread at bay." – Rob Dial (07:30)
• "The only reason why we feel stuck is because it's a that mental treadmill that we're stuck in." – Rob Dial (13:54)
• "To wake up, you have to lose who you thought you were. You have to let entire layers of your identity just kind of fall away." – Rob Dial (15:48)
• "Write it down. What's the thing that you feel is the most true? And then ask yourself the question, where did I first hear this?" – Rob Dial (20:15)
• "The miracle is happening right now in front of you." – Rob Dial (18:40)
• "You don’t need to be better. You don’t need to do anything differently except for wake up." – Rob Dial (22:10)

Final Thoughts "Why You Feel Stuck in Life" serves as a powerful reminder that the journey to personal fulfillment begins with an internal shift rather than external pursuits. Rob Dial effectively combines psychological theories with relatable metaphors, offering listeners both insight and practical steps to overcome feelings of stagnation. By encouraging a reevaluation of deeply held beliefs and promoting mindfulness, Dial empowers individuals to unlock their true potential and embrace the abundance already present in their lives.

Transcript

[Rob Dial]

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[Co-Host]

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[Rob Dial]

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[Co-Host]

Welcome to today's episode of the Mindset Mentor Podcast. I'm your host, Rob Dial. If you have not yet done so, hit that subscribe button so you never miss another episode. I put out episodes four times a week for almost 10 years now. So if you're ready to learn and grow and improve yourself, hit that subscribe button. Follow along and let's change your life. Today, we're going to be talking about why you feel so stuck in your Life and how to basically get everything that you want in your life and to understand that getting everything that you want in life is not about doing or achieving more. And so what I'm going to basically talk about today is hopefully waking you up a little bit to your programmings, some of your conditionings, and also to currently what you already have around you. And so one of the reasons why you feel so stuck in life is because I'm gonna go out and say that everything that you want is already here in front of you. And you might be like, no, no, no, but I don't have that successful business. I don't have that million dollars yet. I don't have this thing and that thing and this thing and that thing. I think that for most of us, what we already want is already right in front of us. We're just missing it. And most people never wake up to the amazing life that they already have that's all around them. And so let's not sugarcoat this. Most people are not living in their life. They're just surviving. They're performing for other people. They're coping, they're numbing, they're distracting themselves. They're drifting through days with just enough stimulation to keep the existential dread at bay. But if you stripped away all of the noise, all of the scrolling on Instagram and watching too much Netflix and being over distracted and everything, take away the jobs, take away the shows, the endless scrolling, most people would feel it. It's that quiet thought in the back of your head that's like, is this it? Is this really all that there is in life? And the real tragedy of all of this is that most people are surrounded by the thing that they already want, the thing that they're starving for. They just don't really know how to open themselves up to receiving it. And so I'll give you a quick little story that'll make sense. Okay. There's a plane that's. That crashes into the water. It hits the water, everybody who is on the plane just blacks out. They wake up and they're alive. They think, oh my God, am I dead? Am I in heaven? What's going on? They're awake up, they're alive and they're on a raft. And no one really remembers how they got there, but they're just drifting in the ocean. And they're drifting in the ocean for days and days and days. And after a few days, they're parched, they're dying of thirst, they're hungry, they're, you know, dying of Thirst. Because they're in the ocean. You can't drink salt water. And so eventually a rescue helicopter comes by, picks them all up and they're all rescued. And the rescuers are just like, do you have water? I'm just so thirsty. Like, yeah, here's some water. They give him water. And eventually the rescuers and the helicopter say, why didn't you just drink the water? And they're like, well, because we were in. We're in salt water. You can't drink saltwater. They're like, no, you weren't in salt water. You were just in a really big lake. They were in this massive lake and they couldn't see land and they don't know how they got there except for the plane crash. So they just assumed, hey, we must be in the ocean. They could have reached over for days and just cupped their hands and drank the water. But they didn't because they didn't know what they were floating in. They already had what they needed. They just didn't know it. Now, it's not a true story. It's a metaphor for how most people live their lives. This is how most people go through their entire life. They're dying of thirst in the middle of an ocean of joy and peace and happiness and love and everything they've ever wanted, but they don't know that it's there. And so what we need is a wake up call to really realize what is around us. And it's not really your fault that you don't realize what's around you. The ugly truth that we don't really want to talk about is that, you know, we've all pretty much been conditioned in the society that we live in unconsciously. It's not like some evil overlord is looking over us and making us do this. But we've basically been conditioned from society and from our parents and then our grandparents and just generations to believe that the good stuff, everything that we want is somewhere else outside of us, that we have to go achieve that love that you want. That's after you get everybody's approval. The peace that you want deep inside, well, that's after all of the achievement that you need. The joy that you want to feel, well, you got to earn that one happiness. You can only be happy after you're done building relaxation. Only after I make that first million dollars, then I can relax. In the society that we live in, we're trained to defer our aliveness. And we're taught that love and joy and fun and peace and happiness is Somewhere else down the road, it's not here and now in, you know, from the first time somebody said, hey, you know, good boy or good girl or you're such a good boy or such a good girl, our nervous system kind of started to pick up on the rules. Okay, I need to be a good boy, I need to be a good girl. I need to be useful, I need to be liked, I need to be loved, I need to be good, I need to work hard, I need to achieve, I need to, I need to earn my worth in some sort of way. And then maybe, maybe one day you can feel safe enough to relax and then live the life you've been wanting to live. So the results is just billions of people kind of waking or walking around in a trance, like spiritually malnourished, emotionally constipated, physically present in their body, but like psychologically not really there. And those, so there's think about what they want and the next thing, and the next thing they got to go to the next thing that will make us happy. And I lived my life for a long time like this, where even when like I was on vacation, I was like, there's gotta be something. I gotta work towards the next thing. I'm not where I want to be yet. I've gotta get somewhere else than here. And the hypnosis of all of this is really real. Like, let's call it what it is. This isn't just about being too busy. It's kind of like a mass hypnosis. So many people are just asleep and they're not aware that they have everything that they need around them. And that by going and achieving something or being somebody else or getting others approval will not give them the thing that they want. They have inside of them and around them the thing that they want. It's always been there. And like I said, most of my life I was in a state of trance. And sometimes I still find myself going back into a state of trance, chasing the next thing, the next achievement, the next dollar. But nothing gave me what I thought that it would. Nothing gave me what I was searching for. All of these boxes I wanted to check off in life. And I've checked off pretty much all of them and then realized one day, like, hold on, I didn't get the feeling I thought I was gonna get. If there was, if there was, and I'm not saying there is, but if there was some controlling evil overlord, right. If I was a conspiracy theorist, it's brilliant because if you're asleep, you're controllable. And then you'll buy what they sell and you'll work the jobs that drain you to keep up with the Joneses and get the next thing and protect belief systems that never belong to you in the first place. And so if we're like a hypnotized audience member on stage, then we're kind of just like clucking and doing what the hypnosis, the hypnotist says and swearing that all of it makes sense. But you're not a fool. I'm not a fool. We're not fools. We just find ourselves to be asleep sometimes. And there's a really big difference. And so it's time to wake up from the trance that we've kind of been conditioned into believing was our life. And this is why the change is so hard. And this is why you remain stuck, is because you're on this treadmill that never actually goes anywhere. And a lot of people are like, yes. Oh my gosh, this sounds great. I want to wake up. I want to just tell you this. Waking up sounds really amazing and romantic until you try it. Because then you have to start questioning things. Why do I need validation from other people to feel worthy? Do I even want the life that I've built? What if everything that I believed about life and love and joy was wrong? And that's not fun. It's actually really terrifying because you have to question the foundation of everything that you've built your life on. And this is where most people bail, because that shit gets scary. Because to wake up, you have to lose who you thought you were. You have to let entire layers of your identity just kind of fall away. Your ideas about success, love, family, spirituality, self worth, success, money, all of it. And let's be honest, most people are so identified with the transit they're in that we would rather defend our suffering than surrender our ego. Most people would rather be right than be free. What do I mean by that? We'd rather fight for our insecurities, our identities, our fears, our limiting beliefs. We'd rather fight for those things to keep that ego attached to who we are and we that identity. And we can say, this is who I am. We'd rather be right and try to prove that that thing is right than actually be free from it. Because defending the ego means that you get to stay the same. Getting free from our trance means that we have to put in work and that work requires us to change. And most people would rather be miserable and comfortable than free and uncertain about the future. But you can't wake up and get out of the trance and start to live a different life and stay comfortable at the same time. That's not how it works. And so here's the wild thing about it. Most of what you believe about yourself and the world and other people isn't even yours. And you can test it. If somebody challenges your worldview and you start to get mad or react emotionally in some sort of way, that's most likely a borrowed belief from someone else. If an idea about love or money or success or God makes you clench inside and kind of tense up, that's most likely not your voice. That's someone else's ideas that you just picked up along the way. And we have all done this in many ways. And so it's really hard to get and to fully understand, but it's really important to understand this. This is how deep the, you know, we'll call it kind of what it is and not in a bad way, but this is how deep the brainwashing goes. We internalize the beliefs of our parents in school, in religion, in media, in culture. And then we want to fight for those things, like, because we believe them so much, because we've been told to believe them, even if those are the very things that really keep you stuck. But that's not loyalty. That's hypnosis. And we will be right back.

[Rob Dial]

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[Co-Host]

That's k I n sta.commindset. and now back to the show. We have to have the courage to change our mind if we want to get unstuck. The only reason why we feel stuck is because it's a that mental treadmill that we're stuck in. So if we want to have something that gets us unstuck, we need to have the courage to change our mind in some way to see things differently than we've seen them before. And most people, let's just be real, most people in this world don't want to change their mind. They're looking more than anything else for data to prove their points right, more than they're looking to prove themselves wrong. But that's not you, right? That's not why you're here. You're here because you're ready to wake up. You're ready to break free. You're ready to feel differently and create a better life. And so I don't want you to. The important thing is I don't want you to shame yourself for the things that you did while you were asleep. Like, for me, I feel like I could look back and be like, I lost years of my life when I was asleep, but it's like, no, I was asleep. So I can't shame myself for not realizing when I was working 110 hours a week for three, four years straight from sunup to sundown, just putting all of my life into A business that I ran into the ground. I can't look at that and be like, oh, my God, I need to shame myself and guilt myself for that thing. I need to just go, no. He was asleep. He thought that that would give him the life that I want. He thought that that's what success and happiness and love and achievement look like. And so we have to stop building an identity around who we were when we didn't know any better. That version of you, that was just you in a sleep, in a dream. It was a survival mechanism, right? So we don't need to hate it. We don't need to be mad at ourselves. We just need to start to outgrow it. What really wakes you up? To be able to see the amazing things around you. Once again, you're on a raft and you're surrounded by the water that you need to drink, but we're thinking that we're not, we gotta go get some other type of water. No, it's right in front of you. And so what wakes you up? It's not effort. It's not willpower. It's not reading one more self help book or. As much as I love that you listen to podcasts, it's not you listening to 10 Hours in Binging a podcast. There's one really true ingredient that wakes you up. Your willingness to receive new truth, even if that terrifies you. And what does that mean? That means questioning some of the things that you've put as the foundation of your entire life. You know, so many people are clinging to their old identities, and the amount of truth that you can tolerate without running away is the exact measure of your capacity to wake up. It's not how smart you are. It's not how much effort you put into it. It's not how spiritually sound you are, how long you meditate for. It's how available you are to see what's actually real, even if it contradicts everything that you've clung to for safety in your entire life. Because everything that you want is already here. And this is where it's really wild. You're not missing the life you want because it doesn't exist yet. You're missing it because you've been trained not to notice it. Like, so many people I've. I've talked to are like, well, once I make up this amount of money, I'll be happy. I'm like, really? Like, I've been to third world countries and seen people who have Nothing that are 10 times happier than people that I know that are worth hundreds of millions, even billions of dollars. So clearly it's not money that makes you happy, if they could be happy. Clearly that money is not the thing that makes somebody happy. And so we've been trained not to notice and not to be able to go, oh, it's right in front of me. You know, the love that you're craving, it's not coming from somebody else. It has to come from yourself. There's people around you that already love you. The joy that you want, it's already available to you right now. The safety, that belonging, that deep sense of meaning that you've been chasing, it's already around you. It's already yours. We're just thinking that it has to come from somewhere else. Right? The problem is that we've been programmed to look everywhere else but here inside of ourselves. I always say, whatever you're looking for in the external world is actually what you're looking for from yourself. And if you say, oh, I want money. No, you don't want money. You want the thing that you think money will give you. Safety. Well, safety. That's something that you find inside of yourself. Whatever it is you think it's going to give you happiness. Happiness is a state of mind. That's something that's inside of you. And so we were all taught to chase this thing in the future and to grasp for achievement and for something else and to hunt for something else. To believe that there's something outside of us. And that's why our dreams and our goals a lot of times are like chasing the horizon. The closer you get to them, the further you get away. And you just. They're always just out of grass. You know, it's kind of like. It's kind of like looking for your glasses when they're already on your face. That's really what it's like. Like life is happening right now. The miracle is happening right now in front of you. But if your mind is locked on what is next, or it's fixated on what is missing, or what you don't have or what you need in order to get the happiness, then you're going to walk past the amazing buffet of life, the feast that is laid out right in front of you. So your life isn't empty. Your awareness is. You're surrounded by all of the things that you've been praying for. You just didn't know how to see it. And so you're not really afraid of change in going into the unknown. Like people always say, like, I'm afraid of the unknown. There's no such thing as being afraid of the unknown. There's only being afraid of losing the known. When you're like, oh, but I don't know what the future looks like. No, no, that doesn't matter. You're afraid of losing what you already know. And so even if what you know is this identity of playing the victim or being the fixer, or being the anxious overthinker, or being the high achiever who's always tired, or being the people pleaser, letting go of that feels like death. Because in a way, it is. It's a death of the you that you thought you were. It's a death of that mask. And that's exactly what's going to set you free. And so what I want you to do is think about this for a second. I know this is a little bit different than some of the stuff that I talk about. It's not about going and achieving more and being more and all that stuff. It's about realizing what's already in front of you. I want you to take like a pen and paper day and I want you to write down the beliefs that you hold most dearly that you feel are true deep down inside of you. Write it down. What's the thing that you feel is the most true? And then ask yourself the question, where.

[Rob Dial]

Did I first hear this?

[Co-Host]

Would I still believe this? And if I had never been taught it? You might, you might not. I don't know. But you might be shocked that you might have been living in someone else's mental operating system that they gave it to you and you didn't realize it. You might notice that a lot of what I talk about is different than other personal development stuff. You know, I've read hundreds of books and listened to hundreds and hundreds of hours of podcasts and conferences and done.

[Rob Dial]

All of those things.

[Co-Host]

And most self development is about adding more, adding more, adding more, learning more, learning more, achieving more. Get this next piece of knowledge so you can get even further along in life. Believe me, I played that game for 20 years. I did. I tried it. It didn't get me anything that I wanted. And what I've realized is that everything.

[Rob Dial]

I want is already here.

[Co-Host]

And it always has been. So it's like, damn, I was kind of like asleep for 20 years. Like, one of the new tattoos that I got is right here on my wrist and it says, be here now. Because it's like I find myself chasing things all of the time and then I look down at my arm and I'm like, that's right, it's already here. It's in me. It's already here. I just need to see that's around me. And so you don't need to be better. You don't need to do anything differently except for wake up. And so my invitation for you is to wake up to the joy that you've been postponing. To wake up to the love that you know you're trying to go and find in someone else. To wake up to the richness and the aliveness that doesn't need permission to be felt. It's already there in front of you because you're already floating in fresh water, my friend. It's right there in front of you. The thirst that you feel is not absent. It's right in front of you. You have the cup, you have the water. Take a drink. It's you just haven't allowed yourself to drink. And so take the cup. Take the risk. Don't look back. It's all right in front of you. And so how do you get yourself unstuck is realizing you were never stuck in the first place. So that's what I got for you for today's episode. If you love this episode, if I woke something up inside of you, please do me a favor. Share it on your Instagram stories. Tag me obdialjr. R O B D I A L J R. And with that, I'm gonna leave the same way I leave you every single episode. Make it your mission to make somebody else's day better. I appreciate you and I hope that you have an amazing day.

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