WHY FOUNDERS WHO MOVE FAST STILL GET STUCK
7 Principles To Break The Stall
4-Minute Read
Motion is not the same as progress.
Getting stuck sucks. When a decision, launch, or whole quarter stalls, and no amount of pushing breaks through, it's excruciating. Founders are built to move. And staying stuck costs you one of the greatest things you trust about yourself: your ability to act.
I recently came across a conversation between Seth Godin and Steven Bartlett on The Diary Of A CEO, and I thoroughly love it. Together they work through close to fifteen separate ways to see a stuck situation differently.
Stay attached to just one lens, and you'll keep spinning at the same stuck point with the story that built it in the first place. Change your lens and you’ll see the solution you couldn’t see before.
This week in The Grip, we hand you seven of the lens shifts covered in that conversation: each with a practical application and reflection questions built to get you moving again.
7 perceptual shifts to get unstuck: a founder framework from seth godin and steven bartlett
7 Founder Applications From Seth Godin and Steven Bartlett's Getting-Unstuck Conversation
Godin and Bartlett spend their conversation untangling the true sources of stuckness, why it shows up right when you’re about to do something meaningful, and how to know when persistence is investment versus waste.
Work through the seven below in order or jump straight to the ones that grab your attention. Either way, the application under each is where the actual shift happens.
1. THE KNOT: Identifying the source
At Gordium, nobody could untie the famous knot until Alexander came along and removed the single pole it was wound around. What keeps a founder stuck usually isn't the situation itself. It's the thing holding the situation in place.
Application: List every reason you've given people for why this decision is stuck. Then write down the unspoken belief, assumption, or commitment holding the whole thing together.
Reflection questions:
What's the one thing underneath the problem I've never acknowledged?
If I finally named that thing, would this still feel like a problem, or would it just be a decision I'm making?
2. RESISTANCE: The voice that talks you out of the work
Resistance is any feeling that keeps you from doing generous, generative, creative work, and it never fully disappears. You identify it, play with it, allow it to be. Naming it gives you the choice to drop it and move forward rather than stay stuck by it.
Application: Next time you feel resistance to something generous (sending the email, hosting the thing, publishing the post), name it out loud as resistance instead of treating it as a real verdict on the idea, then do the smallest version of the thing anyway.
Reflection questions:
What have I been putting off by telling myself it's not the right time, when it's actually resistance?
If I named the exact resistance out loud right now, what would I call it?
3. FEAR, AFFILIATION, STATUS: Naming what's really driving the decision
Nearly every choice we defend hard is driven by one of three forces: fitting in, status, or the avoidance of fear. The fast car is rarely about the car. It's about proving you’re no longer the kid who got picked on at a lunch table years ago.
Application: Next time you catch yourself defending a decision hard, ask which of the three—belonging, status, or fear avoidance—is actually doing the talking.
Reflection questions:
What decision have I made recently that makes more sense once I ask which of the three is driving it?
If status weren't a factor at all, would I still want this?
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4. THE STORY OF HELPLESSNESS: Why believing you have a choice changes the outcome
Believing you have choices in life, even small ones, changes your outcomes, not just feelings. Helplessness is usually a story, not a fact.
Application: In the situation where you feel most stuck, find one real choice still available, however small, and exercise it on purpose this week.
Reflection questions:
Where am I telling myself a story of "no control" when a real choice is still sitting there unused?
What is the smallest decision I could make today that would prove to myself I'm not as stuck as I feel?
5. PICKING YOURSELF: Ending the wait for permission nobody is giving
The old system trained generations to wait to get picked, by a college, a boss, a publisher, before doing meaningful work. The gatekeepers have mostly disappeared. The waiting habit didn't.
Application: Name the thing you're waiting for permission to start, then start the smallest version of it this week without asking anyone.
Reflection questions:
What am I still waiting to be picked for that nobody is actually gatekeeping anymore?
If permission were never coming, what would I do differently starting today?
6. THE DIP VS. THE CUL-DE-SAC: Knowing when to quit
The dip is the hard part in between starting something and getting good at it; organic chemistry on the way to becoming a doctor. Consider and calculate the cost of the dip before you start. And when it shows up, be grateful; it means you're making progress to the other side. But if there's zero evidence that investing more time or money will create the change you're seeking, that's a cul-de-sac. Forgive yourself and move on.
Application: If people before you have gotten through this exact hard part and come out the other side, it's a dip, worth finishing. If nobody gets through it and more effort just buys more loss, it's a cul-de-sac, worth leaving.
Reflection questions:
Did I actually calculate what this hard part would cost before I started, or did I just hope to skip it?
What would the next 90 days need to produce for this to still be a dip and not a dead end?
7. "I MADE THIS": Offering work as a gift instead of auditioning for approval
Putting work into the world can be an offering, not an audition for approval. "I made this" means it's for someone else. If they don't want it, that's information, not rejection, and the only next move is to make a different gift.
Application: Before publishing or pitching something, swap "I hope they like it" for "I made this for you" and notice what shifts in how you show up.
Reflection questions:
Am I offering this work as a gift right now, or quietly asking for validation of my worth?
What would I make differently if rejection just meant "not this gift, not this person," rather than "I’m not enough"?
“We are stuck because we can’t see what’s holding us there.”
Each of these seven principles is a lens you now have access to.
This week, notice one decision or issue where you've exhausted all other ways forward. Run it through one or more of these lenses. Watch what moves.
Keep creating.
key takeaways
Motion and progress are not the same thing. A founder can stay busy while the thing that actually matters stays stalled.
What keeps a situation stuck is rarely the situation itself. It's usually an unexamined belief, fear, or story holding it in place.
Seeing a stall through more than one lens, rather than defending the same explanation, is what gets a founder moving again.
WORK 1:1 WITH BECKY
As a self-mastery coach, I help mission-driven founders accelerate desired results without sacrificing what matters. If that sounds like good news, REACH OUT to experience how 1:1 coaching can empower you to be the masterful leader your mission requires.
May you prosper in every way!
Becky & TPL Team
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