“We get stuck in lots of ways.”

A thought by Matt Perman, from his book, How to Get Unstuck (p. 13). Zondervan. Kindle Edition.  (Click on the book title to go to Amazon.com to buy the book.)

We really do, don’t we?

Stuck in traffic!

Matt says, “We can get stuck in traffic, stuck in line, even stuck in the mud. You might be stuck in a job you don’t like, stuck in your attempt to lose weight, or just plain stuck in a rut.”

He goes on, “At root, we are stuck when we really want to do, change, or accomplish something, but something prevents or blocks us from doing it. Those things can be internal (sometimes we are the reason we are stuck!), or they can be external.

“One of the biggest ways we get stuck is in our productivity. We’ll focus on that in this book because productivity has such an impact on everything we do every day. And it’s getting worse. More and more people are noting that being frustrated and stuck in their productivity is one of their biggest pain points in work and life.

“It’s no surprise that we feel this way. Obstacles to our productivity are everywhere. We often feel frustrated, like we are floundering. We feel overrun with distractions, overloaded with input, stretched by multiple competing demands, exasperated by unrealistic expectations, thrown off track by interruptions, annoyed by incomprehensible snags in the systems we use, trapped by other people’s bad productivity, and more and more.

Of course, where we are right now with the virus is a great obstacle.

He continues, “In a nutshell, many of us feel like we are not getting done what really matters to us and what we are truly capable of doing. And even when we are accomplishing things, doing so is a battle that surely must be harder than it really has to be.”

He then says, “The goal of this book is to get you unstuck in your productivity in work and life, do it in the right way—a God-centered, gospel-driven way—and enable you to stay unstuck through obstacles.

“In other words, this book is about more than just meeting your own needs. It is about getting unstuck so that you can accomplish God’s purposes more effectively. Getting unstuck from things that don’t matter so you can accomplish the things that really do. Ultimately, this is a book about conquering busyness, doing great work, and escaping average for a cause greater than yourself—and doing all this in a holistic way that doesn’t sacrifice one area of life for another (such as sacrificing your family for your career).”

And this is what we need, isn’t it? 

Yes, yes!