My Life’s Been Put On Pause. How Do I Start Getting Unstuck?

Hey Doc,

I’ve been struggling with getting through a transitory period in my life and was wondering if you had any advice. Over the past year, most of my long-term friends from college and earlier have moved far away from the town I’ve lived in and it has been kind of rough. Most have graduated and found jobs – I’m happy about the progress they’ve made. I would have done the same, but COVID and other complications pushed back the study abroad opportunity I wanted to take by over a year. I’m still a few months out from getting to finally take my plunge, but I’m struggling with buckling down and keeping myself running in the meantime.

These friends were genuinely supportive to me and allowed me to open up and be vulnerable as a guy in ways I see a lot of others hungering for today. I can’t state how great they’ve been to me, so it’s been hard without them. I have done my best to keep in touch- we do video chats and play games online semi-regularly, but it’s just not the same. It’s gotten to where I feel lonely in my town, and all my recent attempts to socialize and get involved haven’t really helped or led to new connections.

The complications in plans have left me spinning my wheels for about a year now and being in this environment without my old friends has made me constantly think about all the things I dislike about my current life and the ways I wish I could improve at the moment. Still putting in the effort to change, but preparing and making sure I have enough money to support myself overseas has taken precedence. I know there is a light at the end of the tunnel, but it doesn’t feel like it’s getting any closer. What advice do you have for being stuck in transitory, stagnant-feeling stages like this?

Stuck On Pause

This is a great question, SOP, and I think it’s one that more people are dealing with than you realize.

You, like a lot of folks, are at a frustrating point in life. On the one hand, there’s a new life waiting for you out there (hopefully not in the offworld colonies, though) and you can’t wait to begin it. But on the other hand, you’re watching all the rest of your friends out on their own adventures while you’re still where you started. So on the one hand, you know there’s something bright and beautiful on the horizon, but on the other hand, that horizon doesn’t seem like it’s getting any closer. As a result, you’re caught in this liminal space of a future that hasn’t happened yet and feeling like you’re pressing your nose against the glass while all your friends are on the other side.

This leads to a lot of really frustrating moments because, well… what do you do? Your forward progress seems to be stalled out, but you also don’t want to invest too much in your current living situation because you’ve got a foot out the door. And to make matters worse, you don’t have the support network you used to have. Certainly not in the way that you used to, and not in the way you need right now.

Here’s the thing: yes, the future is ahead of you, and the more you put towards that future – resources, time, effort – means the faster you can reach that future. But the problem is, you don’t live in the future. You live in the present, and the present as it currently stands makes it really damn hard to look forward to that future. How do you balance that need between “prepare for the future” and “stuck living in the here and now?” Which do you prioritize?

The tricky thing about this liminal space you’re stuck in is that it’s familiar and unfamiliar at the same time, and in the exact right ratio that means that you are intimately familiar with all the things that get you down in the here and now but without the benefits of your old life. As a result, you’re in a headspace where all the possibility and hope has been shunted off elsewhere and what you have is just the desiccated remains of your past, where there’s simply no point in trying to do anything other than get out as fast as you can. And that headspace is a problem. Much moreso than the inherent difficulties of preparing for a future oft delayed.

After all, it does you no good to reach that future if you’ve drained yourself of everything that makes life worth living in order to get there. You’ll be dealing with so much burnout and depression that it’ll feel like you can’t even enjoy this new life you’d been looking forward to. And let me tell you, there are few things as corrosive to one’s soul as having the hope of years… not dashed, per se, but drained of life and color. You get there and it’s what you dreamed, but muted somehow. Duller, grayer, less vibrant and far less exciting. And not because you focused on the wrong things, but because you gave so much to get there that you had nothing left once you arrived.

So what do you do? Well, as the man once said: is it too much to ask for both?

The first thing you want to do to break out of that feeling of stagnation is to find the areas where you are making forward momentum and surface them so that they’re more readily apparent. I don’t just mean setting things up for preparing for your future – kicking an automatic percentage of your take-home pay to a savings account, for example – but a way of measuring that progress. Think of advent calendars, counting down the days until the holidays, or the fundraising graphics that show how much money a popular cause has raised thus far. Having a visual representation of your progress – even if it’s as cheesy as an image of a graph in the shape of a thermometer marking off your savings goals – keeps your progress in view. Seeing that you’re making headway is vital for maintaining your motivation. It breaks the illusion that you’re stuck; instead you can see that you’re forging ahead. It may be a battle of inches, literal and metaphorical, but even an inch or a dollar is progress.

Now, while this may make you want to throw more resources towards your GTFO fund, you really shouldn’t. Not so much so, at least, that you sacrifice everything else. There’s value in self-indulgence too, and in giving yourself the gift of the present as much as the future. Those little things that make you feel good now are what help you build your strength to take advantage of your future. Self-denial isn’t the absolute virtue that folks would tell you. Little moments of joy and camaraderie aren’t unnecessary extravagances to expunge, they’re part of what keep you in the game. They’re the moments of rest that let you recoup your energy, soothe your aching muscles and catch your breath. Without them, you don’t finish faster; if anything, you’re more likely to not finish at all.

But, as you said: your home ain’t what it once was, not with everyone gone. Now you’re left with nothing but the ghosts of all the places you used to go and all the people you used to be. What do you do?

Well, you shift your mindset. This isn’t your home anymore, not the way it used to be. So treat it like a new place. This is a rest stop on your journey to the future. You may be here for an indeterminate amount of time, so you may as well get to know it while you’re here. And when I say “get to know it,” I mean precisely that. However long you’ve lived in this town, I can guarantee you haven’t seen its full width and breadth. You, like most people, have likely gotten into ruts; you go to the same places, see the same people, do the same things. The fact that the people aren’t there any more is part of what makes it feel so strange. It robs the things you used to do of their potency, saps the vitality of the places you used to go.

So instead of living life like you used to, you want to break out of that rut. Start treating this like a new city, with new people and new options. When is the last time you’ve gone out of your way to explore the nooks and crannies of your home town? When have you gotten deep in the weeds of what’s on offer, especially things that are outside your usual routine? Now is the perfect time to start, especially since you’re going to have to repeat the process when you do move.

Start by just finding out what’s around you that you may not have seen before. Get on the subreddit for your town, find the Facebook groups for events in your area, hit up the local alt-weekly and find out what’s happening this week. Go to literally anything that seems half-way interesting that you’ve never done before. Expand your horizons and experiment with new stuff. Stretch muscles that haven’t been used for a while and see where they take you.

Just as importantly, make new friends while you’re at these new events. As you’ve said: you’re terminally lonely right now. Well, I hate to tell you this, but unless you already have a pre-existing social network in wherever you’re planning on studying abroad, you’re going to be facing the same loneliness there. Except you’re also going to be dealing with culture shock and homesickness and that sense of unfamiliarity will be exponential to what you’re feeling now. But getting in the habit now of talking to folks, building connections and forging new networks is what will make your new living situation (both in the near future and after your study abroad session) go from a place where you keep your stuff to a home.

By starting now, you’ll be creating new patterns in your brain, turning being social and meeting new people into muscle memory. It’ll stop being something you have to work at to accomplish and become something you do. And while you’re practicing and entrenching those skills into your brain, you’ll also be building a social network that you need now.

Will this mean diverting some of your time, energy and resources away from your future life fund? Yeah, of course; that’s a literal zero sum game. But rather than seeing this as wasting money or slowing your progress down, look at it as investing in yourself for a payoff in the future. The things you do now will not only make it possible for you to start your new life, but they’ll ensure that you hit the ground running when you do. You’ll have built up skills and learned more about yourself than you realized, all the while remembering that your happiness should be a priority too. It will be an investment in feeding your soul and supporting your sense of well-being. And this way, when you do finally go on your study abroad program – or just start your new life and new career in a new city – you aren’t going to have to spend precious days, weeks and months recovering from all of the damage you may have done to yourself in your rush to get there in the first place.

Slow and steady doesn’t just win the race; it means you don’t collapse at the finish line, unable to ascend the winner’s podium.

Good luck.

Hi Doc,

I have long dreamed of emigrating from the US, and as COVID slows down it looks like I may have the opportunity to move to my top-choice country in a few years. My partner of three years seems uncomfortable with this now that it’s no longer theoretical. She has said on multiple occasions that she doesn’t want to live in the US permanently either, and we’ve agreed that, whether we wind up married or not, neither of us wants to have kids in the States.

Is it just that 2-3 years from now (which would make 5-6 years dating) is too short for her to commit to marriage, or is there something else going on here? It hurts that the most exciting thing in my life seems to be putting a wedge between me and the person I value most.

Thanks in advance,
Expat-in-waiting

I think you put your finger on it, right at the start, EIW: this is no longer theoretical to you. When it’s just a thought exercise, the idea of leaving the US is incredibly appealing. The idea of a fresh start is tempting in and of itself; doing so in a place that seems to promise a life that you can’t have (or had to flee) in your home country is even better. It’s all hope and sunshine and rainbows, no downsides, just pure, uncut potential.

Unfortunately, the nature of dreams and fantasies is that these can be perfect. They go exactly how you want them to go. There’re no uncomfortable delays, no awkward transitions as you try to settle into, not just a new city but a new country. There’s no adjustment period, no time needed to get in tune with the new rhythms and routines and the new pulse of your new home. You don’t need to learn the ins and outs of bits of culture that you never thought about because, well, you never had to.

But the problem is: eventually dreams end. Fantasies are like soap bubbles; beautiful, even transcendent… but fragile and temporary. They pop very easily… especially when they come in contact with reality.

The reason why your partner is most likely feeling weird about the idea of either your moving or moving with you is that, at the end of the day, that’s a seismic shift from everything she’s known. Even if she legitimately does want to leave – and I don’t have reason to doubt that she does – that’s a hard thing to do. Especially if she (and you) are fortunate and privileged enough that the chaos and upheaval isn’t affecting you directly yet, or at the same level or intensity it’s already affecting people of color and LGBTQ people.

Now what I’m going to say is going to sound like I’m trying to talk you out of leaving, and I’m not. If you’ve decided that it’s best for you to get the hell outta Dodge, then you’re making the best decision for you and yours. But consider what this means, especially for your partner, who, it seems, may not have had the same dream as you, or to the same degree.

To start with, there’s what you’re leaving behind. Not just an increasingly fascist-friendly right-wing political party or an out-of-control judiciary, but friends and family. Even with the modern conveniences of direct messaging, video calls, email and social media, living in another country is putting a hell of a distance between you and your loved ones. A Skype call or Facetime isn’t going to be the same as driving over to your parents, or dropping in on grandma to take her out to lunch. Even if you’re just moving next door – hey, I hear Vancouver’s amazing! – that’s still a sizable distance between you and them.

Then there’s the fact that, while you may have your ducks in a row – lining up a place to live, making sure you’ve got a job ready and waiting for you when you arrive, all the things that many countries want in place before you immigrate – doesn’t mean she does. If she hasn’t been laying the groundwork to move to this new place the way you’ve been, then she wouldn’t just be moving, she’d be starting completely over. With no support network, no

And, of course, there’s the inherent strangeness of living in a new country. Even if it’s mostly the same as back home – and God knows the Internet and mass-communication have turned the world into much more of a monoculture – there’re differences. Different accents, different slang, different cultural expectations, even different brands. I don’t know if there’s a specific German word for the feeling of missing a particular foodstuff in a foreign country, but if there isn’t there should be. Imagine how much of a craving you might end up facing for something as simple as peanut butter.

There’s a reason why so many expats in foreign countries – even the UK and Canada – tend to cluster together; there’s comfort in the familiar. There’s a very specific form of relief that comes with hearing a familiar accent and being around people who also get that sense of missing what you left behind.

Just as importantly though – and what’s likely bothering her the most – is the difference between your desire to emigrate and hers. For her, it’s been a theoretical; something she’s idly considered but not put serious work into. For you, it’s been the dream of a lifetime. And if she’s not as excited as you, if she’s hesitant or even realizes she doesn’t want to leave after all… well, shit, now what? What does that do to your relationship? Does she white-knuckle it and go anyway and risk resenting you for “taking” her away from everything she’s ever known? Or does she say “hey, I don’t know if I’m down for this” and watch a five to six year relationship come to a screeching halt? Or does she even give it that long? Instead of making that call when you’re actually able to up stakes and go, does she say “I don’t know if I can do this now,” and risk torpedoing a relationship that is incredibly important to her?

To be clear: all of this is pure speculation on my part. I’m only guessing at what she’s thinking and feeling; I have no more of an idea than you do. But you know who does have those answers? Your partner. And the easiest way for you to gather what’s going on is to ask.

So this means it’s time for an Awkward Conversation. And this one could be extra-crispy awkward because hey, this is getting to something deeply important to you. It’s hard to say “I was ok with your dream when it was just a dream, now that its real I don’t know if I’m down with it”, assuming that this is what she’s feeling. It may be even harder for you to hear it. So when you do sit down to talk about it… do so of a mindset of just listening. Not trying to change her mind, not trying to reassure her that everything’s alright or that she shouldn’t worry. You just want to listen and understand. Even if what she says sounds 100% wrong to you.

What she likely needs right now is to feel like she’s free to at least say “I don’t know about this” or “I’m not sure I’m at the same place with this as you are”. Having doubts is hard. Feeling like you can’t express those doubts can be harder. She may feel like clamming up is a way of avoiding an unnecessary conflict. The problem is… that doesn’t avoid it; it only compresses it. It takes something that could be vented or dispelled and shoves it into a can marked “contents under pressure”. And we all know what happens when that can inevitably gets punctured. It explodes… messily and all over the place.

So for now, make room for her to talk, while you commit to just listening and understanding. Nothing needs to be decided now. Nothing needs to be done now. All that’s needed is a chance to clear the air and create a space where she can feel like she can at least express herself. If – and I stress, if – that means that this relationship will end… well, that doesn’t need to be today. Talking now, however, means that if it does come to that, then it will be a much less painful and contentious ending than it would be otherwise.

However, talking now and getting it all out there could also be what saves this. If she’s having doubts or questions and wants you to reassure her, then you have your chance to talk it out and say “ok, here’s how I see this working” or “here’s how we could handle this together.” But let her set the tone. Let your partner decide precisely what she needs from you in this conversation. And then… well, let things be. You have a few years before you and she have to make a final decision, and a lot can happen in that intervening time. Focusing on the worst-case scenarios would just be borrowing trouble from the future – a future that may never come to pass. Worse, it’ll rob you both of joy you could have in the present.

So for now, let her talk, let her vent, and make it clear: she’s allowed to have these feelings, no matter what they are. Let the future take care of itself.

Good luck.