Can’t solve a problem? 5 ways to figure it out!

You’re going along, minding your own business when all of a sudden you realize, you’ve hit a wall.  You’re stuck.  And you don’t see a way around it.  I once worked with a guy who was so good at this he became more like a wind-up toy.  You wound him up, sent him in a direction and he dutifully went until he hit a wall.  And then he sat there until you came back and changed his direction for him.  He was much easier to manage once I figured that out!

But, what can one do to help one’s self out of this situation?  Whether it is writer’s block, or not solving a critical problem, or just losing your “mojo” as I’ve heard it called lately, here are 5 ways I use to get out of it.

1.  Call someone you haven’t spoken with in awhile – seems pretty basic, but a conversation with someone who hasn’t been in your day-to-day can often give you a different perspective on what’s going on and just refresh your point of view.  Not to mention you get to retell all the good stories which puts you in a better frame of mind.

2.  Read something completely unrelated.  Personally, I like Mental Floss which is a quirky, trivia magazine.  They do a feature on a different part of the world, they talk about all kinds of fairly random topics and you sound brilliant at your next networking event when you can whip out off-the-wall facts about things.  But the point is, it isn’t about business in any way.  It is about physics and poetry and  new advances in science, and geography and culture.  But, the process of reading about those things can often give you a whole new insight when you return to the problem at hand.

3.  Pick something totally unrelated and try to incorporate it into the situation.  Generally I run into walls when I’m trying to solve a problem.  So when that happens, one thing to do is pick something completely unrelated and try to incorporate it into a solution.  For example – I was trying to come up with a new slogan for a customer and was completely stumped.  To bring in something unrelated, I randomly selected an album in iTunes to play and tried to incorporate the music.  That led me to reviews of the pieces which in turn gave me different words to consider and wah-la!  A slogan was born!

4.  Color in a coloring book, put together a puzzle, or do something fun but structured.  I know – that sounds weird.  But think about this: you are trying to work through something and are stuck.  So you give your brain something else to think about that is fun, but isn’t completely creative.  When you color (and yes, I mean INSIDE the lines) you select the colors to go next to each other, but the design itself has been dictated so the decisions you make are minimal.  Giving your brain a rest from focusing on the problem at hand gives your subconscious a chance to give it a try and the structure of the activity keeps you engaged.  At the end you may solve your problem as well as decorate your refrigerator!

5.  Talk it out with a friend.  I can’t tell you how many people call and want to talk about something, but by the time they have finished explaining it they found their answer.  The process of verbalizing it is incredibly powerful and having someone else listening can make all the difference.

Here are some of the ways I find to get out of a rut.  What do you do?