Good afternoon, friends. it's Rohan with the latest edition of Coached — your personal mentorship email that takes a few minutes to read, but speeds up your career by years. |
In today's Mentor's Corner, we're tackling a universal struggle: being stuck. Call it procrastination, call it a slump — whatever the name, it's a place we've all been. You sit down to get started…but suddenly, doing anything else seems more appealing. So, what's the way out? I'll walk you through what I do. |
If you're new here and like the sound of getting free career coaching every week — the kind people usually pay a lot for — get my next email by signing up at Coached.com. |
To my loyal readers: I've been more active on LinkedIn lately, sharing bite-sized, candid career advice to give you a boost while you're scrolling through your feed. People tell me it's a nice break from the usual cringefest on LinkedIn! So if you like my writing, follow me on LinkedIn. |
Estimated read time: 4 minutes 56 seconds |
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📈 Mentor's Corner Insights put together by me or coaches who usually charge $750+/hour and mentor senior execs. One practical lesson a week that will make a measurable impact on your career, delivered right to you — for $0. |
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What I do to get 'unstuck' |
Ever have one of those days where you just sit there, looking at your list of things to do, and can't figure out where to start? |
Maybe you know exactly what needs to be done, but you just... don't do it. |
Or maybe everything feels so overwhelming that you don't feel like doing anything at all. |
You're not alone. I've been there, staring at my screen, wondering what to tackle first, feeling all sorts of meh. |
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The question is, what do we do about it? Have a servant strip you naked and only return your clothes when your work's done? (No joke - Victor Hugo actually did this). |
Well today, I'm gonna tell you what I personally do about it when I feel stuck and can't get anything going. |
My secret? |
Don't focus on the work that needs done. |
Focus on something else: |
Momentum. |
Here's how: |
| | | | …by the way, if you use LinkedIn, go to my profile and hit the 'Follow' button. I share a mix of practical career strategy and mid-week motivation — stuff that makes it easy to keep your career on track.
Topics coming up this week: how to communicate like a CEO, LinkedIn hacks to turn your profile into an opportunity magnet (posted yesterday), plus more. See you there. | alright, let's get back to my essay… |
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🧎🏻 Pick tasks that create momentum |
When you're feeling stuck, the goal is to kickstart your momentum with tasks that are easy to tackle—those that don't require much, if any, planning. |
Think about sending a quick email that's been on your mind, an admin-related task or completing a small chore. It's these small, easily achievable tasks that can switch your brain from idle to active, giving you that first push. |
I call these tasks 'FLOW tasks' and I actually have a dedicated section in my to-do tracker where I list these out. Here are the types of things I have in that section: |
Write a short LinkedIn post Follow up on an unpaid invoice Fix a small bug on Resume Worded Outline next week's Coached newsletter
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Here's what's unusual: |
None of these tasks are important tasks I need to do now. |
But, that's exactly the point. They're FLOW tasks because they're easy, don't require planning, and have one purpose: to get me into what I call my flow state and out of my lazy state of inertia. |
I know…it sounds counter intuitive. Most productivity text books tell you to always identify and work on the most important thing yada yada. And sure, that's valid — but usually that important thing is HARD, and is going to literally be the source of procrastination. The flow tasks help me work up to it: |
Whenever I'm stuck and feel meh, I go to my flow section and start tackling the smaller flow tasks. |
Three or four tasks in, I start feeling productive and ready to tackle the important things I should be doing. |
 | (don't wait on motivation to strike. do FLOW tasks and build your consistency) |
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But remember: |
🗽 Avoid the Hercules trap |
I dunno if it's just me, but when I've procrastinated for a few days, I start thinking, "Well, if I can just do this [insert massive task], then it'll all be fine." |
But here's the problem: |
The reason we're stuck is because we don't have enough steam to tackle the big task! |
That's why instead of pinning my hopes on doing the big thing (falling into the "Hercules trap"), I set the bar so low that I can practically trip over it. That way, I can get a mini-win, and start building momentum. |
The lesson: Save up the big "Herculean" tasks for when you're on a roll. |
✍ One more to avoid: The planning trap |
When you're trying to break the cycle of 'stuckness' or procrastination, don't tell yourself, I just need to plan this out first! |
I've been guilty of this all to much. While over planning might seem productive, but it's actually a form of procrastination in disguise. |
It feels like you're getting organized, but without any real progress on tasks, it can leave you feeling more stuck and with less momentum than when you started. |
Keep your plans or to-dos minimal. Make real progress, get momentum, and then course-correct or add detail to your plan if you need to. |
 | the planning trap personified! haha 🥲 |
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👩🏻🔬 Why this works |
I know, I know. This all sounds a bit woo-woo, right? But actually, it's well-grounded in science. |
Whenever you get a win (even a small one), the brain releases dopamine. And when that happens, you get more confident and feel better, which pushes you to accomplish bigger and harder problems. |
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🐾 Start "win-tracking" |
Get a sticky note and title it: 'wins this week'. |
Then, stick it on your desk somewhere you can see it. (Don't put it on a phone app where you won't see it - the more it stares you in the face the better). |
Now, here's the plan: |
Whenever you accomplish something - no matter how small - write it down. |
For example: |
when you eat right, write it down when you exercise, write it down when you spend quality time with your family, write it down when you send that email you've been putting off, write it down
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Then, when you get to the end of the week, and it's time to get out a new sticky, you'll notice you've built quite a lot of momentum. (And that'll whet your appetite to get things done the following week) |
It's pretty simple. |
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I hope this approach not only helps you find your rhythm on those tough days but also changes how you view and tackle what you need to do. Let me know if it did! :) |
These emails take a lot of time and $$ to put together. But I keep them free, because that seems like the best way to reach the most people. |
In return, all I ask for is: |
Each time one of my emails changes how you think, opens your mind to a new perspective, or gives you an insight you get value from, do any of these: |
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It'd really help — thank you! |
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(p.s. this AI tool's pretty cool and helps you write cover letters) |
 | I literally hate when this happens haha. |
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🔎 Speed Up Your Job Search One actionable piece of advice to help you hack your job search. |
Actionable ways to update your resume in 2024 |
Read the full article here. |
This article has a list of actionable things you should do if you're updating your resume after a while. Here are two suggestions from the article: |
📈 Use numbers to quantify your resume. |
Try to add hard numbers into each of your resume's bullet points. For example, if you say you worked with data, be specific and describe how big the dataset was (in terms of rows, attributes or columns). |
🍾 Highlight promotions. |
Hiring managers want to see evidence of career progression on your resume, especially if you're applying for mid-level and up roles. |
🎯 If you haven't yet, you should probably use a tool like Score My Resume that's designed to help you update your existing resume. It'll tell you if your resume can be read by resume screeners, as well as if it passes key criteria recruiters look for. Try it here. |
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If you're new here, let's get the intros out of the way. |
I'm Rohan. Six years ago, I found myself frustrated with the sea of misleading career advice online, so I started Resume Worded. The goal was simple: provide guidance that actually works. |
But resumes were only the tip of the iceberg. There was a lot of clichéd, generic career advice out there. So, I started this email series, Coached. Each week, I talk about real career strategy, informed not only by my experiences but by my conversations with industry leaders, senior coaches who train CEOs, and people with way more experience than I have. |
Every email you receive is written by me, not a ghostwriter. I'm here, on the other end, reading your replies. |
Until next time, |
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Rohan @ Resume Worded |
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 | Thank you Shannon, that means the world! :) |
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P. S. To make sure your career never goes off the rails, don't miss my future emails. A simple way to make sure you get each email is: |
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