How Freeze-Framing Stalls Forward Movement
"Freeze-framing" as a coaching concept may be a term that my husband and I made up. I really can't remember (and I even tried googling it), but no matter the origin, the gist of it is quite helpful.
In a movie or video, freeze-framing is when the projection stops on one particular moment, and the show does not move forward. You only see one frame in still life.
Our thoughts toward situations can be like that. We can freeze the forward movement, so to speak, and not be able to see what could happen if there were movement.
We freeze-frame others when we think of them as not being able to change or grow. We use words like always or never in our thoughts about them. It sounds like, "Well, she'll never change. She never speaks up.", or "He just has a quick temper, you can't really trust him." You get the picture?
We can freeze-frame situations or organizations in the same way. "It's just like that. There's nothing we can do." Entire communities, countries, or cultures can be locked into what they are by freeze-framing.
This mindset limits possibilities.
Have you ever heard the phrase, "hitting a glass ceiling"? It's often used when discussing women in leadership and the perceived inability to move to the next level. Recently, however, the term "sticky floor" has come into vogue. Female leaders have identified that not every glass ceiling has been imposed on them; rather, there has been a self-imposed "sticky floor" that has kept women from even trying to move forward.
We freeze-frame ourselves when we fixate on how something could never work for us. We can become obsessed with past mistakes or failures. We only see the closed doors. We only hear what the nay-sayers are repeating to us.
Breaking the hold of freeze-framing for ourselves, for how we see others, and how we all perceive our environments can be the key we need to unlock what could be waiting for us beyond that locked door of "never" or "always" thinking.
Where do you see freeze-framing in your own thinking - for others, and even for yourself?
Who could you help to see how freeze-framing has held them back, or held you back?
How could you speak life into an environment you face that feels stuck?
In Bridges Coach Training, we teach about removing the obstacles that keep us from moving along, and discovering where freeze-framing has taken over our thinking is one of the many tools we can use to serve others and effect change.
Click here for more info on Bridges Coaching and available options.
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