You’re Not Broken. You’re Just Stuck in a Loop.
- Ryan DeJonghe
- 5 days ago
- 6 min read
Change doesn’t come from forcing yourself forward. It stems from recognizing the loops you’re in.
You have tried so hard. You’ve read the books, listened to the podcasts, and maybe even spent years in therapy, talking it all through. You understand why you feel this way. You can trace the patterns back to their roots, name the dynamics, and analyze your own behavior with painstaking clarity. And yet, despite all the effort, all the insight, and all the raw strength of determination, you find yourself back in the same familiar place — the same anxious thought, the same reactive feeling, the same self-sabotaging behavior.
It’s exhausting. And with every lap around this well-worn track, a heavy question settles deeper in your body: What is wrong with me?
That question alone can feel heavier than the pattern itself.
I want to offer you a different way of seeing this. What if nothing is wrong with you at all? What if you aren’t broken, flawed, or doomed to repeat the past — but simply stuck in a loop? A loop that formed long ago for very real reasons, and one your mind continues to follow not out of weakness, but out of familiarity.
Because change doesn’t come from forcing yourself forward. It comes from gently, compassionately understanding the loops you’re in.
1. The Mind Operates in Loops
Think of the mind as a landscape imprinted with pathways. Some are faint trails you barely notice. Others are deep, well-worn grooves formed by repetition. These grooves are our mental loops — repeating thoughts, beliefs, and meanings that quietly shape our behavior and our reality.
These loops aren’t just abstract ideas; they have a biological basis. Our brains are designed to be efficient. When we repeat a thought or behavior, neural pathways strengthen. The brain learns that this is a reliable route and begins to favor it. Over time, the loop runs automatically, without conscious effort. This repetition is what allows us to drive a car or brush our teeth without thinking. It becomes limiting when the loop is something like, I’m not good enough or Something bad is about to happen.
I had the opportunity to assist a client — let’s refer to her as Samantha— a brilliant designer paralyzed by impostor syndrome. Logically, she knew she was talented. Her awards and client list confirmed it. Yet each time she sat down to start a new project, a familiar voice whispered, You’re going to be found out this time.
The feeling followed immediately: a tight knot in her stomach, shallow breathing, tension through her body. Soon after came the behavior — checking emails, tidying her desk, anything to avoid beginning. She had talked about this pattern for years and understood its roots in a critical childhood environment. But insight hadn’t stopped the loop. Her nervous system had learned that starting something new felt unsafe, and it was doing its job to protect her.
Her mind wasn’t failing her. It was following the deepest, most familiar groove it knew.
This is true for many of us. Your brain isn’t trying to sabotage you; it’s trying to keep you safe by sticking to what it knows. Common discomfort typically feels safer to the nervous system than an unfamiliar possibility. The loop is predictable, known — even when it hurts.
This is the place to start — whether you’re here for anxiety, habits, identity shifts, or something you can’t easily describe yet. Not with fixing, but with seeing the pattern clearly for what it is: a loop, not a life sentence.
At TranceWell, this understanding shapes everything we do. Inside the free TranceWell members space, you’ll find nervous-system tools you can use right away, hypnosis and subconscious exercises for real change, and education that explains why patterns form — without condemnation. Nothing here is about forcing change. The work happens where change actually happens: in the body, the subconscious, and the nervous system.
If you feel ready to explore this in a safe, grounded way, you can begin here:
2. You Have More Control Than You Think
When you’re caught in a powerful mental or emotional loop, it can feel like you have no control at all. The thought arrives, the feeling floods in, and the reaction follows before you’ve had a chance to pause. It feels complete and overwhelming.
But you have more influence than you realize — just not in the way you’ve probably been taught to look for it.
You don’t gain control by trying to stop the entire loop at once. You gain it by interrupting one small part of the sequence. Often, that looks like:
Noticing the exact sentence you repeat to yourself
Becoming aware of a physical cue, like tightening shoulders or shallow breath
Catching the urge to react before you follow it automatically
Neuroplasticity — the brain’s capacity to change — doesn’t require dramatic breakthroughs. It happens in these small moments. Each time you respond differently, even slightly, you begin carving a new neural trail alongside the old one.
I used to have a powerful loop around public speaking. My heart would race, my throat would tighten, and one thought would repeat relentlessly: Don’t mess this up. Telling myself not to be nervous never worked. It only added pressure.
The shift came when I noticed the sentence itself. Don’t mess this up wasn’t the truth — it was a familiar command born from perfectionism. So instead of fighting it, I interrupted it. The next time the thought appeared, I replaced it with something gentler: Just connect with one person.
My anxiety didn’t disappear, but its quality changed. Instead of scanning for mistakes, my attention softened. The loop loosened. That small interruption created space — and in that space, I had a choice.
Where is your point of interruption? You don’t have to fix the whole pattern. You only need to notice one place where you can respond differently and ask, What if I tried something gentler here?
3. Playfully Create a New Path
Once you learn to interrupt a loop, the next step isn’t to force a new belief into place. The subconscious often resists affirmations that feel untrue. If you’re feeling anxious or unworthy, repeating I feel confident can actually create more resistance.
Change works best when it’s playful and curious — when the new thought doesn’t threaten the parts of you that came to survive a certain way. One of the simplest ways to do this is by changing a single word in a familiar sentence.
Take the loop, I am anxious. It sounds like an identity. Now, I feel anxious. The shift is subtle, but powerful. There is now a “you” who is experiencing something, rather than being it.
Or try, I am noticing anxiety. Now you are the observer. The feeling is something that passes through you, not something that defines you.
I once partnered with a man named ‘Mark’ whose inner dialogue was relentlessly critical: I am lazy. I am a failure. We tried simply observing the voice, but it felt overpowering. So we played with language. I asked him to complete a new sentence: I am becoming…
After a long pause, he said in a quiet voice, I am becoming a little more patient with myself. He didn’t have to fully believe it. He only had to allow the possibility. That single word — becoming — created a bridge between where he was and where he wanted to go.
This isn’t about lying to yourself. It’s about offering your subconscious a safer alternative — a new path that doesn’t require force.
What is one word you could change today?
The Way Forward Is Gentle
Nothing about your loops means you failed. They are evidence of a nervous system that developed the skill to adapt the best way it knew how. The way forward isn’t through pressure or shame, but through curiosity and kindness — noticing patterns and choosing differently, one small step at a time.
You simply haven’t been shown how to work with your mind and body instead of against them. The change you’re looking for is available, and the path to it is far gentler than you were ever taught to expect.
If you’d like a place to begin, the free TranceWell experience offers tools and support you can explore at your own pace:
And if, at some point, you feel ready for more one-on-one support, private sessions are also available here:
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