How to Get Unstuck Spiritually

How to Get Unstuck Spiritually (and Actually Experience God)

Have you ever had a moment where you whisper, “God… are you there?”—and all you hear are your own whirling thoughts? Nothing from God.

You still believe.
You still care.
You may even pray, go to church, read good books, try to be a decent human.

And yet something in you feels stalled—like your spiritual life and your relationship with God have become dry, overly mental, distant. Stuck on boring.

You’re not alone. Recent studies suggest that over fifty percent of people in the United States say they feel spiritually stuck.

Not because they’ve stopped believing in God.
Not because they don’t want God.

But because nobody showed them a street-level, practical way to actually experience God—not just think about God.

We Can’t Think Our Way to God

Many of us were taught ideas about God. We were given information. We learned how to behave, what to believe, what to do.

Some of that is helpful and good.

But we were rarely taught how to relate to God—like a best friend you can be honest with, like a wise presence you can come home to, like a steady guide who meets you in the real world of stress, emotion, desire, and decision-making.

That’s why belief alone starts to feel thin. You don’t need more religious pressure or guilt. You need a path—one that helps you move from belief into relationship—from thinking about God into experiencing God.

If you’re feeling stuck, let’s talk about what’s really going on—and a simple time-tested way to get unstuck and experience a direct relationship with God.

Why This Happens to so Many of Us

Here’s what I’ve noticed—both in my own life and in countless conversations with my spiritual direction clients:

When faith becomes mostly intellectual, we can end up with a head full of ideas and a heart that still feels empty—because we’re not actually meeting God in real life, real time.

And when life gets hard—grief, stress, conflict, loneliness, anxiety, messy relationships—our mind does what it was trained to do: solve, analyze, figure it out, push through.

But usually what we need isn’t another solution in our head—we need God’s steady presence with us in the middle of it all. Through direct encounter. We need God’s wisdom.

A Short Story

For much of my life, my relationship with God lived primarily in my head.

I was raised with a good intellectual foundation of faith. I learned Scripture, theology, and doctrine. I knew how to think about God, to explain God, and even to defend God. And for a long time, that foundation was good. It gave structure and language.

But as I got older, something shifted.

Life got more complex. Relationships got messy. Pain didn’t resolve neatly. Questions didn’t have clean answers. I realized I had reached the end of thinking my way to God.

The intellectual experience of God was a good foundation…but it wasn’t enough to help me successfully maneuver through the ups and downs of life.

I didn’t need more head stuff.
I needed to experience God.
I needed a direct relationship with God.

I needed a living faith where God wasn’t just an idea, but a presence—someone who walks with me and leads me in mind, body, and spirit: steadying my mind with guidance and reassurance, letting me feel God’s life and love moving in my body, and helping me notice and follow the Holy Spirit’s quiet invitations toward what’s most life-giving.

The Invitation That Changed Everything

Years ago at a retreat, I brought my stuckness to the retreat director. I asked him, “How can I deepen my relationship with God?”

I expected him to give me a teaching, a plan, maybe a new practice to “fix” what I was feeling.

Instead, he smiled and said something simple:

“Do what Psalm 46:10 says, ‘Be still and know God.’ Every day, go into the quiet. Be still. And listen.”

He told me to create a special place in my home where I could be alone with God each day. Shut the door. No phone. No social media. Just me and God.

He pointed me to Jesus’ words in Matthew 6:6: “When you pray, go into your room, close the door, and pray to your Father who is unseen.”

And he reminded me of Jesus’ invitation in Mark 6:31: “Come away… and rest awhile.”

The retreat director didn’t teach me a new prayer technique or tell me to try harder. He simply invited me to show up—to be with God the way you’d be with someone you love: sitting together, sharing a quiet moment, listening, letting the relationship be real.

Learning to Sit and Listen

So I began to sit for thirty minutes each day.

Not to analyze.
Not to solve.
Not to perform.
Just to sit quietly and notice.

I called those thirty minutes my “Quiet Time”—my way of having coffee with the Creator. I’d pour two cups of coffee: one for me, and one for God. Then I’d take the mugs into my den, light a candle, and sit on my couch as if I were meeting a dear friend. No script. No agenda. Just presence.

At first, my mind resisted. Thoughts raced. My body fidgeted. Everything in me wanted to do something—fix something, figure something out, prove I was “doing prayer right.”

But slowly—almost imperceptibly—something softened.

I began to sense God was not something I had to reach for or figure out. God was already present—within me.

Not as an idea.
But as breath.
As life.
As love.

And in that quiet, with the candle burning and the coffee steaming beside me, God became real.

That was the beginning of what I call “Divine Flow”—the contemplative path of experiencing God in everyday life.

What’s Divine Flow?

Divine Flow is the lived experience of God’s divine life flowing in us, through us, and as us.

It’s a simple, embodied path rooted in the contemplative tradition—the contemplative lifestyle Jesus lived and taught, the way the first Christian community learned to pray and live, and the path countless saints, mystics, and modern spiritual men and women have continued to follow.

This lifestyle helps us quiet the mind, ground the body, awaken the heart, and restore inner peace.

Rather than striving to reach God, Divine Flow teaches us how to return—again and again—to the Presence of God already within us. God with us. God in us.

And if you’re wondering what that feels like…

Living in Divine Flow is like jumping into a refreshing river on a hot summer day—no more standing on the bank watching the water. You plunge in and with a joyful Ahhh! you feel God’s grace slip over your skin like cool silk—embracing you, steadying you, and guiding you into the life you’ve hoped for.

That “Ahhh” is what happens when God moves from concept to communion—from an idea in your head to a Friend swimming with you in the river of life.

As we experience Divine Flow, we awaken to God’s embodied presence within our own mind, body, and spirit.

How Do I Get Into Divine Flow?

It’s not complicated. It’s a daily rhythm—simple enough to practice in real life. I call it the “Four Pillars of Wholeness,” drawn from the life and teachings of Jesus. I like to summarize it with a simple shorthand: QSCS.

Quiet Time—Unplugging from the world each day to spend time alone with God and yourself, listening for the gentle whispers and guidance of the Holy Spirit.

Spiritual Reading—Letting Scripture and inspirational books or podcasts feed your soul—not just filling your head with information, but reshaping how you think, calming your heart, and giving you real wisdom for real life.

Community—Experiencing life with a few trusted and wise individuals so you’re not doing the spiritual life alone—sharing honestly, praying, and learning how to live love through the ups and downs of life.

Spiritual Gifts—Discovering how God has uniquely wired you, then offering those gifts in everyday life so your work, service, and presence become a life-giving expression of love.

Reclaiming What Was Never Meant to Be Lost

This contemplative path isn’t something new I invented. It’s ancient.

For centuries, Christianity held together head, heart, and body—knowing God through study, but also through silence, presence, community, and lived encounter.

Over time, much of our faith became increasingly intellectualized. We learned to think about God, talk about God, and analyze God—often at the expense of encountering God.

What was lost wasn’t belief—it was direct experience.

Divine Flow is about reclaiming the lost art of actually experiencing God—and for so many of us who feel spiritually stuck, it’s a simple path back into a real relationship with the Divine Presence within us.

It’s not a rejection of thinking, but an invitation to move beyond thinking alone into lived relationship with God.

From analysis to awareness.
From concept to communion.
From knowing about God to knowing God.

A Free Guide + A Practical Book to Go Deeper

If you feel stuck—not because you don’t believe, but because you were never taught a practical way to experience God—here are two simple next steps.

1. Download the Free Divine Street-Level Guide: The Four Pillars of Wholeness

I created a free companion resource called: The Divine Flow Street-Level Guide: The Four Pillars of Wholeness. A Simple, Embodied Path to Living in God’s Divine Flow. It’s short, practical, and links you to free tools on my website for each pillar.

Download it free here: Click Here

2. Explore the book: Finding Flow: Spiritual Practices to Reclaim Inner Peace, Balance, and Wholeness

The four Pillars of Wholeness are explored more fully in my book: Finding Flow: Spiritual Practices to Reclaim Inner Peace, Balance, and Wholeness.

Click here for the audio, Kindle, or paperback copy.

This book grew out of my own lived experience of learning to move from an intellectual understanding about God into a real life, direct relationship with God.

An Invitation

If you sense you’ve reached the edge of thinking your way to God…If your faith feels dry, distant, or overly mental…If you long for a quieter, more embodied, more one-to-one experience of God…

I invite you to join me in reclaiming the contemplative lifestyle—Divine Flow, a modern phrase pointing to the ancient path of actually experiencing God.

Start with the free Divine Flow Street-Level Guide. Choose one pillar and practice it this week. Using the simple steps in the Guide you’ll learn how to live in Divine Flow—and move from thinking about God to experiencing God as real. Here. Now. In you. With you.

Jump into the river of Divine Flow by downloading your free Street-Level Guide: Click Here.

Your soul will thank you.

Have a blessed week.

Your friend in the Flow,

brian

PS: Good News for You!

I’ve created a new online page where you can download all of my Divine Flow Street-Level Guides for free—simple, practical tools for experiencing God in everyday life.

Click here to explore the Guides: https://www.findingflowlife.com/divine-flow-street-level-guides

From time to time, I’ll also highlight a newly released Street-Level Guide in my weekly blog so you can explore it and practice it in real life.