The One Word That Keeps You Stuck

Hi there,

There's an old thought experiment called Buridan's ass. A donkey stands exactly halfway between a pile of carrots and a bucket of water, equally hungry and equally thirsty, completely free to walk wherever he likes.

Every step toward the water is a step away from the carrots, and he's too hungry for that. And every step toward the carrots is a step away from the water, and he's too thirsty for that. So he just stands there until he starves.

Fittingly, the philosopher it's named after, Jean Buridan, never told the donkey story. But his critics invented it to mock him.

The anxious animal

But thing is that a real, hungry, thirsty donkey wouldn’t die. We don't see animals starve to death out of indecision, because animals don’t suffer from anxiety.

Anxiety is a uniquely human phenomenon, closely related to fear but much more sophisticated because it's rooted in our capacity to anticipate. It arises in response to the perception of danger and is logical unless the perception is illogical, as it often is the case. The anxious person tends to anticipate danger often when there is little to none. This is the nature of the human animal.

And while we don't really see people starve because of a carrot/water dilemma, us humans do this with almost everything else.

We are the only animal that will stand still between two things it wants and slowly starve, not from lack of options, but from a refusal to lose either one. And we do it with one small word.

“But.”

(yeah, yeah… the irony of a bunch of asses with a but problem isn’t lost on me.)

• I want to write the book, but I don't want anyone to read it and decide it's bad.

• I want the promotion, but I don't want the weekends.

• I want to leave, but I don't want to be the one who broke it.

Each of those has a carrot and a bucket of water inside it: the thing you want, and the price of getting it. And "but" does something quietly sneaky: it sits the two of them down as equals, as if wanting the book and fearing the criticism were the same weight, deserving of the same consideration. They're not. But "but" makes it feel like they are, and so we stand still.

The “But” is a Sneaky Confession

Here's what I've come to believe: the "but" is not the obstacle. The "but" is the confession.

Psychologists have a dry name for the donkey's situation — approach-avoidance conflict. Neal Miller put it in a lab: rats trained to run toward food, then shocked at the same spot, wouldn't run and wouldn't leave. They hovered, edging forward and backing off stuck in the exact middle of their own "but."

Decades earlier, the psychiatrist Eric Berne noticed people doing this, in what he called the "Why don't you — Yes, but" game. You offer a stuck friend a solution; it's "yes, but." Another; "yes, but." Nothing lands, because this is the uncomfortable part they were never looking for the exit. The complaining is the point. The "but" is actually protecting something.

That something has a name too: secondary gain, the hidden payoff of staying stuck. As long as I haven't finished the book, it can't fail. As long as I haven't left, I don't have to grieve or grapple with figuring out the next chapter. The trap keeps me safe from what I'm really avoiding, usually not tiredness or rejection, but the plain fact of having chosen, and being on the hook for it. And because loss aversion makes whatever we'd give up loom larger than whatever we'd gain, standing still feels safe and neutral. It isn't. It's just choosing to lose both, slowly.

If you want proof this is most of us, look at work. Gallup found that in 2024 only 31% of U.S. employees were engaged — a ten-year low. Two out of three people, showing up somewhere between the carrot and the water. Not quite in, not quite out. Wanting more, but…

When You’re at a Crossroad

I actually came across a “but” dilemma recently in my own life. I had a crazy opportunity come up that would’ve paid very well, made me a published author, and had me working on a very compelling project but it meant I had to pay a massive price I wasn’t ready to pay. 

So instead of racking myself with anxiety and indecision for weeks on end, I decided in one day that I would let the opportunity pass and was at peace with it. 

What it boiled down to for me was that I could either take on the massive amount of work and stress that would come with the project and get paid handsomely for it or I’d have to be a big girl about it and accept the regret of not doing it. So, I sat with that and got to a place where I was at peace with the “what ifs” and accepted that the price of regret was something I was willing to pay.

The way I see it, you have three choices:

Route one: eat the carrot. Choose what you want, and pay the price of what you give up. Write the book, and accept the responsibilities and consequences that come with it. This isn't surrender, it's putting your energy into the part of your life that gives something back, instead of into a fear that never does. Say the price out loud, look at it, and decide it's worth paying.

Route two: drink the water. The mirror image. Sometimes the price really is too high, and the braver move is to want the other thing instead. Not every carrot is worth the walk. Choosing to stay, or the quieter life, or the job that keeps your weekends — that's a real choice, not a consolation prize, as long as you choose it intentionally rather than drift mindlessly into it.

Route three: find the door the donkey can't see. For when you truly can't stomach losing either. The trap assumes the food and water sit in fixed corners and you can only walk in a straight line. Life is rarely that tidy. Maybe you write the book under a pen name. Maybe you get the promotion without the weekends. Maybe the marathon becomes a half. The third door isn't a compromise where you lose a little of both, it's the move you couldn't see while you stood still.

The option nobody puts on the table is the one most of us pick: standing in the middle, wanting both, paying for neither, and calling it "not deciding" as if that weren't a decision of its own.

Final Thought

Most of us aren't trapped. We just won't say the "but" out loud because the moment you do, I want this, but I'm afraid of that, you hear how small the "but" is next to the "this." And standing still stops feeling safe. It starts to feel like starving your soul of nourishment that is just there within reach.

So maybe that's the next right step this week: catch one of your "buts" in the act, say the whole sentence out loud, and notice which way you'd actually walk if you let yourself move.

The donkey never had to die. Neither do the things you want.

Until next week,

Shakila