How to Pivot to a Future Focus When Relationships Feel Stuck

What happens when a difficult conversation just keeps playing on repeat in your head? You replay what was said, pick apart what you should have done differently, and somehow find yourself feeling worse – not better – the more you think about it. If that sounds familiar, you’re not alone. And there is a way through.

In my most recent live Peaceable session, I shared a three-step framework I’ve developed through ten years of professional mediation practice: how to pivot to a future focus. It’s a way of shifting attention – gently, practically, and with self-compassion – from what’s gone wrong to what you actually want to happen next. In this article, I’m sharing the key points from that session.

You can also watch the full session below: 

 

Why We Get Stuck in Problem Loops

Let me paint two very familiar pictures.

David has had an argument with his sister about their mother’s care. He keeps replaying it: Why did she say that? I should have responded differently. She always does this. His thinking is stuck in what went wrong, rather than what he wants to happen next.

Maria has been in a difficult meeting with a colleague. She can’t stop thinking: I shouldn’t have said that. He completely misunderstood me. Why did he say that in front of everyone? Same loop, different context.

Both David and Maria are caught in what I call a problem loop. And without a conscious pivot to a future focus, these loops can spiral. Sleep suffers. Rumination grows. In families, it can lead to legal disputes over care arrangements. In workplaces, to resignations, HR processes, and people being unable to work together at all.

In my work as a mediator – much of it in health and social care – I’ve seen this pattern unfold many times. Conversations that didn’t go well, left unaddressed, grow into serious relational breakdowns. The cost is real.

Why We Stay Stuck (It Feels Safe)

Here’s something I’ve noticed – and I say this as a note to self as much as anything else. Once relational disconnect begins, we humans tend to believe that if we can just describe the problem enough, the other person will be motivated to come up with a solution. But this is rarely what happens.

In reality, the responsibility for solution-finding sits with us. But taking that on is harder than it sounds – because stating the problem, venting about it, or ruminating on how we were wronged can actually feel safe. Comforting, even. Validating. And if we’re honest, there can sometimes be a certain satisfaction in holding the moral high ground.

Left unchecked, though, rumination leads to dysphoria and low mood, heightened stress and anxiety, and reduced cognitive flexibility – which is precisely what you need to solve the problem.

This is why the pivot to a future focus matters so much – and why it takes a little more than just ‘thinking positively’.

“If you know what you don’t want, you do know what you do want. They are two sides of the same coin.”

 

The Three-Step Pivot to a Future Focus

In the Peaceable session, I walked through three steps that I use with clients in mediation and teach as personal tools. Together, they form a complete pivot to a future focus.

Step 1: Pivot the Action and Outcome

Before you can let go of what’s unwanted, you need to give it voice. This isn’t about dwelling – it’s about release.

Try writing down – ideally with a pen, which can feel cathartic – everything you don’t want. I don’t want this. I don’t want that. Let it all out.

Once that list is written, something shifts. Your nervous system begins to settle. And now – only now – you’re in a position to write the second list: what you do want.

In the live session, I asked participants to think about David – what might he actually want from his situation with his sister? The answers were rich: to feel seen and validated, to be in alignment with his sibling, to have a real say in his mother’s care. One person also wisely noted a desire to reclaim the moral high ground – which is entirely human, and actually important to acknowledge. When we can own those less-comfortable wants (the need to win, to be vindicated), we can stop being owned by them.

This is the pivot to a future focus in its simplest form: from I don’t want to I do want.

Step 2: Pivot the Emotional State – Using Pendulation

Even after we’ve mapped what we want, we may still feel charged. Vigilance feels protective when we sense a threat – and that’s a natural neurological response. The problem is that fight-or-flight takes the prefrontal cortex offline, which is exactly the part of the brain we need for problem-solving, reasoning, and calm communication.

To shift out of this state, I use a technique called pendulation – drawn from somatic therapy and trauma-informed care. It involves deliberately moving between something activating and something calming, rather than staying stuck at the difficult end.

In practice, it sounds like this:

I worry that when she doesn’t reply to my messages, it’s because she doesn’t care about me.

I hope I can find a way to communicate with her more effectively.

I worry that being put on a performance improvement plan means my job is at risk.

I hope I can find a way to discuss this with my manager, and I hope I can cope well.

Notice that the hope is always about I – not I hope she… or I hope they… Placing hope outside ourselves slides into wishful thinking. Keeping it within our control turns it into something genuinely powerful.

You can use this with others too. When someone is stuck and frozen, simply ask: “What are you worried about right now?” Listen. Then, with warmth: “And what is your hope?” That gentle pendulation between worry and hope – repeated as many times as needed – begins to build data in the brain’s database of possibility.

Step 3: Pivot to the Aspirational Future – The Miracle Question

The final step in the pivot to a future focus is the most expansive. Here, we bypass doubt, impossibility, and uncertainty (all of which our brains amplify for self-protection) and allow ourselves to fully imagine the desired outcome.

The technique I use for this is the Miracle Question, from Solution-Focused Brief Therapy. It was Steve de Shazer who articulated it as a way of helping people describe, in concrete detail, what will be different when the problem is solved.

It goes something like this:

Suppose tonight, while you slept, all your problems were solved. When you awoke tomorrow – what would you notice that told you life had suddenly got better? Who else would notice the difference? What would you see, hear, or find yourself saying?

Or, more simply: What are your best hopes?

I’ve sat with people who’ve spent an entire session describing how hopeless everything is, how impossible the other person is, how stuck they feel. And then I ask: “What are your best hopes?” And I leave silence. And you watch something change in them – they look up (wherever it is we go when we’re imagining), and the words start to come. That is the pivot to a future focus in action. That is where we plant the seed of something new.

The Complete Pivot to a Future Focus – A Quick Summary

Here’s the framework at a glance:

Step 1 – Pivot the Action and Outcome: Write down what you don’t want. Then write what you do want.

Step 2 – Pivot the Emotional State: Use pendulation. “I worry that… I hope I…” Repeat as needed.

Step 3 – Pivot to the Aspirational Future: Ask: “If a miracle had solved this, what would I notice?” Or simply: “What are my best hopes?”

These three steps can be used on yourself, or to support someone else. You can work through them in a journal, in a quiet moment, or in a conversation. They don’t require the other person to be present, or even willing. They start with you – which is always the best place to start.

Recommended further reading: The Conflict Pivot by Tammy Lenski | Handbook of Solution-Focused Conflict Management by Fredrike Bannink

What’s Coming Next in the Peaceable Series

This session on how to pivot to a future focus is part of a growing series of Peaceable live sessions. We’ve already covered Own Your Conflict Style and Keep the Brain in Mind, and the next session – Ask For What You Want – builds directly on this one: now that you know what you want, how do you ask for it? How do you advocate for your needs in a way that doesn’t feel inflammatory, demanding, or overly assertive – but clear, clean, and neutral? That’s where we’re headed next.

 

 

Join the Peaceable Community

If this resonated with you – whether you’re navigating something difficult right now, supporting someone who is, or simply building your toolkit for when conflict arises – I’d love you to be part of the Peaceable community.

You can join us in two ways:

The Peaceable Community – a live, evolving space for people who are facing, managing, or mediating conflict peaceably. Bring your questions, bring your situations. We gather fortnightly for sessions just like this one.

The Peaceable Newsletter on Substack – for updates on upcoming events, new sessions, and practical tools for navigating conflict with more calm and confidence.

There’s room for you. And your questions, your conflicts, your best hopes – they’re welcome here.

Until next time,

Arabella

Mediator | Founder of Peaceable

 

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