Why is it important to stretch out of your Comfort Zone? Ask yourself this: What might you be sacrificing, missing out on, if you aren’t open to trying something new? While staying in your bubble of safety, what potential possibilities are passing you by?
Earlier today I was reflecting on the sense of joy, pride, and celebration I’m experiencing as I watch my 10-year-old son push himself outside his comfort zone this summer. He has embraced new adventures on a regular basis with open arms. I admire his bravery when he openly shares his sense of trepidation, apprehension – the butterflies in his stomach – but he still barrels in head-first. And I delight in the exuberant joy when a new experience is unexpectedly amazing. Of course, there have been moments of overwhelming relief when a new adventure is decidedly not awesome – but still that sense of accomplishment. The most incredible transformation is my son’s sense of overall self-confidence. While he’s blessed to be a good student who makes friends easily, COVID stole some of the team building, adventure-seeking experiences from his age group. As a result, this summer has been packed with new challenges, accomplishments, adventures, and celebration.
My reflection got me thinking about my own white-knuckle journey over the last 18 months. Not just the “Leap Before I Look” attitude I adopted, but my lack of acknowledgment and celebration that I took the box of crayons I had been using to color my picture-perfect pastel life and decided to, instead, choose the neon brights, scribble with reckless abandon, and create something new and vibrant.
I found the Comfort Zone’s EXIT sign, and never looked back.
Yes, I had a comfortable, lucrative corporate career that was also exhausting, unfulfilling, and required no less than 80% of me. I had very little left to give to my family or myself. While the picture looked exactly “right” it could not have been more wrong. As this suspicion dawned on me, I conducted my own honest life/values alignment audit. And I failed miserably.
So, as I was knocking on the door of my 50th birthday, I abandoned the secure paycheck, the comfort of HR jobs where I was technically proficient but held little passion, and steered my head and heart into a new career that rekindled the fire in my soul. My creativity sparked again, and it encouraged my desires to write, learn, share, and grow to WAKE UP, and endeavor to spend the next 50 years making this world a little better than I found it.
It’s been Terrifying. Humbling. Rewarding. Joy-filled. Challenging. Awesome. Come to think of it, I suspect a lot like my son’s been feeling this entire summer, in fact.
What are the benefits of taking the risk and stepping outside your own Comfort Zone? Here are the Big 4 from my perspective:
1. Creativity – get your juices flowing and wake up your imagination!
2. Change resilience – change stops looking so scary, but more like an adventure waiting to be experienced
3. Confidence and inner strength – face your fears, take the risk, celebrate the accomplishments, learn from the failures, and realize you did something you’ve never done before – how cool is that?
4. Fun of adventure and discovery – While typing this I caught myself humming a Disney tune from the movie Moana, where the title character sings, “One day I’ll know, if I go, there’s just no telling how far I’ll go.” I really can’t say it any better than Disney!
I know the Comfort Zone is tempting because it is comfortable. But I genuinely believe it’s wallpapered with sticky notes, letters, e-mails, and shadows of regrets. Adventures not realized. For me, as I turned 50, I realized life is meant to be lived, not preparing to die. And I don’t want to look back someday and wonder, “What if I’d only…” or “Why didn’t I..” but rather, “Can you believe I/we did that, and it worked?!?” In the end, telling regret to take a Time Out was a pretty compelling reason to exit the Comfort Zone. What will it take for you?
