Agghh! Get out of your comfort zone!
Me: “How about going to the movies on Wednesday evening?”
Friend: “I can’t do it on Wednesday evening! That’s when I wash my hair, get a pizza delivery and watch TV.”
You’d have thought I’d asked her to climb Everest in her slippers.
This was the response I received from a very habituated friend. She’d turned me down frequently. I felt sad as I witnessed her increasing unwillingness to step outside her shrinking comfort zone. Now, even an evening out at the movies had become a big deal.
We’ve all got routines. The trouble starts when the routine begins making the decisions for us.
What is a comfort zone?
Your comfort zone is made up of the familiar things you do, think and expect every day. And while many routine practices are beneficial, Too much routine can quietly shrink your world.The more habituated you become, the harder it might be to step outside your habitual behaviour.
Your resilience may suffer.
“Nobody ever died of discomfort, yet living in the name of comfort has killed more ideas, more opportunities, more actions, and more growth than everything else combined. Comfort kills!” – T. Harv Eker.
Habits: The good and the … not so good
Repeating a task, noticing and fixing errors along the way, is an excellent approach to embed new learning. You need practice to become proficient. Once you’ve learnt something new, use repetition and practice to turn knowledge into skill. Each time you rehearse a task, you’ll strengthen the related neural pathways. After a while, those neural pathways become more like superhighways. The task becomes easier. Practice a little longer and you’ll be completing it on autopilot. You’ve formed a new habit.
Thinking processes operate the same way
When you repetitively think the same thoughts, you strengthen the neural pathway so that, after a while, the neural network fires automatically. Your thinking functions without conscious thought. You might only realise you’re thinking the same thoughts when you’re well into the process! That’s one reason negative thinking can feel so convincing.
It isn’t necessarily true. It’s simply well practised.
If that thinking is holding you back, or keeping you stuck in your normal way of doing things, then you might want to change it — and quickly!
A comfort zone — or a prison?
You don’t build your prison overnight. It’s built one small decision at a time.
“Not today.”
“Maybe next week.”
“That’s not really me.”
Eventually the walls become invisible because you’ve lived inside them for so long.
There’s nothing wrong with having a comfort zone. We all need places, people and routines that help us feel safe. The problem starts when comfort quietly turns into avoidance.
If you have set ways of doing everything, you might struggle to face challenging times with resilience. Habituated people may not have the fluid thinking ability, experience or emotional strength to cope in challenging times.
Continuing to develop and grow; stepping outside of habituated behaviours is essential to prevent a comfort zone becoming a prison.
Generate fresh and creative thought
Expand your comfort zone by learning new things. For example, since moving into my tiny house, I’ve learnt about water pumps, grey water systems, growing vegetables and just how little stuff I actually need to be happy.
Remain in your old patterns and you’ll stagnate.
And stagnation breeds inflexibility.
It’s essential to keep learning, even though the learning process often feels uneasy — awkward even. But learning stimulates your brain and creates new neural connections. It will also prevent you from becoming an exceedingly dull person!
A new task will feel more comfortable the second time. Do it a few more times, and it will begin to feel more natural. Soon it will flow and become part of your day-to-day life. The task now falls within your familiar routines.
Your comfort zone has expanded.
The edge of your comfort zone is where magic happens
Think back to learning to drive. You had to coordinate your hands and feet, watch the mirrors, judge speed, notice road signs, anticipate other drivers and somehow remember which pedal was which. At first it felt impossible. Now you probably drive while chatting to a passenger, listening to the radio and, if we’re being completely honest, occasionally eating a sandwich.
Once you can competently drive, even those complex coordination skills become an additional part of your familiar routines.
How to live a vital, fulfilling and resilient life
Instead of always choosing the familiar, deliberately try something different.
Start small. You don’t have to take up an extreme sport like bungee jumping — but feel free if the urge takes you! Try something much less death-defying, such as cleaning your teeth with your toothbrush in your non-dominant hand.
Learn to use a new app or software. Take up a new interest, learn public speaking or a foreign language. Go to dancing or yoga classes. Read a book you wouldn’t normally read. Teach yourself to play an instrument — or try anything unfamiliar that makes you feel a little uncomfortable.
Expand your thinking
Whenever you learn something, your thinking expands. Frequently you can apply aspects of what you’ve discovered to other contexts — which also helps cement that learning. For example, learning to dance might help your coordination in your chosen sport. Mastering public speaking could help build your confidence for training staff at work, or doing sales presentations.
Sometimes the biggest benefit isn’t the new skill itself. It’s discovering you’re capable of learning something you once thought you couldn’t.
How to know if you’re stuck in a rut
If every suggestion is met with “I’ve never done that before, your world may already be shrinking.
A sage once claimed that a rut is just a coffin with an open lid!
Change is a certainty
Change is one thing in life that’s inevitable. Learning helps you build the physical, mental or emotional resources before you need them.
Ironically, staying exactly the same often requires more effort than adapting. The world keeps moving. Technology changes. Relationships change. Our bodies change. We either grow with those changes or spend our energy resisting them.
Key points about your comfort zone
- Habits save mental energy.
- Too many habits reduce flexibility.
- Learning keeps your brain adaptable.
- Small challenges build resilience.
- Expand your comfort zone before life forces you to.
Every time you try something unfamiliar, you’re teaching yourself something far more important than the task itself. You’re proving that you can adapt.
That confidence carries into every other area of life.
So this week, do one thing that’s just outside your usual routine. Nothing dramatic. You don’t need to throw yourself out of a plane or wrestle crocodiles. Simply choose something that makes you think, I’ve never done that before.
You might discover a new hobby. You might discover a hidden talent.
Or you might simply discover that your comfort zone was never meant to be where you lived. It was just somewhere to rest before heading off on your next adventure.
After all, a comfort zone is a wonderful place to visit. It’s just a terrible place to build your permanent address.
Thinking about strengthening your resilience? I’m sure you’ll find Building Resilience When Life Gets Messy really useful.
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Tags: Resilience, Self-awareness, Thinking and mindset
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