Our comfort zone is like our home. It’s where things are familiar, restful, and normal. We rarely leave our comfort zone unless we’re forced into a new situation, like a job promotion that would cause us to speak in front of others or having to move to a new location.
The truth is some of us won’t step out of our comfort zones, even for a small step. But did you know that by staying in our comfort zone, we are keeping ourselves from growing, both personally and professionally.
In fact, when you step out of your comfort zone you are inspired to do it more often. This “facing your fear” helps you grow more confident in your abilities.
Stepping out of your comfort zone isn’t easy and you’ll have to find ways to push yourself. You’ll want to set yourself up for success when you do. If not, a wrong turn out of your comfort zone can lead you to never trying again. But you can’t let fear rule you either. You have to find a balance.
Before you take that leap, you need to know why and how your comfort zone is keeping you small; and you need to know if you are stuck in hiding in your comfort zone.
Your Comfort Zone Keeps You Small
By staying in your comfort zone, you miss out on opportunities that stretch and strengthen you. Compare being in your comfort zone to lifting weights. At first, your muscles ache from lifting the weight. But as you continue to lift, your muscles grow stronger. The same is true with your weaker skills. With training, they grow stronger.
For instance, maybe you’re an introvert who’s great at organizing and has a keen eye for detail. But as part of a job promotion, you need to recruit others. So, you step out of your comfort zone and learn how to sell to others. This may scare you, but your skills will grow and expand as you learn.
Your comfort zone has a way of keeping you from advancing in your career, goals and in life. When you strengthen your skills, they help you to be better prepared to achieve your goals. Having bettered yourself, you open the door for new opportunities for advancement. You’re no longer limited or passed over because you were afraid to go for the skills needed.
Stepping out of your comfort zone keeps your life from becoming dull. Outside of your comfort zone, you can find many ways to find excitement. If it’s scary to jump into a sport, start small.
Sometimes embarrassment can keep you in your comfort zone. We’re afraid of looking foolish for doing something. This keeps us from doing things we enjoy or might want to pursue. It keeps you from changing personally and advancing in your career and life.
When to Push the Boundary
There are methods and strategies you can use to help you decide when and where you should be pushing your comfort zone boundary so you can grow. Fear is the main thing that keeps us in our safe area, but by pushing against our boundaries in strategic ways, it becomes easier each time we attempt it.
Use these tactics to help you.
Evaluate before you jump. Is what you are contemplating worth it? Put the fear aside and ask yourself if you would do whatever it is if there was not risk of failure, not stress and no fear. Try reframing the situation.
For example, if you are an introvert and you are invited to a networking event that would advance your career, you might be anxious and say you really don’t want to advance. However, if you reframe your thinking into imagining you’re just going to a friend’s house for a party where a lot of the people in your industry happen to be as well.
Look at your current schedule. When presented with an opportunity, decide if you have to accept it. You need time to work on building your skills or getting trained. You might have to learn how to handle the stress of the unknown in the new situation. Calculate how long it will take to participate as well as the planning and learning you’ll need to do beforehand.
For example, you are asked to speak at an event. The actual speech is only 20 minutes long and the event is for 2 hours. But you’ll need time to prepare, research and write the speech as well as practicing it so you will be comfortable giving it. This takes time you need to put into your schedule.
Get prepared to make your move. As we just saw, you need to prepare before you leap out of your comfort zone into some unknown endeavor. Determine what you need to do and what you need to accomplish. What steps do you need to take? What skills need developing? These steps help build your confidence to make the full jump out of your comfort zone.
Implementing these tactics as you learn to push out the boundary of your comfort zone will help make the transition a bit more comfortable. Taking small steps and preparing yourself beforehand helps the fear be less powerful.
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