How To: Step Outside Your Comfort Zone
Are you playing it safe and hiding in your comfort zone? Do you keep finding reasons or excuses to not move forward with something? Or you don't feel ready enough and keep worrying about what people will think?
Growth can only happen when we step outside of our comfort zone.
That means looking at everything we're scared of and choosing to listen to the voice that says "you can do this!"
One of the best pieces of advice we've ever heard is "act before you're ready." Think less about how all of your worst fears will manifest and instead think about the growth, joy and success that can come from just doing the thing before the voices in your head pipe up!
Here are four tips to help you step outside your comfort zone.
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Revisit your greatest accomplishments: What’s behind every great achievement or big win you’ve ever had? Courage. Comfort keeps us “safe” but also stuck. It keeps us from reaching our highest potential. Courage, on the other hand, prompts us to take a step forward (no matter how little) into the unknown to test the waters. Lean into your courage and remember how it’s served you in the past.
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Visualise your perfect scenario: Once you’ve got a compelling reason to step out of your comfort zone, visualise exactly how you want it to play out. We’re not saying that it actually will unfold that way, but visualisation is a powerful tool to get you in the right mindset. Marinate in that visual long enough to build momentum and courage to propel you into action.
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Make a habit to try something new: Start small and begin to train your brain that straying from the familiar is nothing to fear. Sign up for a new movement class, engage a stranger in conversation, share the poem or essay you wrote with a friend, ask someone you admire if they’de want to have a chat. Make it routine to try new things, and you’ll be surprised at how quickly things you deemed scary are much less intimidating.
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Rationalize your fear: Our brain is wired to keep us safe, but it doesn’t understand the difference between real-life danger and what we feel is just out of comfort zone. So start by identifying the fear that makes something uncomfortable in the first place. Ask yourself, why shouldn’t I proceed with this? If you find that the rationalization is factual, maybe rethink the decision. However, often the rationalization is based on our emotional fears (aka I’m not good enough, I’ll make a fool of myself, etc), try and if that’s the case, try and push through the discomfort and proceed.