Your comfort zone is a place where your behavior is normal, routine and familiar. It provides you with security and certainty. Stepping out of your comfort zone means taking a risk, anxiety and even some stress. Staying in your comfort zone is not a good or bad thing, it’s just where most people tend to stay. Leaving it means you could increase your risk and create some anxiety, which can have positive and negative results. How often do you think about stepping out of your comfort zone? This weekend my family stepped out of our comfort zone together at our local amusement park. There is one ride, the Giant Swing that we had attempted to ride the last two times we went to the park, even stood in line with others, only to step out of line before we got to the front of the line. It was fear and not being comfortable with swinging over the Colorado River running a mere 1400 feet below that kept us from going on this ride. As we arrived my kids said “We have to do the Giant Swing this time. Let’s get over our fear and just do it.” It might have been that many of my kids friends told them they did it but whatever it was, we decided we were ready for the challenge. We stood in line, waited and all the while I think all four of us were thinking about stepping out of line again. As we arrived at the front of the line, I took a deep breath and got on the ride. We were all ready for it. It was amazing and while it did take my breath away a few times, the adrenaline was more fun. It was so fun we even went back and did it again. Guess what; it wasn’t near as scary the second time around. 
We found the magic. You don’t have to do adrenaline to go outside your comfort zone or find the “magic”. Stepping outside your comfort zone at work is something we should all do more often. It’s hard though. Status quo or doing the same thing day after day is so much easier….but it’s boring. You don’t learn anything and you’re not as productive as you could be. In sales and recruiting achieving quota is all about being as productive as you can, so going out of your comfort zone is something we should all do so we can continue to overachieve. Daniel H. Pink, author of “Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us” says that what we are ideally looking for is a place of productive discomfort: “If you’re too comfortable, you’re not productive. And if you’re too uncomfortable, you’re not productive. Like Goldilocks, we can’t be too hot or too cold.” We need to pay more attention and find our “productive discomfort” and find that happy balance of being as productive as we can be and not stuck in our comfort zone for too long. Ask yourself a few questions: Are you challenged? Are you bored? Are you making your quota? Then ask yourself “Would your boss answer the questions the same way you are?” If you’re bored at work, then you are not working to your full potential. Get creative and identify a few new skills or practices you can put into place to push yourself to the next level. Continue to open the door to a few new ideas on a consistent basis and this will give you the opportunity to push yourself just a little harder. By challenging yourself, you will perform better. You’ll see that as you challenge yourself, your comfort zone adjusts so what was difficult in the beginning becomes easier as you repeat it. Motivate yourself today and see if you can find some “magic” and expand your comfort zone. Would love to hear about a time you stepped out of your comfort zone and created some magic!
Are You Stuck in Your Comfort Zone?
