Expanding Your Comfort Zone: How to try new things with less anxiety and stress.

Notice I didn’t say going outside your comfort zone. I said expanding your comfort zone because honestly there is nothing wrong with being comfortable. People, however, confuse this with being complacent and that is where you stop growing.

Complacent Zone

After struggling and pushing yourself trying to make your dreams come true and it didn’t happen, it can be exhausting to keep trying, so you just settle. You settle for the life you have thinking this is the best it’s going to get, at least for you. You don’t have the time, energy or resources to change your situation and maybe your situation isn’t that horrible, but it’s also not as fulfilling or enjoyable as you’d hoped it’d be at this point in your life.

Being complacent may not even be your idea. You may have seen it growing up watching those close to you, parents, friends and family, just settle for the life they ended up in without trying for more. They made excuses for all the reasons they couldn’t follow their dreams or change their situation. It’s too risky. You might fail. You could lose everything. People will reject you, judge you. Don’t rock the boat. All the fear-based excuses keep you complacent, not in a comfort zone. Fear is not comfort by a long shot.

Another excuse you may have heard was to be grateful for what you have as if wanting more meant you were being selfish, ungrateful, or greedy. I disagree. You can be grateful you have a good paying job and still want a better job. You can be grateful you have a marriage and still want to improve the quality of the relationship, spend more time together, communicate more and have more sex. What you have can be sufficient and good enough and you can also want more or something different for yourself.

If you haven’t resigned yourself to simply settle for the life you have even if it doesn’t bring you joy and fulfillment, then you’re probably like most people in this world, living in the survival zone. This is what people refer to as “going outside your comfort zone.”

Survival Zone

You’ll hear phrases like you gotta hustle, grind, no pain no gain, the only way to earn good money is to struggle and work hard, struggle makes the reward mean more. Says who? Employers that push the employees to work themselves to death so the administration can make three times as much money while they enjoy weekends and holidays off, and don’t struggle or grind at all? Why are we listening to these outdated beliefs?

When you feel stressed, anxious, on edge, pressured, exhausted, uncomfortable, with racing thoughts of all the possible failures and what if scenarios, how efficient is your work? How successful is your work? How confident do you feel? How about just your memory, focus and concentration? You already know when you’re stressed and anxious you’re not your best self doing your best work. And your people skills probably aren’t too great either.

Long term stress leads to higher levels of cortisol which creates inflammation in the body, heart disease, increased blood pressures, weakens the immune system causing more illnesses and disease, not to mention insomnia and poor-quality of sleep. Eventually all that hustle and pressure to do more and struggle or just to stay so uncomfortable that you’re constantly anxious, catches up with you physically, mentally and emotionally.

The survival zone might be useful if you need to meet a deadline in a couple days or to push through a project on the weekend every once and a while, but it is not productive or fulfilling long term. It’s just exhausting.

If being complacent is taking no action to change your life and survival zone is super high stress, anxiety, pressure to force yourself to keep going and doing constantly, then the comfort zone is the sweet spot.

Comfort Zone

The comfort zone is where your strengths are. It’s where you are your best self, knowing your skills, gifts, talents, abilities, where you radiate confidence, ease, self-esteem and are most successful. It’s being in a state of flow, passion, excitement, creativity, and where you have the most fun, joy, and fulfillment. Your comfort zone feels safe and when you feel safe within yourself you can feel safe, comfortable and confident to then expand your zone to include something new like meeting new people, trying new things, applying for the promotion, asking someone out, posting your first YouTube video, selling your handmade projects you’re so proud of. It’s taking risks without the fear of failure because you’re doing it from a place of fun and expressing who you are, what your skills are, not seeking approval or even money. Those are the bonuses that come from putting yourself out there.

Going outside your comfort zone into survival zone is applying for a job that everyone says would be great for career, a pay raise, better hours, like applying for Sargent or prison counselor, but your personality, talents and skills are not for management or more inmate contact. It’s not something you’d get joy, fulfillment, or excitement out of. It’s not your comfort zone and you’d be in a constant state of stress and pressure.

Your comfort zone may be as an officer. You like your coworkers, and your skills are good with inmates and running a housing unit that is fair, organized, and safe. People respect you and listen to you, but you have no desire to be above them or have to mandate them and keep them from their families. You’re grateful for your job but without being complacent and settling you find ways to expand your comfort zone based on your interest and skills already.

You may get handgun qualified and go on transportation runs so you don’t get bored being in a unit all day and to do something challenging and different. You might sign up for the emergency response team  because you like being part of a team and work well with others. You could talk to the Captain about being assigned a regular unit that you’re in charge of and enjoy the consistency each day knowing what to expect because that makes you feel safer. You could join the union to help coworkers in a different capacity without being “one of the suits.” These are several options for expanding your comfort zone without going outside it into a survival zone of stress and pressure that doesn’t match your personality.

And your comfort zone may have nothing to do with your job. You may choose to stay an officer and just do the job so you can focus your time, energy and skills into wood working on the weekends and selling projects on Etsy or just making gifts for the holidays. It’s still taking a risk, putting yourself out there to face possible rejection but it can be exciting, rewarding, and fulfilling to pursue a passion that could turn into some extra money on the side.

Or maybe your comfort zone is animals or eating all natural, so you expand that zone by raising chickens and you sell some eggs or donate them to the community, and you feel good about yourself for helping out. I’ve had several clients get into raising chickens and getting started is a challenge. It’s learning something new, changing your routine, but if it’s something you’re interested in then it also brings you joy.  

There is nothing wrong with your comfort zone. It doesn’t hold you back. If you want more in life you just need to expand this zone, you don’t have to go outside it and freak out from all the anxiety, stress and trying to be someone you’re not or do it the way other people or society says you have to.

I’ve always known this to be true based on my own experiences with anxiety, being an introvert and questioning the values of society that I’ve never fully agreed with or understood. I’ve always been the person to ask why and never settled for the answer “Because this is how we’ve always done it.” Then I read the book, The Comfort Zone by Kristen Butler, and it reaffirmed what I’ve known all along. If you want a deeper explanation, then I highly recommend you check it out.