Expanding your comfort zone for leadership success
How to step beyond boundaries to cultivate resilience, embrace change, and achieve leadership excellence.
Have you ever been in a position, where you are endlessly pushed beyond your limits and experience a constant state of stress and overwhelm? Reflecting on my own journey, this was precisely the case during a time when I worked in hospitality. It became a relentless cycle where I craved the familiarity of my Comfort Zone (in other words, the couch and TV series binge-watching), yet the mounting pressure kept pushing me further away from it. During this period, I vividly remember losing sight of what truly mattered in my career and life. The lack of a clear direction, coupled with the nonstop demands, led to a mental and emotional toll.
What I know now about the Comfort Zone would have been incredibly helpful back then. So, I hope me sharing these insights with you will enable you to consider your identity, recharge in the Comfort Zone, and make decisions aligned with your heart and soul.
The Comfort Zone
The outcomes we achieve in both our professional and personal lives are shaped by our existing knowledge and the actions we take based on that knowledge. Simply put, our current position is a reflection of our Comfort Zone.
Our Comfort Zone is equivalent to ‘I know what I know’ and is also commonly referred to as ‘common sense’. In other words, the Comfort Zone defines the boundary condition of our thinking; our paradigm, and how we make sense of the world. The term ‘Comfort Zone’ is sometimes interpreted as something negative, but we must be careful not to alienate ourselves from it, because it definitely has its purpose (especially in today’s busy and ever-changing environment). The critical question we need to ask ourselves is how vast and expansive our Comfort Zone is. Are we feeling insecure, constantly in survival mode, or are we fulfilled and actively pursuing our dreams?
“If the rate of change on the outside exceeds the rate of change on the inside, the end is near.”
~ Jack Welch
Fortunately, the size and quality of our Comfort Zone are directly influenced by something within our control. The expansion, or quality, of our Comfort Zone is determined by how much time we spend in our learning zone by stepping outside our Comfort Zone (trying new things, personal and professional development etc.). The more we invest in the learning zone, the more it integrates into our Comfort Zone, leading to its expansion.
On the contrary, if we seldom venture outside our Comfort Zone, we struggle to keep up with the changes around us, causing our Comfort Zone to contract.
In general terms:
A SMALL COMFORT ZONE is based on a limited and dependent mindset, and equals: surviving, being driven by fear, lack of trust in ourselves etc. For example: “Failure is the opposite of success’, so I’ll stay in my little Comfort Zone and play it safe.”
Versus a LARGE COMFORT ZONE, which is based on an abundant and independent mindset, and encompasses living the dream. It provides more tools, self-trust, certainty, and confidence to face life's challenges. An example would be, "Failure is the pathway to success. Successful people fail more often because they try new things and learn from mistakes, leading to long-term growth and success."
We can probably agree that life does not get easier anytime soon, but we can get better at it by expanding our Comfort Zone. Therefore, it is crucial to invest in the most valuable real estate we possess— the space between our ears!
Activities in the learning zone include signing up for leadership e-learning, watching a daily Ted Talk, joining a club or class in unfamiliar areas, learning a new language, and exploring unexpected topics. The options are endless, allowing us to try new things and broaden our horizons.
“Courage is one step ahead of fear.”
~ Coleman Young
The Panic Zone
If we try to achieve or expect too much in too little time from ourselves and/or others, then we literally push ourselves or them over the edge [pictured with a green dotted line] and end up in the Panic Zone. Spending a prolonged amount of time in this state is not sustainable and stress, anxiety and burnout are the consequences.
In this state, we crave our Comfort Zone more than ever, and our Comfort Zone starts to shrink because we cannot keep up with the advancements around us. In this state, fear kicks in, comparing the future to past experiences, creating an unresourceful 'complex equivalence,' expecting the future to mirror the past. This sets the stage for a self-fulfilling prophecy as our focus shapes our reality.
Extended stays in the Panic Zone can lead to burnouts and depression. Mental and emotional wellbeing becomes increasingly challenging in today's demanding and ever-changing environment with high expectations. To address this, we must:
- Think of new, sustainable identities
- Recover and recharge our energy in the Comfort Zone
- Find new inspiration and start making decisions that are loyal and honour heart and soul to again step outside the Comfort Zone, sustainably!
Let's step back and focus on something often forgotten amid life's chaos.
The Magic Circle
Each time we expand our Comfort Zone, the unfamiliar becomes more familiar. This growth brings us closer to the 'Magic Circle,' representing our goals, vision, and purpose aligned with our time, money, and energy investments.
“If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favourable.”
~ Lucius Annaeus Seneca
The challenge is that our 'Magic Place' may seem distant. How do we get there?
We must encourage ourselves and others to step outside the Comfort Zone, within reason. Stepping into a new area costs energy to absorb new thinking, perspectives, and actions. Therefore, it's crucial to return to the Comfort Zone periodically, recharge without guilt, and have sufficient energy for sustainable ventures outside the Comfort Zone.
“An empty tank will take you exactly nowhere; take some time to refuel.”
~ Steve Jobs
Consistent application of this strategy expands our Comfort Zone. The Learning Zone becomes a part of our expanded Comfort Zone, and the old Panic Zone transforms into our new Learning Zone. With repetition, we eventually reach our Magic Place with comfort, confidence, and ease.
Here are some key points and attributes for reaching our ‘Magic Circle’ over time.
- Awareness and willingness to think differently and embracing unfamiliar situations
- Curiosity and desire to go where we’ve never gone before
- Recognition of our self-empowerment, and the choice between allowing fear and doubt to keep us in our Comfort Zone OR courage and self-trust to step out
- Attitude change towards challenges by seeing them as opportunities
- Commitment towards keeping promises we make to ourselves and others
- Taking the action required for change
And once we reached our port, our ‘Magic Circle’, there are two important things we must do:
-
Celebrate our success
Providing us with a sense of achievement, fulfilment and determination to keep going and to keep expanding our Comfort Zone
-
Set new and bigger goals
Avoiding complacency and preventing our Comfort Zone from shrinking by setting sail to reach a port a little further away
Let’s keep in mind the universal law about growth: Everything is either growing or dying - there is no middle ground. In order for us to grow both personally and professionally, we must be willing to constantly push beyond your current boundaries, sustainably and in balance by recharging our energy.
Leadership. Success. Unpacked.
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