Every Great Story Has This

• 💡 Wisdom

• ✏️ Illustration

• 💬 Saying

• 🧭 Explanation

• 📝 Reflection

Estimated reading time: 4 minutes, 2 seconds

True growth comes from stepping out of your comfort zone.

By challenging yourself you will evolve personally, develop new skills and adapt to new situations.

Will you accept the invitation to step out of your comfort zone?

Today’s illustration comes from personal experience:

Life is much more expansive when you step outside of your comfort zone.

Sure, it is more dangerous, but there is beauty to experience.

You were born to fly.

Today’s saying comes courtesy of American author Neale Donald Walsch:

Take a moment to think of your favourite story; fiction or nonfiction.

It is likely that it starts with someone stepping outside of their comfort zone.

• Frodo and the other hobbits left the familiarity of the Shire in The Lord of the Rings in an attempt to destroy the One Ring and prevent Lord Sauron returning to power.

• Mulan leaves the comfort of her home life by disguising herself as a man to take her unwell father's place in the army, ultimately becoming a courageous warrior that saves her country from invaders.

• Even inspirational Marie Curie found herself outside of her comfort zone by stepping into a male-dominated industry. She would go on to become a groundbreaking scientist in her own right, becoming the first person to win multiple Nobel Prizes.

In all of these examples, they experienced frightening revelations, intimidating challenges and undeniable discomfort, but they learned from these experiences, became stronger and ultimately fulfilled their potential.

Your life and your story begins when you step outside of your comfort zone too.

We all like our comfort zones, right? They wouldn’t be comfort zones if they weren’t comfortable.

We all can testify that much of our growth has come when we have stepped outside of our comfort zones too.

Whether it was learning a new skill, a new language, starting a new job, making a new friend - whatever - you have had to be vulnerable and step outside of your zone of comfort to reap the rewards.

Despite that, many of us still struggle to step outside of our comfort zones.

We fear the danger, embarrassment and cost associated with taking that step.

So here’s 3 tips to help you step out of your comfort zone:

1. Start small.

   I had the pleasure of working with Patrick Regan OBE for his book launch of Brighter Days, and one of the principles that he speaks about is “Small steps are still steps.”

   If you are stepping out of your comfort zone for the first time, know that even a small step is progress.

2. Redefine discomfort.

   Many of us see discomfort as a negative thing, but does it have to be?

   When we recognise the value that one experiences when we step outside of our comfort zone, the way that we feel about discomfort changes.

3. Celebrate wins.

   One of the best things that you can do to reinforce a behaviour is to celebrate when you do it.

   In this context, you will benefit from recognising your achievements after you have stepped out of your comfort zone.

   It doesn’t have to be a big win, but make sure that you celebrate it.

Unpack how you could apply these 3 tips in today’s Reflection.

Here are 2 journal prompts to help you explore today’s wisdom:

• Consider the last time that you stepped out of your comfort zone. What did you learn from that experience? What is a win that you could celebrate from that experience?

• What is one area of your life where you feel stagnant? What is a small, actionable step that you can take to step out of your comfort zone this week?

Want to learn more about journaling? Join Journal Wiser today!

By now, you’ll know that I am a big fan of TED Talks.

Today’s presentation comes courtesy of Yubing Zhang, where she shares her experience

She shares her 7-word phrase that she recites to overcome the fear that we all experience before we step outside of our comfort zone.

You can watch it here:

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Catch you in the next issue!

Thanks,
Michael