IS A COMFORT ZONE ACTUALLY A DANGER ZONE? A comfort zone is defined as "a behavioral space where your activities and behaviors fit a routine and pattern that minimizes stress and risk," (Alan 2019). Comfort zones allow us to live life in a way that provides the least resistance. We avoid hurt, pain or embarrassment, but at what cost? New experiences lead to learning and growing, but this requires taking that first step outside of your comfort zone. 

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In order to discover more about how to take that first step and what the rewards of stepping outside of your comfort zone are, I decided to chose three people that have inspired me to go out of my comfort zone in the past and interview them about what seeking discomfort really means. 

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The three interviewees are all college students, however stepping outside of your comfort zone should by no means stop when you get older. According to Science Daily, "brain health decreases with age, with the average brain shrinking by approximately five per cent per decade after the age of 40." 

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After the age of 40, when most people are living their most stable lives- waking up at 6am, making the kids' lunches for school, driving to work, working in the same cubicle as yesterday, grabbing take out lunch from the same Thai noodle bar down the street, picking up the kids from school, watching the nightly news, ... I think you get my point. The stable and predictable lives that most people strive for are, on the contrary, dangerous. They endanger our ability to grow. 

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I'm not preaching that we should all quit our jobs and backpack around the world and experience a new culture everyday or something crazy like that, but I am here, writing this project, trying to motivate others, and myself, to be comfortable with being uncomfortable, to seek discomfort, whether that mean trying a new restaurant, striking up a conversation with that random person in the elevator, reading a book from a genre you normally avoid, picking up a new hobby...etc. 

 

Whatever it looks like to step outside of your comfort zone I challenge you to take one step each day out of it. Each of these new experiences will teach us something new not only about the people and world around us, but also about ourselves.