YOUR DISCOMFORT ZONE

#42 - YOUR DISCOMFORT ZONE is that large area outside your comfort zone where you may feel awkward, challenged, or just plain uncomfortable.  As a new leader, you"ll have to get comfortable with discomfort and learn to live in your DIS-comfort Zone in a mindful way.  Life begins at the end of your comfort zone.

Transcript

Hello and welcome to Keys For New Leaders, a podcast Serving Leaders Serving Others.  This is your host, Dr. Charles Boyer, but just call me Charlie, my friend.  Thank you so much for listening.  If you’re joining us for the first time, a big warm welcome to you!  Serving Leaders Serving Others is what we’re all about.  In this series of podcasts, my goal is to serve you, the new leader, helping you serve others through sharing ideas, helpful hints, suggestions, inspiration, insights, encouragement and sometimes a laugh or two to lighten the load along the way.

If you haven’t already done so, please click on the subscribe or the follow button on your podcast platform so you won’t miss any new episodes.  As always, if you stick around to the end of the episode, I always ask a few questions that are just for you to think about and answer for yourself.  And, I also include a Special Key for you as well to highlight the main points of this podcast.

This is Episode #42, and we’re going to talk about Your DIS-comfort Zone.   Now what in the world is that – a DIS-comfort zone?  Well, I’m sure we’re all familiar with our comfort zone – where to find it, how good it feels when we’re in it, and how contented we are just to hang out there for awhile.  The DIS-comfort zone is just the opposite.  It's that large area outside your comfort zone where you are pushed, pulled or prodded to step outside your usual area of comfort, where you feel awkward, or challenged, or out of sync with what’s going on around you.  We’ve all been there.  It’s where a lot of learning takes place, skills are developed, and where a lot of personal and professional growth occurs.

As a new leader, you are most certainly well aware of your DIS-comfort zone.  Serving others as a leader brings on all sorts of new challenges, even more so as a NEW leader.  There is a lot to learn, adaptations you must make, and obstacles to overcome.  But as the saying goes, life begins at the end of your comfort zone.  Welcome to the world of leadership.

Adam Grant, in his book “Hidden Potential” writes that we should be “creatures of discomfort” and that we should “embrace the unbearable awkwardness of learning.”  I love that description – “the unbearable awkwardness of learning.”  The learning process brings with it a lot of dis-comfort.  It’s awkward. It’s uncomfortable. It’s making a lot of mistakes.  It’s a lot of trial and error, and then trying again and again.  Think about it – a child takes a lot of falls in the process of learning to walk.  Thank goodness the child is a lot closer to the ground than most of us.  And that child is not afraid of getting up and trying again, and again, and again.  With a lot of practice, a lot of trial and error, her discomfort eventually becomes her comfort zone as she learns to walk.

Learning anything new involves a lot of YOU being in your DIS-comfort zone -- making mistakes and learning from those mistakes, of trial and error and then trying again and again.  Have you ever wondered what those first few wobbly times on the ice must have felt like to a professional hockey player?  Or what those first few notes must have sounded like for a concertmaster violinist (or his parents)?  Thank goodness they didn’t stop making mistakes and kept at it until they really became great at what they were doing.

It’s easier when we’re young and don’t feel so uncomfortable about making a mistake.  That DIS-comfort zone seems to expand as we grow older and we begin to be more self-conscious, to worry about feeling awkward or looking foolish or wondering what other people think.  If it’s any consolation, though, what I’m experiencing is that eventually I’m getting to the age of not minding so much feeling awkward or looking foolish.  I’m just old so I can use that as an excuse.  If I make a mistake trying something new – so what?  I just chalk it up to old age – and keep going!

I tried something entirely new a few days ago.  I baked some bread.  I have never done that before in my life.  I watched a couple of videos and it didn’t look too difficult, so I gave it a try.  I was lucky.  The first loaf was pretty good, so a few days later, I tried baking another loaf.  That one was a doorstop.  A few more days and I tried a third one.  That was a little better than the first loaf, so maybe I’m headed in the right direction.  My DIS-comfort zone shrunk a little and my comfort zone grew a little, so I’m going to try again in a few days.

Talk about more DIS-comfort:  my sister and I made a pact with each other, a friendly challenge, to declutter our houses, to clean out the fridge, freezer, closets, etc., a little bit at a time, but to keep at it –  you know, sort of like eating an elephant.  Just a bite at a time and someday the job will be done.  And just like those bites of elephant, decluttering involves a LOT of DIS-comfort, but we’re finding that the end result is a lot more pleasant – no spoiled or outdated food in the fridge and kitchen cabinets,  the garage is beginning to look less like a war zone, and half a closet full of things I didn’t wear anymore are at the thrift shop where someone will get the good out of them, as Grandma used to say.

One of the biggest DIS-comfort zones for a lot of people is speaking in front of a crowd.  For most of us, it feels awkward at best, and more than a bit terrifying most of the time.  Yes, I’ve been there and done that, too.  Sweaty palms and dry mouth time.  Once when I was on my way to speak at a national conference, I happened to pick up a magazine and found the following gem:

“The human mind is a wonderful thing.  It starts working the minute you’re born and never stops – until you get up to speak in public.”

I wish I knew who wrote that brilliant tidbit.  It gave me a few chuckles then as I read it over and over, and it gave me the confidence I needed to get through my talk – as well as a round of tension-breaking laughs from the audience when I read that to them before I began my presentation.

Now, enough about my DIS-comfort zone.  How about YOU?  What’s in YOUR DIS-comfort zone?  What is it that makes your palms sweat and your mouth go dry?  What makes you feel awkward, embarrassed, worried about being judged?  C’mon now, you’ve got to name it and claim it.

You’re OK.  It’s normal to feel some discomfort and resistance around new and different things that are happening to you and all around you.  Just keep in mind that your best chance for growth as a new leader is to get comfortable with discomfort.  There will be lots of it.  The good news is that a short time in your DIS-comfort zone tends to increase your long-term comfort zone.

So, what can you do to take advantage of some of that time you are spending in your DIS-comfort zone?  Well, for one thing, you can practice discomfort.  Start small.  Take one bite at a time.  Find something that puts you in your DIS-comfort zone and make the effort to take just one step to start to do whatever it is.  Ask yourself: what have you always wanted to do or learn but haven’t had the nerve to get started yet?  Then just do it – take that first step.  If it’s playing the banjo, start pickin’.  If it’s speaking in public, practice your talk in front of a mirror.  If you’re a couch potato, begin with one simple exercise each day – and stay with it!  The more you get into what’s DIS-comforting, the more it will begin to be comfortable for you.

If you’re facing a huge DIS-comfort project, chunkify it.  Break that big project down into smaller parts or steps.  What’s the first step you can and will take, and then do it.  As you get comfortable with that first step, then go for the next step – and keep going!

Another thing you can do is to give yourself permission to make mistakes.  We all do, you know.  If you’re not making any mistakes, you’re selling yourself short and you’re not learning very much.  An occasional mistake is a part of the process of living.  Just don’t plan to stay in mistake mode and don’t quit trying.  Learn from your mistakes and make a commitment to do things better the next time.

Be flexible.  If you get in a rut, doing the same thing in the same way time after time, be careful.  Those ruts can become giant potholes of comfort to wallow around in.  Do something different or do the same task in a different way.  If a big obstacle is in your way, start looking for ways around it, under it, over it, through it. 

Discomfort isn’t all bad.  Discomfort can be a positive force in our lives.  Just think, without the discomfort of a grain of sand, the oyster wouldn’t produce a pearl.  Look for the possibilities for growth, for learning, for new ways to solve old problems.  Learn to live in your DIS-comfort zone in a mindful way.   Get comfortable with discomfort.  Remember that life begins at the end of your comfort zone.

And now, here are three questions just for you to think about and answer for yourself.  There aren’t any right answers, just the answers that are right for you.  Here they are:

1.    What is one thing you have always wanted to do but haven’t had the nerve to get started doing it?

2.    What is the first step you will take in the next week to start doing that one thing?

3.    How can your DIS-comfort zone become a positive force in your life?

What’s the Special Key for this episode?  Well actually, there are two:  the Key of D for your DIS-comfort zone, and then moving to the Key of C for the positive energy you’ll find in your expanded Comfort zone.

In the next episode, we’ll talk about – well, just a minute.  If you notice, at the end of each podcast, I always announce what the next episode will be about.  That forces me into my DIS-comfort zone to start preparing the next episode right away.  It begins to get comfortable again when that next episode is recorded, edited, and finally published for you to listen to. 

With that said, the next episode will be about your Agility Ability, no, not the “leap tall buildings” kind of agility, but the ability to lead by being flexible, innovative, and resourceful, all things and more that a leader must be able to do and demonstrate these days.

Until then, stay safe and well, my friend.  Enjoy basking in your comfort zone, but  be sure to visit your DIS-comfort Zone now and then.  As former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt said, “Do one thing every day that scares you.”  Here’s wishing you a few scary days ahead, my friend.