Have you heard of this thing called your comfort zone? Let’s chat about how your comfort zone could be hindering your business and what you can do to change it.
Listen Now or Download:
Training:
We each have a way of protecting ourselves from things that could potentially be dangerous. This dates back to caveman times when things that were new or frightening could be potentially life threatening. In our lives today, our comfort zones will kill our businesses!
Let’s quickly define what a comfort zone is. A Comfort Zone is a place where we feel secure, happy and content. It is a place where things don’t often change or cause us stress or anxiety. This space can be mental or physical.
While a comfort zone isn’t necessarily a bad thing, it isn’t necessarily a good thing either. Within a comfort zone, there is no change. Things pretty much always stay the same. If you are living the life of your dreams, this place might be your happiness, but MOST people find that they aren’t happy with things just as they are and in order to change life as it is right now, you need to stretch your comfort zone.
Stretching your comfort zone
Think of your comfort zone as a rubber band. This band is to help keep you in that place of optimal anxiety where stress and change are minimal. What would happen in you were to run as fast as you could with that rubber band attached to your back? SNAP! Right back into place, right back where you came from. But what would happen instead of you took half a step further than you have been? There would still be resistance and a bit of discomfort, but eventually, the rubber band would stretch out just a bit and you would have expanded your area of comfort.
There is a place called Optimal Anxiety. This is the place where you are slightly uncomfortable, but not extremely uncomfortable. In this area, your stress levels are slightly elevated, but you are also changing things up. You are getting outside of the normal and the everyday into undiscovered areas. THIS is the place where all the magic is going to happen!!
How do you know that you are in the area of Optimal Anxiety? Think of an athlete before a big game or a politician or keynote speaker before the game or performance. They feel a bit of stress, a tiny amount or pressure to perform, but they aren’t so afraid of the task at hand that they are paralyzed by fear. The stress and slight burst of adrenaline that they are experiencing actually helps to focus them in on the task at hand and preform at their best.
For you, this might be a challenge that helps you to meet new people or do something that you wouldn’t normally do. Something like giving away a piece of free jewelry or giving a compliment to 5 people a week can push you outside your comfort zone by pushing you to talk to new people.
Have you heard of the rejection guy? This guy set a goal to get rejected for 100 days. 100 days!!! He asked random people things like “Can I play soccer in your back yard?” and he also asked if he could borrow a dog from the Humane Society for a day. Some of his rejections were completely crazy, but there were some GREAT lessons he learned from the experiment and it’s totally inspiring. If you want some help in getting outside your comfort zone, check out some of his videos or his book Rejection Proof.
Let’s do a quick experiment. Fold your arms across your chest like you would if you were saying a prayer. Notice which arm is on top and which is on the bottom. Now trade. Does it feel weird? It totally does, right?! Keep ‘um folded…
After a few minutes, you will adjust to the new way to fold your arms, and while it might not be your favorite still, it won’t be AS uncomfortable. THIS is your goal! You want to start to stretch and grow your comfort zone so that you are constantly growing and developing!
This way, you won’t get stuck in a rut. It keeps you growing and learning and trying new things! If I had stayed in my comfort zone, I would never have joined Paparazzi. I would never be talking to strangers about $5 jewelry. I would have missed out on so many friendships and opportunities AND I wouldn’t have traveled to amazing international destinations. What would you be missing out on if you always stayed inside your comfort zone?
Now, let’s think about what would happen if you stretched your comfort zone a little bit more?! Would you grow your team? Would you be hitting new ranks or getting a massive paycheck? The sky is the limit!
So let’s do it!! What are you going to do this week to break out of the normal?
Resources:
Call Challenge:
The challenge for this episode is to choose 2 ways that you are going to stretch your comfort zone this week and then DO them! A few suggestions are:
- -give 5 compliments to people
- -give away 2 pieces of jewelry
- -go to a networking event in your area
- -call a potential host an ask her to do a party for you
- -call someone you thing would be a GREAT paparazzi consultant ans ask if it is something she would be interested in