A comfort zone is that place you find yourself when you know what to expect, and you are comfortable there, even if you are not in a good place.<\/p>\n
Looking back over my life, I have never felt more alive than when I force myself to step outside of my comfort zones. It can be exhilarating, exciting, and sometimes even life altering to step outside of that which is comfortable and explore the realm of possibilities.<\/p>\n
I realize in the past that one of the reasons I’ve stayed firmly inside my comfort zones, even and especially the ones that were not healthy for me emotionally and physically, is because of two little words: trust and faith.<\/p>\n
In order to step outside of your comfort zones, you have to have trust\u2014trust in yourself, trust in those around you, trust in God or something larger than yourself, and trust in the universe itself.<\/p>\n
In order to step outside of your comfort zones, you have to have faith\u2014faith in yourself, faith in those around you, faith in God or something larger than yourself, and faith in the universe itself.<\/p>\n
Both words\u2014faith and trust\u2014were lacking in my life. I did not have faith or trust in my life, not in myself, not in my family, not in those I shared my life with, not in the universe.<\/p>\n
While I thought I had trust and faith in God, the truth is, I often wondered why His plan for me seemed to only bring me down painful paths.<\/p>\n
I’ve since learned that I chose my path, and any blame I put on God was simply my unwillingness to take responsibility for that direction I had chosen to walk.<\/p>\n
I have a hard time putting faith and trust into another person. I know many people who have this same problem. I have learned, over the years, that perhaps the biggest reason for this lack of trust in others was because I didn’t trust myself.<\/p>\n
Human beings tend to project their inner feelings on those around them. We see in others that which we either fear in ourselves or that which we admire and want to hold for ourselves.<\/p>\n
If I didn’t have faith in myself, I surely couldn’t ‘believe’ that anyone else should have faith in me, now could I? If I’m not worthy of faith, then why should anyone else be?<\/p>\n
Learning to have faith and trust in yourself is not an easy path to walk, but it is a worthwhile path to venture.<\/p>\n
Think about this. If you were to learn you were going to die in\u00a0exactly two weeks, without illness, you were just going to\u00a0drop dead, how much of an impact would that make on how you life your life now?\u00a0I’d venture to guess it would have a huge impact on your life,\u00a0and I also bet you would find that it is much easier to step\u00a0out of your comfort zones then too.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ve read stories about people who find out they have a\u00a0terminal illness, and after the initial shock and grief, they sit\u00a0and make lists of all the things they want to do, all the people\u00a0they want to talk to, all the things they want to say before\u00a0they die. Then they set out to do all these things.<\/p>\n
Why should we wait until we are dying to actually start\u00a0living?\u00a0What keeps us from living, truly living, to our fullest potential\u00a0are our comfort zones. It is the unknown, the fear, and the\u00a0fear of the unknown that keeps us stuck in these comfort\u00a0zones.<\/p>\n
It is what we don’t know that scares us, that makes us immobile, keeps us stuck.\u00a0If you had a remote control that you could use to rewind and\u00a0relive any moment in your life, at any time, how differently\u00a0would you live your life?<\/p>\n
Think about it. You want to try something but you don’t know\u00a0how it will turn out, so you don’t try it. Now, if you have this\u00a0remote control and you can try it and know that if it doesn’t\u00a0work out, you can rewind it and do something differently,\u00a0you’d probably give it a go, wouldn’t you?<\/p>\n
When we remove the element of fear, extending trust and\u00a0having faith in yourself and in others is so much easier.<\/p>\n
F E A R !<\/p>\n
When we know we can change an event if it doesn\u2019t turn out\u00a0as expected, there is no fear.<\/p>\n
Fear immobilizes, but truly, there should be no fear. Fear is\u00a0truly just an illusion. The past can’t be changed. The future\u00a0isn’t predestined.<\/p>\n
The only thing that is real is the here and now, and if you live\u00a0completely in the here and now, there can be no fear,\u00a0because as long as you are alive and breathing, there is\u00a0nothing to fear. Not a single moment in time is guaranteed,\u00a0not one.<\/p>\n
I’m the type who likes to plan, to know my future, to know\u00a0what to expect, and learning that I can’t possibly know that,\u00a0can’t possibly plan for every contingency, really is quite terrifying to me… but also exhilarating!<\/p>\n
Everyone should live there life fully. Everyone should live like\u00a0they were dying, every day, because the truth is, you are\u00a0dying. We all are born with a terminal illness. It’s called life.<\/p>\n
No one escapes it. We all will die from life, at some point, so\u00a0shouldn’t we make the most of what we have of it in the here\u00a0and now?<\/p>\n
I’m not asking you to let go of your comfort. I can\u2019t even do\u00a0that. There are things I take comfort in and I will never give\u00a0those things up. But I think that everyone should, on a\u00a0regular basis, push the limits of their comfort zones and see\u00a0where life takes them.<\/p>\n
I’ve learned the trick for me that allows me to step outside of\u00a0my comfort zone now when I had trouble doing so earlier in\u00a0my life. I have learned that I have to detach from my\u00a0expectation of a certain outcome.<\/p>\n
So every day, I find some way to take a leap into my life, into\u00a0my future. I have no idea when or even if I’m ever going to\u00a0land, and if I do land, I have no idea where or how… and\u00a0that’s quite all right with me.<\/p>\n
I am flying!<\/p>\n
Even if I crash at some point in the future from having taken\u00a0a leap, the one thing no one can take from me is the\u00a0experience I had while flying. It\u2019s mine to hold, forevermore, and even if I have to land at some point, I will always have\u00a0the memory of flying to push me forward to the next leap of\u00a0faith.<\/p>\n
Won\u2019t you stop for a moment and look at your own comfort\u00a0zones and ask yourself whether or not you\u2019re ready to take\u00a0that leap?<\/p>\n
Come on, now. Step outside of your comfort zones. Quit dying and start living. Come fly with me.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A comfort zone is that place you find yourself when you know what to expect, and you are comfortable there, even if you are not in a good place. Looking back over my life, I have never felt more alive than when I force myself to step outside of my comfort zones. It can be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-284","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n