Sometimes, when I think I'm in a comfort zone, I wonder if it's good to stay in the comfort zone or get out of the zone and do something challenging. Many fear factors can make us stay in our comfort zone. I have experienced this and continue to stay in my comfort zone despite all the fear factors.
Sometimes when you talk to people who have taken risks in their lives, they might say that it is okay to stay in the comfort zone as long as we can make a good work-life balance. When it starts to take risks in life, anything can happen. We may be unable to return to the same comfort zone again and our life might change completely.
When to challenge the comfort zone
The first thing that I can think of is when there is no growth for us. Mostly comfort zone is something referred to in career opportunities. If we are not learning anything new in our current job, then that's the right time to challenge our comfort zone.
Sometimes we might think that what we are doing is always right and we might even have an environment where others won't even challenge us if we say something. This is a dangerous environment. The reason is that there should always be someone who can challenge what we are doing. This way we will be able to try something different and also make sure we improve the current process.
The next important thing is when we are doing the same thing again and again. If we are not doing anything different and just doing the same set of tasks again and again without any learning. Then that is again the moment to challenge the comfort zone. There should be some learning and repetitive tasks might have lesser learning compared to doing something new.
Finding a solution
If we are sure that we are in our comfort zone, then there are several ways to get out of our comfort zone. We can choose a method to get out of our comfort zone and start doing something good. It is okay to take some calculated risks. Before taking the risk it is good to plan accordingly so that we are able to escape even if the risk that we took did not turn out to be a good one.
Changing from the current role or the current project or moving to a new place are all good changes. This change is healthy because it will make us do something different in our life and that will indeed give us confidence to keep going. To do any of these things, we have to step out of our comfort zone.
The best way to deal with the problem of comfort zone is to learn something new. It can be a new skill or it can even be a new book that we are reading. Doing something new or learning something new will give us some challenges and when we overcome those challenges, we will be able to come out of our comfort zone.