In the modern day world, almost every person is necessarily bundled and squeezed with responsibilities and several external and internal pressures. We are all taught to make the best out of our lives but everyday struggles make it nearly impossible to enjoy our lives in its true sense. Every day we come across situations that make lives difficult, complicated and stressed. This happens when we are pushed to deal in circumstances that lie outside our comfort zones.
Inspirational and motivational quotes do encourage to push the limits and boundaries and break out of the walls of comfort but sometimes prove to be of absolutely no use. Every person is different, thus behaves and reacts in a certain way in a given situation. However, most of us tend to set a routine with regular tasks which in return, creates familiarity and monotony in our lives. Some of them keep doing new things but others start dwelling inside their cocoons without wanting to get out.
There’s a science behind everything and comfort is no different. In common, the comfort zone is defined as a patterned behaviour without the fear of unknown. This fear and anxiety of happening of such an event whose consequences are not known is a terrible state. And hence, the person starts living in a vacuum like space without actually realising it.
Pushing too hard is bad. Never try anything similar to that. But do take action for it otherwise it may result in optimal anxiety and other mental disturbances. Take it easy. Everything can have a solution. Few steps and ways are listed below to break from your comfort zone without getting stressed and anxious. These can be tried on a daily basis in order to develop your brain to act patiently in uncomfortable situations.
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1. Make physical changes
Take baby steps, there’s no hurry. It is essential to change the things around you in order to improve things inside you. Start waking up early. Give yourself time to think. Look around. Observe things that you have never noticed before. Spend time with yourself. Talk to yourself.
You can open the windows, change the seating of room, change the curtains and the bedsheets, hang a painting, add more light to your room, anything that you think needs to be changed. Physical changes can also be made to your routine. Start physical workout or meditation. It may be difficult initially but eventually, it will work out in your favour.
2. Do odd or abnormal things
Doing different things that you have never done before helps you have new experiences. Remember that you are your best friend and you know yourself the best. It can be as small as trying cooking or as huge as getting a tattoo.
Listen to the kind of music you have never listened to. Eat something unusual that you have never tried before. The main objective is to do things that you will definitely be uncomfortable in. It will make you feel anxious and vulnerable but not for long. Notice and realise how you feel when you try out things that aren’t normal for you. Make a notebook and jot them down so you can work on them when you do another odd thing.
However’ this is not an exhaustive list of odd things, you can do anything that you have never done before. You can start by being kind or smiling at people while walking if you feel that you are rude. Wake up every morning and thoughtfully decide what you can do today that isn’t normal for you.
3. Know your fears
People usually have a fear of unknown things that seem strange to them, sometimes because of the thought of failing at them or even because of issues like a contingency. It is important to move “towards” your fears and not “away” from them. Gather information about yourself by talking to yourself every day and realising what is the biggest fear that you never want to face. Most of the times, these fears are really small but become the cause of the greatest problems that we face in life.
Struggling with fears makes you know things, especially for those who have their fear known. Tell yourself every day that you are fearless over and over again. It will help you in creating empowering thoughts within yourself. Comfort gives birth to the fear of discomfort. When one faces his or her fears and achieves success, the preexisting fear gets eliminated and paves the way for another fear to be swayed away. Try destructing your fears one after the other day by day.
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4. Interact with strangers
This is the fear that everyone persists in today’s era specifically due to social media. Social media has expanded as well as reduced the interaction of human beings at the same time. Some of them avoid talking to strangers because of shyness and others because they don’t want to seem desperate. However, everyone has the same ideology, who speaks first and due to this ideology, everyone dwells inside their comfort deeper day by day.
It is okay to be uncomfortable. Follow this mantra always. Start by complimenting people around with kindness however difficult it may seem. It will make you start small conversations with people that you fear to come across. Make eye contact with everyone you cross paths with, it is a very essential part of getting out of your comfort. When you start having long conversations, you will eventually learn to do that naturally without discomfort.
5. Do creative exercises
When your brain feels challenged, it seems to adapt to situations that it has never experienced before. It’s like physical pain. When you experience something hurting your body, the brain tends to react immediately but eventually, the pain reduces. It actually doesn’t disappear, but your body becomes more receptive.
This is what tends to happen when you try out creative things. Typically, a creative thing is anything that involves making something new. It can be a feeling, a behaviour, a trait, or an experience. Cooking, reading, dancing, writing, going shopping, watching movies, meeting friends are all things that can be included in your routine one after the other. Refuelling your life from time to time is as essential as finding stability. Creative exercises will help you keep yourself lively.
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6. Have a positive approach
Optimism plays a significant role in staying patient and calm in uncomfortable situations. Breaking out from your comfort zone is not easy, but it is not that tough either. And whoever said it’s tough has not tried enough. When we face a strange situation, we do not know how to respond, we start looking at people around. What will people think? This is the question that pops in everyone’s head when they want to get out of their comfort zone. This leads to the creation of a fake wall around ourselves by ourselves.
Although the consequence of every circumstance is unknown, life is no different either. No one knows for sure what is actually going to happen next. So give your best shot at everything that you do and enjoy it. Enjoy every fear, every flaw, every worry, every breath that you take. Stay positive. Believe in yourself that whatever comes your way, you will make the best out of it and if not, you will give your 100%.
7. Be honest and true to yourself
Avoiding your fears has never helped anyone in this world. It only makes the conditions worse. People usually stay in their comfort zone without realising it and those who realise tend to reject those facts because no one wants to feel sad and fearful. Until and unless you don’t stand in front of the mirror and say to yourself that you must get out of comfort, nothing is going to change.
You are the only person who has spent the most amount of time with yourself, hence only you can understand yourself the best. Accept the uncomfortable situations and proceed towards them with strength and courage. Different people face different uncomfortable situations. One may find it difficult to talk to a stranger while another may find it challenging to change a house or a city. Introspection will help you a lot to find your fears and overcome them. But it can only happen if you are true to yourself.
8. Do things that make you happy
We often leave things or stop doing activities that we live because of being judged by others or restrictions from parents or peer pressure. Resume to the things that you miss doing. Watch cartoons, read an old book, listen to classic old songs, open the box of earrings that you don’t wear anymore, take out pebbles and play, talk to an old friend. Visiting old memories helps to refurbish the brain and create a sense of nostalgia and novelty.
When you try to do things that make you happy and that give you personal satisfaction, you seem to care less about what others have to say or think. Take a walk around the park in the evening, listen to chirpings of birds, take morning walks, play some sports. Do anything and everything that keeps you lively. If doing nothing makes you happy, do nothing for some time. Every activity that you do is an integral part of the day. Do not stay in one single mood the entire day. Let things happen to you. Lose control and go with the flow.
9. Be offline for a day
Social media has such an influence in our daily lives that it has made impossible to live without it. The main objective of social media was connecting people but it has started working in an adverse manner due to excessive use. From morning till midnight, there’s no time we are not glued to our phone screens. It is beneficial in our daily lives but snatched out realism from the lives of people.
Take a day off from social media and the internet. Observe what is going around you. Observe the silence and also the noise. Enjoy the calm that you are experiencing. You will eventually realise that you can save a lot of time by not using social media to actually socialise with people around. This will further bring you out of your comfort and care less about judgements received online.
10. Let it go
Not everything in life should be handled seriously. Fun is also important. Having control in every situation is nearly impossible. So just focus on things that you can control and correct. Always remember that failure is your biggest teacher, embrace and cherish it. We usually stay in our comfort zones because we have no knowledge of how the external forces may affect us. But they will anyway exist.
However, if you have confidence and faith in yourself, you will overcome them without realizing it. Take a deep breath and constantly keep on trying to let it go. Break out of your shield, make no boundaries and learn to enjoy discomfort until it gets comfortable.
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If you follow the above steps in a routine manner, you will start seeing the change that you had always wanted to see. It will encourage you to try new things that you don’t find comfortable and you never know, you might actually start liking them. Life is a cycle that never stops so shouldn’t you. Live and relive each moment that you get to spend. Throughout our history, people have done incredible tasks just by being able to step out of their comfort zone. While it might seem like a tricky process to attempt things that have always been difficult to you, it is equally important to keep putting in the efforts until you overcome the habit of staying in your comfort zone. It can only be achieved when you’re ready not to give up and put efforts regardless of how tough things get and how difficult a task appears at first.
