Here’s Why I Do the Scary Shit Anyway
Most of life is consumed by things that are uncomfortable and scary.
We only grow as people when we take those scary things head on, regardless of how they make us feel.
The very definition of courage is taking action even when we feel scared.
Everyday courage is doing the things we’re uncomfortable with in order to achieve our goals.
I hate being uncomfortable.
Just straight up.
I’m not even gonna fib about finding meaning in the moment or some higher transcendence bullshit about being happy while doing uncomfortable things.
Being uncomfortable sucks. There’s a reason it’s called “uncomfortable.”
It’s the opposite of comfortable.
But we don’t grow in comfort.
Bill Treasurer, founder of Giant Leap Consulting, says that we only grow when we’re in our “zone of discomfort.”
Ginni Rometty, current CEO of IBM, says that “comfort and growth do not coexist.”
If I want to better myself at anything in my life, I need to stretch outside my comfort bubble to reach the “zone of learning.”
There’s a reason they’re called “growing pains.”
It is, predictably, because growing is uncomfortable.
It’s painful.
Our bodies stretch and tear to grow from infancy to toddler-hood to adolescence, and then into the teenage years until we reach “adult” status.
I still haven’t entirely figured out adulting, but I’m sure I’ll get there eventually.
Our bodies have to go through those growing pains in order to become fully developed.
When we lift weights to build muscle, we’re tearing the muscle so it can grow back stronger.
Growing pains.
I do the scary shit anyways because I want to grow.
I need to grow.
Without it, I feel caged and underdeveloped and useless.
It feels wrong to stay stagnant and stop learning.
But if I’m too scared to do the scary shit, I’m not going to learn. I’m not going to become more developed in life. Stepping outside of my comfort zone is not easy.
It never is.
But it’s the only thing I can do that’s capable of expanding my experiences and making me into a better, more developed, more successful person.
Scary shit is still scary.
Doing it doesn’t make it any less scary.
I still get anxiety and a pounding heart whenever I’m in a situation that my personality type hates, like conflict.
And this is an important thing to remember:
Doing the scary shit doesn’t make it any less scary!
It just makes YOU better at dealing with it.
