A lot of quotes talk about going outside your comfort zone and never being satisfied. This is a Type A way of saying you can never stop moving forward. There's value to those statements, but I'm not sure always being uncomfortable is a good thing.
Those who know me know I coach youth basketball. One of main philosophies I have for players I coach is for them to push to failure during practice. By going at something to a point where they will fail, they start the process of growth. If a player is satisfied with their capabilities, it will be hard to grow. I create a culture where I applaud the behavior regardless of the result.
We also talk about making our opponent uncomfortable, especially on defense. When we can put stress on another team (and maintain our comfortability), we will do good things. So, in this manner, such quoted statements have validity.
Addressing uncomfortability through being comfortable
In one game I coached, we went against a team that had a defense rarely seen and was used simply to make us uncomfortable and to win games at that level. We didn't start out well, at all. We were rattled. Some of the players were even crying because of what was happening. I worked to decrease the players' stress and increase comfortability as the game went on. We migrated from our standard offense and leaned on something we often do in practice.
We run a drill in practice similar to Ultimate Frisbee where we just make cuts, pass to the open person and play. The drill puts a lot of pressure on players so they can learn how to react. To combat this defense, we leaned on something with which we had a level of comfort to manage the stress level.
Uncomfortability and stress generally causes one of two actions to occur:
- We shy away from what's around us, implementing resistors in our path for protection; or,
- We open ourselves up to possibilities and rise to the occasion.
There are many variables which factor into which result comes forth. Neither one is bad, but one is usually better in a specific scenario than the other.
How can we prepare ourselves to push our own comfortability as well as react to situations that cause us discomfort?
Name it to tame it
With players I coach, employees I've led and executives I've coached, I've often used the term "Name it to tame it." The statement is used to help both leaders and participants to react in a new way to stress. Once a stress is identified and named, e.g. an opponent is pressuring defensively full court and using various tactics, the stress loses power to control and steps can be taken to address it. With executives, this term has been very effective in allowing them the opening to lead in a different way that enables employees to move forward.
Learn How to Learn
"Learning how to learn" is one of the main ways to establish a base of comfort. If you are comfortable in how to progress through situations with a learning mindset and processes which leave you open to possibilities, you can accomplish almost anything.
By being in this growth mindset, a challenge is simply a learning opportunity and the processes that can be used enable us to process and grow.
Lean on Your Past Experiences
After the game I described, I talked with the boys about how, over the course of their lives, they will come across situations where they will have no experience. They will have to move forward, but may not know how.
What will happen is they will lean on previous experience, processes and comfortabilities and use them to venture into the unknown with a level of confidence to get the job done, because they also know they've gone through this process before.
When you are venturing into the uncomfortable, depend on what got you where you are. This is a form of Respecting that helps people translate success in one area into what is being faced in the moment. I use this technique in many areas to have clients go, "Oh, yeah. I remember that. I can transfer that experience here. I can do this." Use your comfort level to help you progress. If there are too many things that are uncomfortable, we're less able to be successful.
Be aware of comfort stagnating you
Staying too comfortable means not having a lot of resistors in place, but we also aren't putting enough energy through our pipeline to do good work. Not being satisfied helps keep energy pumping through us to make things work effectively. To use another analogy, we put our thumb over the opening of a water hose to restrict the water flow and bring forth more speed and distance for the water. If we put too much of our thumb over the hose, we don't get enough water out. There's a balance.
Personally, I think the obsession with not being satisfied robs one of the chance to learn from what's been accomplished to be used later. It also can cause us to move forward headlong into something without enough forethought. Always pushing also puts chronic stress on us which, inevitably, sets forth resistors that impede performance.
Conclusion? Lean on what you are comfortable with in times of uncomfortability. Be comfortable in your ability to learn new things and you venture into new realms. Be satisfied with your path to this point while you reach for your future path.