The Real Truth about Comfort Zones

The number one piece of business, personal growth, and high achievement advice in our day gets shouted out from stages, repeated in podcasts, and endlessly printed in the pages of best selling books: “You gotta get out of your comfort zone!” “All the good stuff is to be found outside of your comfort zone!” And: “You want one piece of advice from me today that will change your life? Get out of your comfort zone!” But as I realized long ago and have mentioned in a short reflection before, the last few times I heard someone repeat this advice as if it were scintillatingly new and powerful and desperately needed, they were voicing it from the middle of a stage, in front of a big audience, under spotlights, where they are to be found dozens, scores, or even hundreds of times a year, or, in other words, from right smack dab in the middle of their own comfort zones. Yeah. Ponder that for a second. Now this is a conundrum, and that always attracts a philosopher’s attention.

If you’re stuck in a rut, hiding from anything new, wallowing like a little pig in warm mud deeply ensconced in a dulling comfort, or you’re robotically frozen in a rigid routine that prevents you from experiencing or discovering anything new, then yes indeed, maybe you need to get out of your comfort zone. Right now. But there’s a deeper truth and a much more powerful one that nobody ever mentions. You ultimately need to learn to develop a different sort of comfort zone, one of mastery not mediocrity, and take that comfort zone with you wherever you go. Get out of that? No. Get into it if you aren’t already. Then: Take it with you into any new situation.

It just occurred to me yesterday that all the championship athletes I’ve ever known play best in their comfort zone, one they’ve built up and cultivated and constructed into an inner cathedral of strength that they can take with them into any new stadium, field, arena, or contest where they’ll be mightily challenged to prevail. All the great musicians I’ve ever seen also tend to play right in the middle of their own well earned comfort zones, where there’s a groove and a deep feeling of flow. Masters of any art or craft, intellectual discipline or difficult enterprise most often live and work inside an amazing comfort zone that the rest of us can only admire with great respect. They make it look easy, no matter how incredibly hard it might be.

The real truth is that there are two very different kinds of comfort zones. There is of course the one that the motivational speakers and high paid business advisors are urging you to leave behind. And that’s what we can call “The Complacent Comfort Zone.” But then there is another kind that we might call “The Courageous Comfort Zone.” It’s a commanding place of strength and skill. It’s about attitudes and emotions, talent and skill, and seemingly effortless lightning quick thought. That’s what’s worth creating and sustaining and taking with you wherever you go. That’s where greatness happens. It’s the garden of delights for the excellence of peak attainment. It’s the highest playground of mastery.

And that’s where I’ll see you soon. Ok? Bring your own.