We’re told so often that we should be getting out of our comfort zone. It’s become one of those pieces of advice that sounds so obviously sensible that we rarely stop to question it. Growth happens outside your comfort zone. Feel the fear and do it anyway. Push yourself. Challenge yourself. Say yes to the thing that scares you. If it makes you uncomfortable, it’s probably good for you.
And there is definitely some truth in that. I can think of plenty of things I’ve done in my own life that felt terrifying beforehand and turned out to be wonderful. Things I nearly talked myself out of, things that made my stomach flip, things where I wondered what on earth I was doing right up until the moment I did them. I think most of us can probably look back and find moments like that. The first time we walked into a room alone, travelled somewhere new, changed jobs, started something, ended something, spoke up, showed somebody what we’d created, went on a date, joined a class, made a decision that felt bigger than us. Sometimes there really is something lovely waiting just beyond the familiar.
But I’m not sure I believe anymore that being outside our comfort zone is automatically where we should be aiming to live.
Because there’s something missing from that advice.
It assumes that comfort is always the problem.
And sometimes comfort is exactly what we need.
If you’ve spent years living with stress, pain, uncertainty, responsibility, grief, hormonal upheaval, difficult relationships, caring for other people or simply being the person who holds everything together, you may have spent quite enough time outside your comfort zone already. You might not need another challenge. You might actually need somewhere your body can finally soften.
And that has made me wonder whether we’ve been asking ourselves the wrong question.
Perhaps instead of always asking, How can I push myself out of my comfort zone?, we need to get much better at asking:
What is this discomfort actually trying to tell me?
Because not all discomfort means the same thing.
Sometimes nerves are actually quite lovely
You know that feeling when you’re about to do something that scares you but there’s also a little bit of excitement underneath it?
Your stomach is fluttery. You’re thinking about cancelling. You’ve changed your outfit four times. You’re wondering why you ever agreed to it. But somewhere underneath all of that is a little spark of oooooh...
You want to know what happens.
There’s curiosity there.
Perhaps even excitement.
You’re nervous because it matters to you, or because it’s new, or because you’re being seen in a way you haven’t been seen before.
That kind of discomfort can be wonderful.
It’s the feeling of stretching ourselves just a little beyond what we already know.
And sometimes we do need to give ourselves a gentle nudge through it.
I think back to times when I’ve nearly cancelled something because I felt nervous and then been so pleased afterwards that I went. I’m sure you’ve had those too. The night out you couldn’t face getting ready for but ended up laughing all evening. The class where you hovered outside wondering whether to go in and then loved it. The conversation you rehearsed twenty times that turned out to be exactly what was needed.
Sometimes the part before the thing is much harder than the thing itself.
We talked about that recently with cancelling plans and self-care, because transitions require energy. Getting ourselves from here to there can feel enormous when our capacity is already low, even when there is somewhere we genuinely want to be.
So yes, sometimes the answer is absolutely: put your shoes on, grab your keys and go.
But not always.
Because I think we’ve become so accustomed to believing that pushing ourselves is admirable that we sometimes override a completely different kind of discomfort.
Sometimes your body isn’t frightened of something new. It just doesn’t want to be there.
And I think many women know this feeling too.
It doesn’t feel fluttery or exciting.
There’s no little spark underneath it.
It feels heavy.
You find yourself trying to persuade yourself into wanting something that, if you’re really truthful, you simply don’t want.
Perhaps you agreed to something because you felt you should. Perhaps everybody else seemed enthusiastic. Perhaps it looked like a good opportunity. Perhaps the old version of you would have loved it. Perhaps saying no felt awkward. Perhaps you’ve absorbed the idea that staying comfortable means you’re playing small.
So you tell yourself you need to push through.
But what if there is nothing on the other side that you actually want?
That’s the bit I think we need to talk about more.
There is a difference between being frightened of something you want and forcing yourself towards something you don’t.
They can look remarkably similar from the outside.
Both can involve nerves.
Both can make you want to cancel.
Both can produce that feeling of resistance in the body.
But internally, they can feel very different if we give ourselves enough quiet to notice.
One contains possibility.
The other often contains contraction.
One has a little what if I can?
The other feels more like why am I making myself do this?
And perhaps part of getting older, or simply getting to know ourselves better, is learning not to bulldoze straight over that distinction.
Comfort isn’t a character flaw
I think comfort has been given a terrible PR job.
Somehow we’ve come to associate it with laziness, stagnation and lack of ambition.
But comfort can also mean safety.
It can mean familiarity.
It can mean belonging.
It can mean being somewhere you don’t have to perform.
Think about the places where your whole body seems to know it can relax. Perhaps it’s your own sofa with the dog curled up next to you. Perhaps it’s your mum’s kitchen. Your garden. Your favourite café. A particular friend’s house. Your bed with clean sheets. A familiar walk where you know every turn.
Nothing particularly exciting has to happen there.
That’s almost the point.
Your body knows the territory.
It knows the sounds and smells and people. It doesn’t have to constantly work out what is coming next.
There is enormous value in that.
Particularly if other areas of your life require a lot from you.
I sometimes wonder whether somebody who has spent years living in a heightened state — constantly adapting, coping, responding, anticipating, looking after everybody else — might actually need to spend some time inside their comfort zone before we start enthusiastically telling them to get out of it.
Because safety isn’t something we graduate from.
We need it.
Our nervous systems need moments when nothing is being demanded of us, when we aren’t having to rise to anything, prove anything or expand anything.
Sometimes growth happens because we challenge ourselves.
And sometimes growth happens because we finally feel safe enough to soften.
And your comfort zone isn’t the same size every day
This matters too.
We sometimes talk about capacity as though it’s a fixed personality trait.
I used to be able to do this.
This never used to bother me.
Why am I suddenly finding everything so difficult?
But your capacity changes.
Of course it does.
If you slept beautifully last night, ate well, had a relatively calm week and feel physically good, something new might feel exciting.
If you’ve slept badly for three nights, work has been relentless, somebody you love is struggling, your hormones are all over the place and your period is due tomorrow, the exact same thing might feel enormous.
That doesn’t necessarily mean you’ve become less confident.
Your body is simply working with a different amount of available energy.
Hormonal changes can alter this too. Many women notice during perimenopause that things they once tolerated easily — noise, busy social environments, late nights, alcohol, constant demands, being available to everybody — begin to feel very different. We can interpret that as ourselves becoming less capable, when perhaps our bodies are simply becoming much less willing to quietly absorb things that cost us.
And I think that’s interesting.
Because maybe the boundary of our comfort zone isn’t something we need to defeat.
Maybe it’s information about where we are today.
Tomorrow may be different.
Next month may be different.
And perhaps we can work with that instead of constantly judging ourselves against the version of us who existed five or ten years ago.
I think the real skill is learning the difference between stretching and straining
If you’ve ever done a physical stretch, you’ll know there’s a point where you can feel the edge of your range.
There’s sensation there. Maybe a little resistance. You breathe. You wait. Perhaps the muscle softens and you move another tiny bit.
You don’t need to yank it.
You don’t need to prove anything.
You certainly don’t get extra points for injuring yourself.
And I think emotional growth can work in much the same way.
There is a beautiful space at the edge of what feels familiar where we can experiment.
We can take one step.
See how it feels.
Come back if we need to.
Try again.
That might be going somewhere alone but arranging to meet somebody when you arrive. Joining the class but emailing the teacher beforehand to say you’re nervous. Travelling somewhere new but starting with somewhere close to home. Speaking once in the meeting rather than deciding that the new confident version of you must suddenly dominate the entire room.
We can stretch without throwing ourselves off a cliff.
And perhaps that’s actually how our comfort zones grow.
Not because we repeatedly terrify ourselves, but because we have enough experiences of stepping a little beyond the familiar and discovering, Oh. I can do this.
Our body learns.
Our confidence grows.
What was once outside the comfort zone gradually becomes part of it.
And then, when we’re ready, perhaps we explore the next little edge.
But there are times when the bravest thing might actually be staying put
This is probably the bit we don’t put on motivational posters.
Sometimes you are allowed to decide that you don’t want the thing.
You are allowed to choose the quiet holiday instead of the adventurous one.
You are allowed to prefer dinner with two people to a room full of twenty.
You are allowed to stay in a job you enjoy rather than constantly climbing towards something bigger.
You are allowed to decide that Friday nights are for pyjamas now.
You are allowed to stop doing something you once loved because it no longer fits.
You are allowed familiar routines, favourite restaurants, the same walk, the same people and a life that feels peaceful rather than impressive.
You are even allowed to say, I’ve challenged myself quite enough lately, thank you very much.
There will be seasons for expansion.
There will be seasons for consolidation.
There will be times when life itself has pushed you so far beyond anything resembling comfort that the most healing thing you can do is build some predictability around yourself again.
None of that means you’ve stopped growing.
Maybe it means you’ve stopped assuming growth always has to hurt.
So perhaps this week, don’t immediately push through
The next time you notice yourself resisting something, rather than automatically telling yourself to get out of your comfort zone, I’d love you to get curious about the resistance.
Sit with it for a moment.
Not for hours. We don’t need to turn deciding whether to go for dinner into a full spiritual enquiry.
Just long enough to ask yourself:
If I wasn’t trying to prove anything, would I still want to do this?
I really like that question.
Because it removes the imaginary audience.
It removes the person who might think you should.
It removes the motivational quote.
It removes the idea that saying yes makes you brave and saying no makes you boring.
And leaves you with yourself.
Do I actually want this?
And if the answer is yes, perhaps there’s another question:
Can I make the stretch a little gentler?
Maybe you don’t need to leap. Maybe you just need one small step towards the edge.
But if the answer is no, perhaps listen to that too.
Not every no is fear.
Not every yes is courage.
Not every comfortable choice is avoidance.
And not every uncomfortable choice is growth.
The interesting bit is getting to know yourself well enough to begin recognising which is which.
Perhaps that’s what I want you to notice this week.
Where in your life have you become a little too comfortable around something you genuinely want?
Where might there be a tiny spark of curiosity asking you to be brave?
And where are you pushing yourself simply because you have absorbed the idea that you’re supposed to?
There will be moments in our lives when happiness asks us to take a risk.
To say yes.
To walk into the room.
To book the ticket.
To speak.
To begin.
And there will be other moments when happiness looks remarkably like coming home, shutting the door, putting the kettle on and thinking...
Actually, I’m very happy here.
We need both.
We need the places that stretch us and the places that hold us.
The adventures and the familiar.
The butterflies and the exhale.
Perhaps the aim was never to live outside our comfort zone at all.
Perhaps it’s simply to know ourselves well enough to recognise when the edge is inviting us forward and when our body is asking us to stay somewhere soft for a while.
