The idea that we all live within a single, all-important comfort zone, is incorrect. For years; trainers, gurus and authors have been telling us to leave our comfort zone, if we want to become more successful. However, the reality is that we have not one comfort zone, but thousands of them, which we set for the various areas of our life. The idea that you live within a single comfort zone falls apart as soon as you test it.
The single comfort zone myth
I want you to imagine you are on a safe, straight section of a motorway or free-way and that there is no other traffic around you and no speed cameras either. The weather is perfect and you have the road to yourself. As you accelerate your car, you will reach a speed where you stop accelerating. This is the speed limit you have set yourself for driving in ideal conditions – your comfort zone for this driving scenario. Driving any faster than this would make you feel uncomfortable. If you then noticed yourself driving slower, you would accelerate until you reached your ideal speed again. The limitation you set governs what actions you take; in this case, whether to brake or to accelerate.
Let’s now imagine that a thick fog appears. You decide to slow down until you reach the speed you have set yourself, for driving in fog. This new speed represents another comfort zone; the zone that sets your speed when driving in fog.
The person overtaking you has a comfort zone speed for those conditions, which is set higher then yours and the person crawling along that same road is also within their comfort zone; wondering why you drive so fast!
Comfort zones and your income or profits
The comfort zones we set in the various areas of our lives govern how we act, because they control what we believe we are capable of and even what we believe is possible for us and what’s out of our reach. This is why we need to make sure that these zones have been set correctly.
You see, if you have set an income comfort zone of £20,000 a year, you will find it impossible to earn much more than this on a regular basis. Just as in the above example, where the driver either hit the brakes or hit the gas in order to stay within their speed zone, a person with a £20,000 income limitation will hit the mental brakes when they realise they are about to hit the top of their income comfort zone! They will start to feel comfortable and thus coast along.
Employers who hire salespeople with low-cost lifestyles often tell me that they perform far less well than equally talented salespeople, who have live a high-cost lifestyle. It is far harder for a person with a £20,000 a year lifestyle to earn £50,000 than it is for someone with a £50,000 a year lifestyle to earn that same amount.
Comfort is not always good for us
How comfortable are you with regard to the success of your business or career? I am not talking here about external targets you set for yourself, but rather how comfortable you are, right now, with what you have. You see, from an income or turnover perspective, if you feel fairly comfortable with the home you live in, the car you drive, the holidays you have etc, you will find it very difficult to brake beyond this. That’s why when two equally gifted boxers fight, the hungry fighter will always win. Their motivation is massively greater than the fighter who is already comfortably wealthy.
The most accurate indicator that you are subconsciously comfortable with what you already have, is how you act when a business or career reaches a plateau. If someone’s turnover or income has grown either very slowly or not at all over the past few years – and they have not been motivated to do everything they possibly can to increase it, this usually indicates that they are performing within their income / turnover comfort zone.
How to master your comfort zones
To achieve at a higher level in any area of your business, career or life; you need to acquire a high degree of discomfort with how things currently are in that area. The greater your level of discomfort, the more motivated you will be to take the actions required.
For example: Many people find that they are able to lose weight on the lead up to a school reunion, even if they have really struggled to lose weight previously. That’s because the level of discomfort they feel about being over-weight is suddenly massively increased, with the impending deadline of the reunion.
Typically, once the reunion has past, most people will slowly revert back to their pre-reunion weight; because the level of discomfort with their weight eases again. The people who keep the weight off, are typically those who have reset the limit of their weight comfort zone. Getting heavier again causes them so much discomfort, that they immediately take action if they see a few pounds pile on.
It is not enough to know on an intellectual level that we could have more and should have more. We need to remove the current limiting beliefs that are putting a cap on our potential in all the key areas of our lives. We need to believe that we absolutely MUST improve in whatever area we want to see growth in.
Your feedback and ideas on comfort zones
What comfort zones in your career or business have you been able to brake free from? How did you do it? Share your experiences and ideas with a comment!
Some really good points here, Jim, thanks.
Leaving our comfort zones means accepting the idea of making a mistake, and making mistakes is how we learn and grow – well, one way!
A few years back I was in a very comfortable place – on one level at least. I was in a well paid job where I was well respected and with a good pension (everyone used to tell me how brilliant the pension was!) But it wasn’t enough. I wasn’t stretched and I wasn’t being true to my self.
So I left (yes, pension and all!) and set up my own business doing what I love. And of course it was a bit scary and a bit uncomfortable but it was electrifying too! No regrets.
I love the idea of looking at your various comfort zones and then pushing your own boundaries. I see myself as a work in progress and hope I never finish the work. Never stop pushing your boundaries and growing and developing!
Jane,
Thanks for such an open comment. I believe that we are all a ‘work in progress.’ I certainly hope I am
Taking the step from a well-paid job to working for yourself is a massive one.
So, today you are an author and a well respected trainer / coach. I wonder how different things would have been, had you stayed within your comfort zones?
Jane,
Congrats on going out on your own. It looks like you are experiencing what many entrepreneurs do; No more Mondays.
Good post on comfort zones. My favorite quote around this is “don’t aim too low, you might hit the target”. Another is “fail fast, fail cheap”.
Dale – EchoQuote
Dale,
Thanks for that great quote; “don’t aim too low, you might hit the target.”
Thanks for writing this! I am looking for ways to break out of some of my own comfort zones.
Let me nit-pick a bit and point out that we slow an automobile by braking – not breaking.
Matthew,
Nice spot – changed it!
Jim,
This is so true and something I see every week with business owners. A lot say that they want to earn more money, but they don’t really have the motivation or desire to change what they have been doing for the last x years, i.e. they don’t want to move out of their comfort zones. I’ve often worked through ideas with business owners to improve profitability and once they feel confident to make the changes suggested, they don’t look back.
Like Jane (comments above) I left a well paid job to strike out on my own. It was amazing how many people who worked in the same organistaion thought I was being daft. Comments such as “why do you want to leave when there’s a great pension/ bonus structure here”, or “You’ve got a job for life, why leave it?” were commonplace. Looking back it was clear that these commentators were well inside their comfortzone as far as work was concerned and couldn’t understand why anyone would want to leave it.
I don’t regret extending my comfortzones one bit and I don’t think that the business owners I now work with do either.