Stepping Out of Comfort Zone

Assalamualaikum and wishing you all a very good day amazing ppl. Hope all of you are well as always. Absolutely delighted to meet you all with this post and especially on this beautiful day. Wishing my beloved country Malaysia and my fellow Malaysian “Selamat Hari Kemerdekaan Yang Ke 61 Malaysia” (Happy 61st Independence Day Malaysia in Malay) from truly proud Malaysian. Sincere thanks and love to everyone who fought for the Independence that we enjoy today. Wouldn’t happen without your hard work and sacrifices, truly appreciate it ♥

When talking about “Stepping Out of Comfort Zone”, I would define the comfort zone as your zone. Most often “comfort zone” is defined as a settled method of working that requires little effort and yields only barely acceptable results. It is an area that you are truly comfortable at. In this rapid and ever-changing world, the word “change” is only constant that stays the same throughout the years. Often the dreams that we hold can only be achieved if we leave our grounds. Challenge yourself  to know your true worth. There was this one day that I saw my colleagues working with black screen(Unix systems with no GUI), I was truly amazed with them. They were so cool I guess it could be a dream of every software engineer to make system work with commands without clicking buttons. I told myself I will never be able to do that. I continued working on my skill set and gain more knowledge day after day. There were days I went slow and paused too. After like months, something clicked me “I was working with black screen, I said to myself I am so cool!!!”. Sometimes it is really important to be your own fan and praise yourself for things you do. You actually getting a lot things done. You truly deserve it. Therefore, adapting to the change that happens around you and step out has become basic skill or more like a survival skill today but some questions bug us when we decide to leave our zone :

1. Is stepping out of your comfort zone necessary?
2. Is stepping out of your comfort zone is really that easy?
3. What if this goes wrong?
4. Can I come back to my comfort zone again?

Not only these questions but so many more questions haunt us down when we are about to step out. The truth is we will not be able run away from opportunities or risks in life. The opportunities or risks could be good or bad. Sometimes the difference between them could be so thin that, we fail to differentiate them even with so much of  analysis. This opportunities or risk could be life changing experience, set aside the result (success or failure). Seriously, the success or failure of the opportunity or risk really does matter but the experience in gaining the result weigh more than the result. Every new beginning is scary and the amount of stress we handle just to make sure we made the right choice is just unexplainable. So much hesitation that we almost want to give up even before starting. Another thing, you don’t need to make sure everything is perfect all the time, Allah will ease everything. Remember the first day of school or new job or new challenge you took up, how does it feel? Remember those days, our experience can be unique and peculiar but if you are able to pass through it you will find yourself at your new level of comfort zone. Definitely it is not something really easy to achieve it takes so much of hard work and sacrifices, it is not that hard as well. My mom always tells me this “Nothing is impossible in this world, try harder my girl. Allah will reward you with more than what you truly deserve.“

Here are some tips on how you could make your step out of your comfort zone experience less scary and beneficial to yourself:

Analyse the opportunity or risk.

Every chance we are about to take or has taken is associated with a set of opportunities and risks where something that we need to analyse to able to yield the best result possible. In another word, put some planning to the chance to minimize the negative effects of it and maximize the positive effects of it. At times, we are not able to even properly describe a chance that we have because there is always something limited to our knowledge and can only be discovered by exploring the chance. Therefore, the planning does not need to be a complete one. Sometimes if you would like to just take it without any analysis, it is fine too as long as you happy with the choice of yours.

Start with a positive mindset.

With positive mindset, you will be always able to conquer more than negative one where it stops you from taking the chance. It is good to be cautious of your choice but most of the time positive mindset will always try to find way to make the things happen where some things can only be observed well when it done rather than when it is in your to-do list.

Always be prepared for the worst.

Besides starting with a positive mindset, it is extremely good to be aware of the challenges that might arise in the future. If the mitigation plan is in hand, the effects of it could be lessened and you could continue from where you left it. Mentally being prepared could actually help you a lot in dealing with it.

Learn and seek experience as much as you could. 

Everyday is a new day, new experience could be gained.  Never let even a minute to pass by without getting the best from it. Seek new knowledge or strengthen your skill day by day. Expertise comes with a lot practice, knowledge and patience.

Find your point of comfort.

Even when stepping out of your comfort, you will need to find your comfort point. It could be anything a person, hobby, passion or anything at all that relaxes you. Stepping out of your comfort zone takes so much of courage and it could be you fight for something too long that sometimes you just want to give up. At that point, it is fine to pause and get to your comfort point for certain period. After you are boost up again, you can continue from where you left or redirect yourself to somewhere better if you wish to.

Step out of your comfort zones and make the your impossible possible !!!