Podcast Episode #74
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[00:00:00] Welcome to the Extraordinary Life Podcast from the creator of the Extraordinary Life Tribe, Crystal Obregon the Self-Development Podcast propelling you forward toward your goals using science-backed high performance habits. Reach the next level in your physical and mental health. See new heights in your relationships.
[00:00:18] Gain clarity on your purpose and live your extraordinary life. Welcome your host writer, speaker and coach, Crystal Obregon. Hi there. This is Crystal of Crystal Obregon Coaching with Episode Number 74 of the Extraordinary Life Podcast. Happy New Year. I hope you had a restful holiday and you were able to spend time with family and /or friends.
[00:00:48] I don't know about you, but as much as I enjoy the holidays, I'm always happy to get back to routine. It seems like it's about six weeks of prep with the buildup to Thanksgiving, [00:01:00] Christmas, and the New Year. And honestly, my high schooler is still not back to school. Now that my daughter is off at college, during that holiday period, I always wanna spend the extra time with her when she's home because I'm never sure whether she'll be coming back home for her breaks or whether she'll get internships.
[00:01:22] There's a lot that can happen at that age, and I'm starting to feel that way about my son too. He still has two and a half years left of high school, but I know from experience now that it will go fast. So as we start the new year, I'm continuing my series on getting out of your comfort zone, and this week I'm talking about creating the motivation to get out of your comfort zone and why you will always need to be creating that for yourself.
[00:01:53] Your comfort zone isn't set in stone. It's just an artificial mental boundary that [00:02:00] allows you to function in your daily life without getting anxious and without getting scared. It's a zone where you feel in control. But to achieve your goals, it is necessary to step out of your comfort zone like I've been talking about the past few weeks.
[00:02:17] But it doesn't mean that you have to leave it forever and never look back. That's not how comfort zones work. Successful people still have their comfort zones. They don't completely abandon them when they're chasing their dreams. They still want to go back into their comfort zone when they feel fatigued or they need to go back to the familiar for a bit.
[00:02:40] The thing is, is they don't let themselves get trapped there. What they actually do over time is they expand their comfort zones and turn the previously unfamiliar into something familiar and comfortable. The first thing you need to do to get out of your comfort zone so you [00:03:00] can expand it later is just to take a step forward.
[00:03:04] You can't get out of your comfort zone without taking necessary action. It's like arriving in a busy city you've never been before. When you first go out, it might feel unfamiliar and chaotic. You might want to plan carefully where to go to eat and which sites to see. And depending on the city, your senses might even be on alert, looking for any sign of danger, which isn't a bad idea in a city you don't know.
[00:03:33] As you get to know the city a little more, you expand your territory. You don't rely on the maps as much. You experiment more. You might be like this with a new job too, a bit quiet and conservative until you learn the company culture. It's absolutely normal to feel intimidated when you're in unfamiliar territory.
[00:03:54] That's just the way our DNA is wired. When faced with uncertainty, [00:04:00] humans do have a fight or flight response. We either want to stand our ground and fight, or run away, which is flight. In the course of chasing your dreams, there will be many instances where you will have your fight or flight response tested, and to reach your ultimate destination, you'll have to fight more often than you run away.
[00:04:27] But in some cases, running away may be the smart option. The obstacle might be unscalable and unavoidable at a certain time. So I'll use my son again as an example. This year he ended his bike race season early because of back pain he was experiencing while racing. It really didn't make sense for him to continue to fly across the country again, missing school, just to [00:05:00] have his pain, keep him from performing at his best.
[00:05:04] So instead of going to the national championships, he decided to stop. He started seeing a physical therapist, which gave him some core work to do. Really just decided to take some time off from the heavy training and racing to focus on school. Now that he's in that routine and has had a little break, He's starting to do his early season training again, so in a way he did have to stop.
[00:05:37] His obstacle at that point was both unavoidable and and unscalable. The point is, is that when you run away, you need to be able to come back and pick up where you left off with your new resources that you have. You're not supposed to abandon your journey to success. Ultimately, you [00:06:00] do need to have a fighting spirit if you want to have the slightest chance at success.
[00:06:05] And in most cases, you will need to stand your ground. You'll need to be brave enough to slay and conquer the dragons standing in your path. Whether it's a fear of public speaking or that boss that's so hard to communicate with. Every little bit of ground you gain from your victories will become yours.
[00:06:28] You absolutely deserve every inch and naturally what you've conquered will form part of your expanded comfort zone. That growth comes from challenging yourself to learn new things. So when you conquer your fears, you learn something new, and then you learn that your fears were often nothing more than a figment of your imagination or your subconscious mind stopping you.
[00:06:56] When you take risks, whether you succeed or [00:07:00] fail, you learn something new. When you succeed, you determine the correct formula to success that you can repeat. When you fail, you learn what you should avoid doing the next time and maybe come up with some ideas of what you can try instead. But when you feel like your life has stagnated because you've been in your comfort zone for too long, then the idea is to challenge yourself to explore and experiment in some area of your life, because for every win and every skill you master, whether it's in forming new friendships or doing something physical or a job, whatever it is, your comfort zone grows and expands with you.
[00:07:51] I'll give you an example of a story from about seven years ago. My daughter and her friend talked me [00:08:00] into being Mother Ginger in their ballet company's production of the Nutcracker and not a home cooked version either. It was five performances with an audience of nearly 2000 people each time and a live orchestra.
[00:08:18] At the time, I was feeling some stagnation. So when this opportunity came up, I felt like I wanted to take it to be pushed outside of my comfort zone. There were weeks of rehearsals. I was in charge of six young ginger snap dancers, and then I was up on a big stage with bright lights, a huge dress, a wig.
[00:08:44] And I had to learn how to put all this makeup onto my face for the lights. Every time as I was waiting to go on stage, my heart rate would rise, I'd start sweating a bit, and I'd have to [00:09:00] use lots of deep breathing to calm myself down. I'd take one last deep breath at my cue. I would walk on stage. I would do what I had practiced.
[00:09:10] It was only a few minutes. Then I'd walk back off and take a sigh of relief. But I'm glad I took that opportunity. It was fun. And anytime I'm feeling fearful, I have that experience in my back pocket to draw from. And obviously you don't have to put on a big skirt and perform in front of 2000 people to break out of your comfort zone, but it can be just little things.
[00:09:39] So I'd like to give you a little homework after you finished listening to this. Sit down with a piece of paper and look at the different areas of your life. Some examples could be health, relationships, finances, your career, your business or your hobbies. And then if you [00:10:00] want to go ahead and score yourself on a scale of one to 10, that'll give you an idea of an area that you could focus on, then pick an area or two where you could do something that expands your comfort zone just a little bit.
[00:10:16] So it's different than a New Year's resolution. It's something that works a little better for. It's just deciding on an action that you could take today or tomorrow that will just push you a little bit so that you strengthen your "getting out of your comfort zone" muscle. My example for right now is my Garmin watch.
[00:10:35] It keeps track of my steps each day. I know there's lots of watches that do that now. What I've realized is that if I meet my goal for taking the number of steps it takes, then the next day the goal is a little higher. So each day that I meet my goal, it pushes me the next day to walk a little further.
[00:10:56] This doesn't take a big courageous act to meet this goal. [00:11:00] But if I pay attention to it, then I do feel good for meeting the goal. Soon enough, I don't want to go to sleep at night without finishing my steps and to finish them, usually I'm not going to accomplish them just around the house, so I have to leave the house and take my dogs for a walk.
[00:11:20] It does build that muscle. So be gentle with yourself. Come up with something simple that you could do to that pushes you just a little bit. I'd love it if you reached out and if you let me know what you've decided to do to motivate yourself to build that muscle and let me know how it's going. Also, it is not too late to sign up for the last live versions of my Design Your Decade workshop that I'm doing.
[00:11:51] After that, you'll still be able to purchase the online program that you can do on your own time. So I do hope you'll join [00:12:00] me. It's a lot of fun to do the work together. I will share the link to those workshops in the show notes. That's it for now. So have a great rest of your day and I'll see you in here next week.
[00:12:14] Bye for now. Thank you for listening to the Extraordinary Life Podcast with writer and coach, Crystal Obregon. We'd love to connect with you outside of the podcast, too. To find more helpful insights, show notes, and more about Crystal, go to Crystal Obregon.com. O B R E G O N, where you'll also find info for the Design Your Decade workshop.
[00:12:36] This workshop will help you to stop drifting and start creating. Until next time, Be Extraordinary.
