“As you move outside of your comfort zone, what was once the unknown and frightening becomes your new normal.”
—Robin Sharma
It’s uncomfortable leaving our comfort zone…
Ummm…yeah!
In theory, I suspect most of us know it is good to leave our comfort zone every now and then. In practice, it can be pretty damn daunting to actually do so. But the personal growth we inevitably experience when and if we do find the courage to leave our comfort zone is usually well worth it.
When I was traveling in Ireland recently, I had to rent a car because the places I was visiting weren’t reachable by public transport. And taking a taxi would have been pretty expensive.
Renting a car is easy; driving on the opposite side of the road not so much…at least, not at first.
Back home in Canada, of course, we drive on the right hand side of the road. And the steering wheel is on the left side. In Ireland, the steering wheel is on the right side…and they drive on the left side of the road. I don’t know about your experience (if any) but driving on the other side of the road took a wee bit o’ time for me and my brain to get used to.
Thankfully, someone had told me (prior to driving in Ireland) a helpful little mantra of sorts, that would help remind me which side of the road I needed to be on:
“Left to Live; Right to Die.”
Sure, it’s a bit over the top. But boy was it effective in helping me stay on the correct side of the road! So there I was, driving through the streets of Dublin, and then on to other parts of Ireland (on increasingly narrow roads) chanting to myself this not-so-cheery mantra. To be honest, I ditched the ‘Right to Die’ part pretty quick (too morbid) and instead just said ‘Left to Live’ out loud to myself…especially when I first got into the vehicle (which was, thankfully, an automatic).
Interestingly, it only took a couple of days before driving on the left side of the road became my new normal. And the more I drove, the more my confidence improved—but not just my confidence in my driving. That’s the cool thing…and the point of this blog.
Doing something scary outside our comfort zone shows us that we can probably do a lot of things outside our comfort zone!
Yes, doing something new is uncomfortable at first. But then it becomes familiar. And I’ve discovered that the more often I go outside my comfort zone, the easier it becomes to do so. I suspect the reverse is true as well: the more we stay stuck inside our zone of familiarity, the harder it becomes to muster up the courage to venture outside of it.
But I suspect the more we do drive outside our comfort zone, the more we grow as human beings.
Shaking things up a little is, apparently, also beneficial for our health. Change is good for our brain because it forces the creation of new neural pathways, a process driven by neuroplasticity. Whereas routines allow the brain’s basal ganglia to run on “autopilot” to conserve energy, introducing new experiences – such as driving on the other side of the road—challenges the brain, keeping it agile and capable of forming new connections.
For me, what I appreciated the most about the initial challenge of driving on the other side of the road is that it forced me to figure things out immediately. Unlike in other areas of my life and work, I didn’t have the luxury of procrastinating and telling myself I’ll figure it out tomorrow.
My butt was already in the driver’s seat of a rental car in a country far from home! If I wanted to get where I was going (which I did) and there was no other way to get there (which there wasn’t), I had to learn the new rules of the road and figure out HOW to drive safely, right then and there.
And I did. And by the end of my two weeks of driving in Ireland, it felt like I’d been driving on the left hand side of the road my entire life.
So it was time to stir the mental pot again…
After safely returning my rental car at the airport in Dublin (proud as a peacock, let me tell you) I flew to Greece. For the few days I spent on the island of Naxos, there was no need for a rental car. But when I went to the island of Folegandros, I had to rent a car because my guest house wasn’t accessible by public transport – nor taxi for that matter…because the road down to the house is very steep and too bumpy for a taxi driver’s liking.
And my liking, for that matter. But I’ll get to that in a moment.
Since they drive on the right hand side of the road in Greece, I now had to flip my magical mental mantra to:
“Right to Live; Left to Die”
Which is even more morbid than the first version…but rather appropriate considering the massive drop to the ocean right beside many of the mountainous roads of Folegandros.
But first I had to get to the mountain roads…which nearly didn’t happen.
I arrived on Folegandros by ferry, which is where the guy from the rental car agency met me. After signing the contract and getting the keys, I strutted over to my tiny rental car and climbed in, still feeling uber confident from my successful experience of driving in Ireland. Then I looked down.
Oh. Shit.
It was a standard. I hadn’t driven a stick shift in over two decades!
Now I had to get used to driving on the right hand side of the road again, while shifting gears…on what is probably one of the most mountainous islands in Greece! The roads are extremely steep and very narrow, there aren’t many guard rails, and the cliff drop to the ocean below is sometimes hundreds of feet high.
But I’m getting ahead of myself again. First, I had to remember HOW to drive a standard. Which, oddly enough, is when I heard my brother Doug’s voice in my head, saying something to the effect of “Just push in the clutch.”
Doug was the family member who taught me to drive a standard, way back when I was a teenager first learning to drive. Round and round the empty shopping mall parking lot we’d bunny-hopped…not a hill in sight. I’d gotten the hang of it eventually and graduated to, you know, actual roads—some of which even had an incline.
In other words, I knew I knew how to drive a standard…I just couldn’t remember how.
So there I sat (not a shred of confidence left, let me tell you) in the sweltering heat, racking my brain, trying to recall the correct sequence of steps to get the damn car started and moving. Do I push in the clutch first? Then the brake pedal? Does it have to be in neutral first? Then do I push in the clutch? Then put it in first gear? Then slowly hit the gas. No, that won’t work: I don’t have three feet! Wait, I think I’m supposed to use the hand-break for something…
Oh. Shit.
I could feel the panic starting to rise. And then I remembered a handy-dandy tool to use in such occasions. No, not my phone. My breath. I closed my eyes and focused on my breathing for a few moments, calming myself down.
And then muscle memory kicked in…and I remembered how to drive a standard! Sort of. I mean, not like a race car driver. More like a nervous nelly who drives super slow because she’s afraid to get out of first gear.
But hey, I made it to the grocery store (eventually). Then, after a rather nerve-wracking up and down drive to the other side of the (uber hilly) island, then slowly making my way down the extremely steep, narrow, and bumpy cobblestone road to the guest house (pumping the poor brakes the entire time), I arrived at my lovely destination.
Of course, after ten days of practice, I was a pro (again) at driving a standard. As perhaps you can imagine, I had a swagger in my step by the time I returned that rental car…even though they probably had to put new brakes on the vehicle after I was done with it.
It can be scary, and frustrating, to leave our comfort zone and try new things. Sure, we may be stuck in first gear for awhile—but this won’t last forever. Before we know it, we’ll be shifting those gears like a race car driver…honking at the poor schmuck in front of us who is going WAY too slow up that hill for our liking.
“Believe you can and you’re halfway there.”
—Theodore Roosevelt
Previously Published on Pink Gazelle
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