“To the degree we’re not living our dreams, our comfort zone has more control of us than we have over ourselves.”
Peter McWilliams, Writer
Pros and Cons of Getting out of your Comfort Zone
As the name already tells, comfort zones provide us with a safe environment in which we usually feel quite good.
However, staying in our comfort zone all day long can also lead to serious issues since we will not learn and progress enough.
In the following, all pros and cons of getting yourself out of your comfort zone are discussed.
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Contents
Advantages of Getting out of your Comfort Zone
- You can learn about yourself
- You will make many new experiences
- You can get to know new lifestyles
- You can expand your knowledge in various fields
- Leaving your comfort zone can help you make new friends
- Can also be helpful to find new career opportunities
- Leaving our comfort zone can help to develop our character
- You can learn how to deal with fear
- Can increase your overall level of confidence
- You can find your passion by leaving your comfort zone
- You can find out who you really are
- May help you to unplug from social norms and cultural values
- Comfort zones prevent us to succeed in life
- Can help you to expand your comfort zone in the long run
You can learn about yourself
One advantage of leaving your comfort zone is that you can really learn about yourself.
In fact, as long as you stay in your comfort bubble, you will not learn too many new things.
Sure, you will feel good and cozy inside your comfort zone, yet you will not develop yourself further.
However, developing yourself further is crucial for success in various parts of life and therefore, you should leave your comfort zone from time to time to learn and progress.
You will make many new experiences
Leaving your comfort zone can also help you to make many new experiences.
In fact, new things often scare us since we haven’t done them before and don’t know what to expect.
However, when we finally did it, we will see that most of those experiences had been quite beneficial for us and that we don’t want to miss those experiences at all.
Therefore, in order to make as many new experiences as possible, it is crucial that you find the courage to get out of your comfort zone.
You can get to know new lifestyles
Many people also don’t know that there are several different ways of life out there.
In fact, many people consider their way of life to be superior and that everything else is basically nonsense.
However, this is not true at all and experiencing those alternative lifestyles can greatly help us to understand better how the world really works and that there are so many different ways how to live a happy life.
Thus, if you are curious and want to experience new lifestyles, you also have to get outside your comfort zone since many of those lifestyles will feel rather unfamiliar to you at first.
You can expand your knowledge in various fields
Another benefit of getting outside your comfort zone is that you can also expand your overall knowledge in various parts of life.
It doesn’t matter what it is, every new experience can teach us about life.
Therefore, the more experiences you make, the more you will be able to improve your knowledge. Sure, some of those experiences may not be enjoyable first, but we can also learn quite a lot from negative experiences as well.
Leaving your comfort zone can help you make new friends
Especially introverts often have a hard time finding new friends since they are often too shy to talk to people.
Hence, if you are one of those people who struggle to find friends, you may want to step out of your comfort zone and start to talk to people.
In fact, you will soon realize that it is not hard at all and that most of your fears will be groundless.
Can also be helpful to find new career opportunities
Leaving your comfort zone can also be quite helpful for you when it comes to the corporate world.
In fact, many people are rather afraid to leave their jobs and to go for alternative career paths.
However, only if you leave the beaten track from time to time, you will be able to figure out what you really want to do with your life.
Leaving our comfort zone can help to develop our character
In general, every time you step out of your comfort zone, you will also grow in character.
In fact, our character is formed by all the experiences we make in life and therefore, the more experiences you make, the stronger you will grow in character.
This is also quite important to overcome difficult periods in your life.
You can learn how to deal with fear
Another upside of stepping out of your comfort zone is that you will also learn how to deal with fear.
When we have to leave our comfort zone, we often feel a certain level of fear since we will often not know what to expect.
However, learning how to overcome this fear is crucial to achieve true happiness in life since if you learn how to overcome fear, there is not much that can stop you from this time on.
Can increase your overall level of confidence
If you get out of your comfort zone from time to time and make new experiences, you will also soon realize that your overall confidence level will increase significantly.
This is due to the fact that you will notice how much you can actually achieve in your life and that the only thing that’s holding you back is your mind.
In turn, you will feel prepared for many things that previously scared you quite a lot in the past.
You can find your passion by leaving your comfort zone
In fact, many people found their true passion once they took a step out of their comfort zone.
We are all different and have different strengths, weaknesses and expectations in life.
However, our education system does not account for those differences in a sufficient manner and far too many people in our nowadays society are pushed into college, even though they might be much happier with an alternative career path.
Consequently, if you are not sure whether you are on the right career path right now, you may want to get out of your comfort zone and experience new things so that you can get a better impression of what you want to do next.
You can find out who you really are
Many people also just feel lost in life.
They never found what they were looking for and are quite desperate due to that.
If you are one of those people, stepping out of your comfort zone can be a great way to find a purpose in life since only if you make enough different experiences, you can figure out who you truly are and can take action according to that.
May help you to unplug from social norms and cultural values
It can also be quite helpful to get out of our comfort zones so that we can unplug from social norms and cultural values that have been indoctrinated into us from an early age.
In fact, a significant fraction of those norms is nothing else but a quite subjective and confined view on how the world should be.
It has actually nothing to do with reality and you will experience this when you get outside your comfort zone, for example by traveling to foreign countries with completely different social norms.
Comfort zones prevent us to succeed in life
Another problem of staying inside our comfort zones is that it simply prevents us from succeeding in various parts of life.
In order to succeed in life, we have to experience pain from time to time in order to grow in character and to become that invincible person who can achieve basically everything he or she wants.
Can help you to expand your comfort zone in the long run
While getting out of our comfort zones can be challenging in the short run, it can help us to expand our comfort zone in the long run.
If you make new experiences and lose your fears, you will feel much more comfortable with doing new things and therefore, your comfort zone will become much bigger.
Disadvantages of Leaving your Comfort Zone
- Some people are not yet ready to leave their comfort zones
- Leaving your comfort zone is a mental challenge
- Can be overwhelming at the beginning
- Getting out of your comfort zone can be exhausting
- You may have to deal with disappointment
- Stepping out of your comfort zone can be time-consuming
- You may meet people you don’t like
- You may lose some friends by leaving your comfort zone
- Leaving your comfort zone can imply some risks
- Getting out of your comfort zone is a long-term process
Some people are not yet ready to leave their comfort zones
Apart from the many advantages of leaving your comfort zone, there are still some issues with this concept.
For instance, one problem of leaving comfort zones is that many people are just not ready for it yet.
In fact, leaving our comfort zones can be quite scary and some people need to prepare for that for quite a long time.
Leaving your comfort zone is a mental challenge
Whether you will be able to get out of your comfort zone or not will be determined in your brain.
In fact, getting out of your comfort zone is a mental challenge and if you mind will be ready for it, your body will most often be ready for it as well.
Can be overwhelming at the beginning
Many people also feel quite overwhelmed when they get out of their comfort zones.
In fact, especially at the beginning, leaving our comfort zones can be quite scary and may even lead to temporary mental issues.
Getting out of your comfort zone can be exhausting
Another disadvantage of getting out of your comfort zone is that it can simply be quite exhausting.
Quite often, people work in demanding jobs for long hours every day and are just tired when they finally leave the office and come home.
Thus, many people will simply not have the power to get out of their comfort zone since their daily life is already exhausting enough.
You may have to deal with disappointment
When you get out of your comfort zone, you will also have to deal with disappointment from time to time.
While you will make many good experiences, you may also experience bad things.
However, don’t let bad experiences discourage you. After all, we often learn from so-called “bad” experiences more than from good ones.
Stepping out of your comfort zone can be time-consuming
Stepping out of your comfort zone can also be rather time-consuming.
You will have to try new things and in order to do those things, you will have to use the time that you can no longer spend on other things you like.
You may meet people you don’t like
While you will make many friendships by stepping out of your comfort zone, you will also meet people you don’t like from time to time.
However, this is not a problem since you don’t have to continue to hang out with those people anyway.
You may lose some friends by leaving your comfort zone
When you step out of your comfort zone, you may also lose some friends who don’t respect your new lifestyle.
However, if you lose friends due to that, they haven’t been good friends anyways and you should not care too much about it.
Leaving your comfort zone can imply some risks
Nothing is free and also the new experiences that you will make when you leave your comfort zone may imply some risks.
However, as long as you don’t take excessive risks, the pros of getting out of your comfort zones will often outweigh the cons.
Getting out of your comfort zone is a long-term process
For many people, it takes quite a lot of time until they are finally mentally ready to leave their comfort zone.
Even when they finally decided to do so, it still takes time until the positive effects of pushing out of their comfort zones become visible.
Therefore, getting out of your comfort zone will not solve all your problems immediately.
It is rather a tool that allows you to improve yourself over time.
Top 10 Leaving your Comfort Zone Pros & Cons – Summary List
| Leaving your Comfort Zone Pros | Leaving your Comfort Zone Cons |
|---|---|
| Leaving your comfort zone can improve your life | Leaving your comfort zone can be stressful |
| Can help you grow in character | Many people will be overwhelmed |
| You can learn about yourself | Leaving your comfort zone needs courage |
| It shows you how to deal with fear | Many people are not ready for it |
| You can get to know new cultures | May lead to mental issues |
| You can find many new friends | Leaving comfort zones can be risky |
| Can also help you in business | Can be time-consuming |
| Leaving comfort zones can increase confidence | No short-term solution for your problems |
| Comfort zones prevent us succeed in life | You will have to deal with disappointment |
| Can help to unplug from social norms | Can be exhausting |
Should You Step Out Of Your Comfort Zone?
As we have seen before, there are many advantages and disadvantages of leaving your comfort zone.
In my opinion, the pros of getting out of your comfort zone outweigh the cons and if you really want to develop a strong character, it is crucial to step out of your comfort zone from time to time.
Sources
https://www.developgoodhabits.com/comfort-zone/
About the author
My name is Andreas and my mission is to educate people of all ages about our environmental problems and how everyone can make a contribution to mitigate these issues.
As I went to university and got my Master’s degree in Economics, I did plenty of research in the field of Development Economics.
After finishing university, I traveled around the world. From this time on, I wanted to make a contribution to ensure a livable future for the next generations in every part of our beautiful planet.
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