Tag: Discomfort

Fear of failure or is it something else

Posted on by philipdodson

Fear of failure is one of those excuses that we often use externally as a reason not to do something different or outstanding.

I actually think that it is deeper than that, it is an internal fear that we don’t admit to others.

I think that it is to do more with the fear of ridicule by peers, of feeling silly in front of friends/family/coworkers that often keeps us in our discomfort zone of the familiar.

It is that personal thing that effects our self-confidence, our egos, that holds us back more than the fear of it failing.

We often satisfied with good enough, instead of stepping into the ring and daring to be great. That way we avoid the fear of criticism or ridicule.

The good news, however, everyone else is facing that fear, so much so, that they are not that bothered with your idea, they are too busy stewing over what people might think of their ideas, should they decide to share them with the world.

It is best to completely ignore what others might think of your ideas. As they are your ideas and it is the real world of customers and their thoughts that matters, as to whether, that new product or service that you launch, will be a success.

Going further than that, there will be a niche for almost any idea and it is likely to be more than just a few of the 7 billion of us, that will think that your idea is great.

Some of the greatest, world changing ideas are often not liked by the masses initially. It is the small percent of early adopters that matter the most anyway, as they will love it and help spread it further for you.

So be brave, be bold, step out of the discomfort zone of the fear of ridicule and dare to try your ideas.

Think differently, work differently, live and be different..

Comfort zones

Posted on by philipdodson

The path of least resistance is where we often naturally gravitate to, especially, if we are not motivated in life. Honestly, writing our daily to do lists and we start off with heaps of enthusiasm of all the great things that we are going to achieve that day.

Then you start, often though, you will pick an easy task on the list, avoiding the one you deep down know that you should be doing, but it’s hard and often requires you to step out of our comfort zones.

Comfort zones are an interesting thing and it is often talked about by coaches and guru’s. ‘You got to get out of your comfort zone’. That implies that you need to step in to somewhere which is going to make you feel uncomfortable.

I’m not sure that is the best sales pitch that I’ve heard, to be honest, to get you to do something, especially something that you are already putting off, as you think it will be hard.

Imagine if DFS advertised ‘ditch your comfortable sofa and grab one of our range of uncomfortable couches’ or ‘feel the pain of our latest armchairs’. Not sure that would be a real winner of a campaign to be honest.

There is almost this ‘macho’ tag attached to doing things, you have to be ‘tough’ to run a business, you need ‘big balls’ and so on.

I think that this kind of thinking actually has a negative effect on doing stuff and often puts people off stepping out of their ‘comfort zones’.

I actually think that the ‘zone’ of doing the same old, same old and just floating along through life doing the familiar is actually mis-named to be honest.

As the reality is, most of the people in this supposed ‘comfort zone’, aren’t these happy contented people living a familiar and ‘comfy’ life of inertia. They are in fact living a life full of worries, anxiety, stress, fears, feelings of being trapped, inadequacy and in fact they are very uncomfortable.

The phrase should be free yourself from your discomfort zone and step into a new life.

Actually, this whole notion of ‘comfortable’ sounds fairly mediocre to be honest too. Who wants to be settling for comfort, we actually want to be happy.

So, perhaps it could be free yourself from your discomfort zone and create a life of happiness.

Now that sounds a better sales pitch to be honest.

Life for a good deal of people is that discomfort zone and it is because they fear that breaking free from their mis-named ‘comfort zone’, it is this giant leap, as you’ve ‘GOT TO GET OUT OF IT’. But by leaving what they have, that’s described as ‘comfort’ implies that they are going to somewhere less comfortable.

Negative and fear based messages are often how we ‘drive’ people to do things. This is wrong and it can easily be changed too.

We could encourage people to be more open, encourage people that it is OK to talk about how we really feel. We can start to make progress on getting people to see change as thing that will bring them a happier life.

Not to have to frighten them to go into this ‘discomfort zone’ to get them to change.