Monday, July 31, 2006

Out of comfort zone

What is a comfort zone?

This is how wikipedia defines it :

Comfort Zone is the term used to denote a type of mental conditioning resulting in artificially created mental boundaries, within which an individual derives a sense of security.

A person tries to cling to the comfort zone and its sense of security, for outside lies the fear of the unknown and the undefined.

As we grow older, we lose our agility and adaptability, we become rigid in our thoughts and deeds. Social prejudices and conditioning, increasing responsibilities and decreasing risk taking force us to continually narrow our comfort zones to the extend that we stop evolving and growing altogether. This because evolution is a process of stretching yourself beyond the known, beyond what is safe, trying out something new, experimenting with life itself. Chaos is to be feared and yet, it is the same turmoil that is the mother of evolution.

Why am I writing all this?
Why? Because I am out of my comfort zone, very far from it. A new job, a new domain, new technology, new house, a new setup, a new team, a new boss, new colleague, friendless in an alien place. There is nothing to cling to. I must either evolve or perish and the way it stand it the latter is more likely. Not a very pleasing thought after the reasonable success that had covered my in its comforting shell for the past few years. It is hard to leave all the warmth of the past and present and look to a possibly cold future.

Do I regret?
No, an emphatic NO. Why? Because this is the only way I an ensure that I am in touch with reality. For all I know the security blanket which was covering me might have worn thin, I need to knit a fresh one that will sustain, even at the cost of spending this winter in the cold, know that I might not even last this winter to enjoy the new blanket that I am knitting, and worst of all, not knowing if I know how to knit :-)

Well, let me know back to knitting ... But .. What if it turns out to be summer rather than winter? And the blanket turns out to be a burden rather than a comfort? What if the old blanket is better than the one I am making.

No point dwelling on these issues, too late for that.
Not waiting for the final outcome, I need to enjoy the journey itself. So au revoir.. Catch up with you at the other end.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

And I thought we get bolder with age. Certainly the shackles of society and burdens of responsiblity clashes against the rigidness & wisdom of age. When we are young we have the whole life to screw up now you have nothing to worry and you can experiment..

Taking risk is always hard and getting out of comfort zone is always harder. But the big step was when you decide to leave your old blanket. Yes it is hard work to weave a new one but don't worry it won't take long ....

Enjoy the ride..