Get out of your comfort zone!

Change. That’s a word that we’ve heard a lot of recently. As the big buzz word during the elections, people acted excited for change, and even said they wanted it. It’s even been the slogan of a politician in Afghanistan recently. But have you ever noticed that the only change people will support, is something that gives them something?

When it comes to change, most people don’t actually like it. In many cases even if it makes things easier in the long run. For example, I have dealt with a few clients recently that switched over to a new computer software. For the first year or more, everyone who used the old software hated the change, even if the new stuff was better, faster, and could do more for them. It required a shift in thinking, and put them outside of their comfort zone, and people don’t like that.

I heard an interesting idea. If you have something you have to do, that you are nervous about, find something you are scared of more, and do that first. Then when you get back to the thing you have to do, it won’t be so bad. The example they used was, if you need to do a presentation in front of someone that makes you nervous, find someone who makes you more nervous and practice your presentation on them. I don’t think I will be following that advice, but it is interesting to think about.

My mission president challenged us to get out of our comfort zone many times. (I’m sure that’s a common theme among mission presidents) He was pretty specific for about a month. He challenged us to go into businesses and talk to the manager about giving a presentation about the Book of Mormon to their employees, on the grounds that it would help them be more productive and happy. We actually did it a few times – well, we talked to the managers about it, but we never got a meeting set up. But that was probably the farthest outside of my comfort zone I got on my mission. I don’t know why it is harder to talk to a businessman about making a presentation. Probably because it felt a lot more formal, and I don’t do well in formal situations.

Anyway, I just looked back over what I wrote and realized that I really haven’t said anything that y’all haven’t heard already. It’s good to be reminded of these things occasionally, though.