One Step Beyond My Comfort Zone
Did you take swimming lessons when you were a kid? Me too. Your town might have had a municipal or community pool. I practically lived at the pool every summer, taking lessons every morning, back at the pool every afternoon swimming with my friends for a few hours then head to the snack shop to order a frozen Snickers candy bar and gnaw on that all the way home. And, that was my routine every day, of every summer.
Then when I was around 10 years old I had a new awareness of something for the first time. It stood above the deep end of the pool, it was ominous…it was 10 feet tall, it was, The High Dive! As I watched bigger kids jump off, I was fascinated with the idea of trying it myself. But, there was no trying it. If you climb the ladder - you jump! You see the ladder was packed with kids waiting their turn. If you got to the top and got scared, they’re not letting you back down.
About then I started spending more time in the deep end of the pool watching kids, jump, dive, flip and cannonball from 10 feet in the air. So I would get out of the pool and hang around the end of the line of kids waiting to go up. And I'd ask, “What’s it like anyway?” Everyone said the same thing, “It’s awesome…you gotta do it! Then invariably someone would come behind me thinking I’m at the end of the line. So, I’d say, yeah…we’re just talking. And, I would slip back into the pool, nice and warm, nice and safe, back into my comfort zone.
But every day I found myself inching closer to the ladder. You see I really wanted to be one of that elite group of people who could fly ten feet through the air splashing into the water below, but, I was afraid. It was Jack Canfield who said...
Everything you want is on the other side of fear.
I soon discovered that what I wanted was not at the end of the line waiting to climb the ladder. When I got to the top, it wasn’t there either. See at that moment everything I wanted was just one step beyond the end of the High Dive! The one step I couldn’t take.
Just then the Life Guard saw my predicament. So he hollered, “I’m going to count down from ten, when I say one, you jump! I nodded. He shouted 10! 9! 8! (Then everyone on the high dive yelled with him) 7! 6! 5! (Then everyone in the POOL stopped what they were doing, looked up at me and joined in) 4! 3! 2! 1 - jump!
I took one step, dropped 10 feet through the air and overcame what was at that time the greatest fear in my life! From that day forward I had a new routine, a new comfort zone. Every day of every summer I went to the pool with a new purpose, to jump off the High Dive!
When was the last time you faced a fearful or uncomfortable situation and found it was easier to not take the step that would very possibly move you in the direction of your dreams and life's goals? Truly everything you want is on the other side of fear. Wouldn't you say?
It's time to get comfortable being uncomfortable!
Your spirit is never content with the status quo. You have an inner energy just waiting to be consumed upon a worthy goal. A goal that' worthy of you. It's your purpose to find that goal and reach for it, exert the energy and make every step count. Especially the one step that will take you outside and away from your comfort zone.
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