Quick, back to the comfort zone!

Yes, there is value in stepping out of your comfort zone from time to time. You get to experience the new, the wonderful, the strange. You see things differently.

However, it is also equally important to have a comfort zone that allows you a place of safety from which to venture forth.

Many people are in a constant state of turmoil, stress, and distress.

Without a comfort zone, you have no place for the mind or body to rest. Like a metal ball in a pin ball machine, you are bouncing excitedly against the bumpers. You do what you have to do, and despite all the frenetic activity, choices for how to react are limited. In our daily lives, it is easy to perceive threats where there are none. It is easy to choose to be on edge, when you could be relaxed. Our wild animal minds are always on alert. Our outer critics are too numerous and our inner critic won't shut up for a moment.

Tiger Lounging: Took this photo when we had a day at the Animal Kingdom when we were down for launch of STS 120. We were safely behind glass. (Our comfort zone when face to face with Tigers!)My grandmother used to say, "they can kill you, but they can't eat you," which always left me perplexed. Once I've been done in, who is to say that they won't fry me up with some butter and onions, or tear into me with bare teeth? However, the point was supposed to be that neither outcome was very likely to happen on the school playground. A point that was lost on me as a child. Instead I imagined my playmates to be potential closet cannibals or ravenous beasts. I already did not trust many people, and that simply reinforced my suspicion that I should be on my guard at all times. You never know who might be looking at you with a fork in one hand and a bottle of ketchup in the other!

The most successful people I have met, know how to create some margin of safety for themselves and others. Even when their professions involve real danger, risk to life and limb, or when they are very busy people with more to do than most. Most successful people have some kind of a safe haven -- trusted friends, and room to retreat when the world imposes. People who really know you, who will say "you are alright with me. I don't care what happened or what that other bozo said about you."

The people I know who are trust worthy, are so dear to me, that I would gladly do anything in the world for them. They are a joy to work with. We need not worry about offending each other with small slights, although we are careful of each other's feelings. Some real doozie mistakes are tolerated with a kind eye. We can relax together in close quarters, be awkward or bashful without serious reproach beyond a mild kidding. We can be quiet, or talk. We share a comfort zone. We are tigers among tigers; playing like kittens, with claws withdrawn. We have to give each other room to be safe, even when we know the world is full of other bigger meaner tigers. Schoolyard cannibals might still be out there. Lock the gate, there might be barbarians, or diabolical chipmunks. Dangers real and imagined.

You can't step out of your comfort zone if you don't ever have one. If you wish to live a balanced life, you have to have a comfort zone, some core, some central pivot point of equilibrium around which you can divert energy to stretch, to grow, and to achieve your larger goals and purpose.

Sometimes that point is easy to see, and sometimes that point can only be determined by indirectly watching the motion of daily life swirl around it. It is worth keeping an eye out for it, so you can come back to it often, like a lair.

Once you have even a moment of pause, where you feel a sense of safety and comfort, consider how to expand it, a little... so that over time, you are comfortable in more situations. Eventually, when you break away from the quiet camouflage of the underbrush to pounce and tussle with the Thomson's gazelles, or to deal with the chipmunk menace, you'll always have some restful place for your wild panting tigress heart to return.

Copyright @ 2009, Catherine E. White, permission is granted for this article to be redistributed and shared with others in its entirety as long as links and attribution are maintained.
Catherine E. White is president of Llamagraphics, Inc., developer of Life Balance™ software for Mac OS X, Windows, Palm OS and iPhone. Life Balance provides a structure for your goals, projects and tasks that is priority driven, so you can to make better decisions about how to use your discretionary time. To learn more, please visit http://www.llamagraphics.com/