Growth or comfort

Photo by Jim Chaput
Written by Jim Chaput
After a 19-year career in financial services, Jim left a leadership position to focus on health and fitness. Jim is a Master Practitioner of Applied Movement Neurology and holds Certificates in Applied Functional Science and 3DMAPS from the Gray Institute. His passion is empowering people to help resolve the pain, tension and insomnia that prevents them from living well.

If you seek growth, you need to look outside your comfort zone.

Small discomforts can promote slow, steady growth.

  • Try a new class at the gym or hire a personal trainer to push you a bit. Becoming a beginner again can help you see what other people go through when they learn the things at which you are an expert.
  • At home, try some new vegetables, meat or recipes. Maybe try some of the foods you did not like as a child and see what happens. (Based on my childhood tastes, I never imagined I would regularly eat squash and beets, but I do.)
  • Take an art or photography class where you have to make some art. A little push to express yourself might be exactly what you need.

For more dramatic growth, look to the things that scare you.

  • Book a holiday to somewhere exotic you have always wanted to go. Trish and I were in Thailand a few years ago and stopped at a bar that seemed a bit dodgy, but I had to go – it was the Broomstick Bar and we used to live in Salem, MA (Witch City). It turned out the people were super nice and reminded us to not judge a book by its cover.
  • Lurking on sites for your passions or career? Start commenting on posts and contribute. It easy to think you have the answers, much harder to put your thoughts out there for scrutiny. Clarifying your thoughts in writing is a great way to accelerate your learning.
  • Go back to school or take a course to learn that thing you always wanted to do. You will never know how great you can be at something until you start doing it. I once took a week off of work to learn to sail. I had thought about sailing for years, finally did it and had several years of great sailing and racing before we moved to London. I still miss it and hope to get back out there soon.

When you look back on your life so far, which bothers you more…the things you did that did not work out or the things that might have been that you never tried?

2 Comments

  1. Duncs

    The things I didn’t dare to go all in with. I was once called by a football manager and didn’t follow up.
    I talking about it with friends and family but didn’t take it the step further.
    Even to have made the first training session on not been taken on would have been a big experience and far more rewarding the The not knowing what might have been

  2. Jim Chaput

    That is a tough one, but maybe was for the best as you were not ready for some reason. No failures, just lessons.