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Comfort is the Enemy?
Theoldguy1
Posts: 2,510 Member
in Debate Club
What do you think about the title? I've see this for years from what some would call hard core "macho" guys. Now there are NYT best selling books on the topic, even less "in your face" author promoting this.
I'm going to say it's pretty true. I like the phrase, "no growth happens in your comfort zone". IMO this applies to health and fitness, relationships, your job, learning, i.e., all parts of life.
Interested in what other people think.
I'm going to say it's pretty true. I like the phrase, "no growth happens in your comfort zone". IMO this applies to health and fitness, relationships, your job, learning, i.e., all parts of life.
Interested in what other people think.
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Replies
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I'm skeptical to dismissive.
Sure, gotta challenge myself to create change, make progress.
Too much challenge in too many domains? High stress, probably underperform in some of those domains, most likely the more difficult ones . . . which may not be the least important ones.
Balance in life is important, IMO. Challenge in priority domains, satisficing in necessary but lower priority ones, ignore stuff that doesn't matter (like keeping up with the Joneses for no other reason than keeping up,
for one example).
The hard core macho rhetoric is just a marketing hook. A certain segment will buy into it. Some may even benefit. But being best sellers doesn't necessarily mean the content is good. Some influencers are hugely popular, and I've seen your opinions about influencers on other threads. Same deal with books.
For myself, I feel like "health and fitness, relationships, your job, learning" have been in decent shape over the long haul in my life, mostly better than average. Along the way, going (too) hard in some areas short-changed others that mattered, for sure, though.
We're talking about abstractions here. That kind of discussion almost never yields consensus or leads to useful conclusions. Yeah, I'm cynical, too.1 -
No I don't agree - I see nothing wrong with comfort
Nothing wrong with doing things regularly and consistently - just because you are in your comfort zone walking the dog for 20 minutes or doing a regular 5 km run, doesn't mean it isn't doing you any good.1 -
I think "comfort is the enemy" is a pretty loaded catch phrase. Kind of like "body positivity" is. For me, I think the word "enemy" is a bit strong and turns me off the sentiment. I just picture some red-faced roided out bro bellowing spittle in my face. Probably singing the praises of 75 Hard or something. It's a very militaristic phrasing and I just don't see my life as some constant battle against mediocrity.
That said, I completely agree that expanding your horizons can be a very positive thing. My sister is currently in an improv class to be more comfortable speaking publicly and I think that's great. But that's not the first thought that comes to my mind when I hear "comfort is the enemy".2 -
I think it's really indicative of the current (toxic, imo) "hustle culture" where the measure of success is how many minutes of the day you're spending creating more wealth, reach, recognition etc. It sells books, and gets podcast listeners and social media followers but it's a pretty messed up thing in the end - what is wrong with finding your comfortable spot in life, where you can sustain yourself and then spending your time making yourself happy? When did life become about grinding yourself down in the name of "self improvement" and everything become a competition (with yourself or someone else) to keep clocking up more money, more 'achievements' etc?
I'm not saying self improvement isn't a great ongoing goal, but there seems to be this idea that if you aren't working yourself to the bone for it, you're failing at life. Sure, the comfort zone can be a dangerous place if your comfortable being unhealthy, or it requires you to be dependent on others instead of self sustaining (excepting of course where that's agreed with the others, or you have circumstances where it's necessary), but I do feel like the "never stay comfortable, always push yourself, grind, grind, grind" mindset is a symptom of corporate/capitalist brainwashing.
I am comfortable doing my job, and spending the spare time doing things that make me happy and, yes, comfortable. I'm not looking to monetise my hobbies, and I'm not going to feel guilty for reading trash sci fi instead of a self improvement book. I'm not using my spare time to get another job. I'm going to eat and workout in ways that benefit me and make me happy, but I'm not going to work myself to the bone to attain, and maintain a physique that goes well beyond what I need for my health and happiness.
I think posing "comfort" which really should be the ultimate goal, as the enemy is pretty toxic.2 -
Thought provoking.
Not a good motto. Too "Hitlerish" for the average Joe.
A personal mantra? You choose. Certainly not for me.0 -
Wow, I've been familiar with this concept for decades and don't attribute the thought to anything current, trendy, capitalistic, corporate, dude-bro/roid-ish, toxic or having to do with Hitler for eff's sake.
You can find this sentiment in philosophy and religions throughout the world and throughout time.
To me, it simply means you're likely not growing, learning, understanding, improving etc...to the extent you could be, if you're floating downstream on the river of life rather than being challenged by it.
Challenge and adversity, whether physical, mental or philosophical causes focus and hopefully introspection. We're more likely to grow in this environment. Plants and animals thrive under adversity.
If you were to rephrase the thought as something like "Challenge is my friend" I doubt all the negative connotations would come to mind for most.
My .02
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No, long-running I would still feel same about "Challenge is my friend".
Although I agree that wording isn't as strident as in OP.
Because, sure, it is good to challenge yourself if you want to - but nothing wrong with doing something comfortably either without wanting to always be stretching and challenging further.
If where you are in fitness, finances, work, sport, whatever, is healthy and happy, nothing wrong with staying at that point.
I don't agree that we need adversity to thrive - and it is ok if you are not growing and improving in everything if you are happy where you are.
Floating along the river of life, or in the parts of life you choose to, is fine too.
You shouldn't feel compelled to push yourself further and further unless you want to - and these statements make it seem as though you should.
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I think this kind of statement resonates differently depending on life experience - and maybe life stage. So in the gym? Sure? I’ll keep on challenging myself to develop better technique, to get stronger, to get fitter and to keep mobile.
But I’ve been through a “challenging” time at work and home in the last 18 months. I don’t want to repeat any of that and frankly it was traumatic. So my current “comfort” of stable work life and no personal trauma with the relatives and various social services is lovely. In my view I’ve earned that comfort and I am going to enjoy it. I’ve also earned the comfort to be able to heat my home and do my weekly shop without being terrified of the budget and whether I had to pay for food or heating (couldn’t afford both once upon a time).
So if that makes my current comfort boring and means I’m not pushing myself - I’ll happily take that.4 -
I think the "Hitlerian" rhetoric is over the top. Waaaay over.
But when I think about the most effective, productive people I've known in real life, they were not all about "I'm going to make myself get out of my comfort zone!". They looked around, set a direction or goal, made a smart plan, put their heads down, and worked hard. In the cases I'd consider most effective, they didn't sacrifice all other aspects of life for that one thing, but that's kind of an individual values dimension. Uni-focus can be OK, if that's what a person wants.
Sure, some things will involve discomfort, but that's sort of a side trip, IMO: A byproduct at some stages, a distraction, or maybe a speed bump in certain cases. A few goals are all about discomfort, I dunno, maybe something like summiting the highest peak on every continent, or running a marathon every day for a year? Still, the discomfort seems like a byproduct, but I'm not the people who've done those things, so what do I know?
To me, the "get out of your comfort zone" theme - when posed as a universal necessity for progress - seems more ego-driven, braggadocio, more noise than seriousness. It makes me want to eye-roll.
The OP mentions learning as an area to get out of one's comfort zone. That's truly weird to me. Usually, I think learning is fun, even "extreme learning". There are exceptions, like learning from being in a country under siege, for example. But generally, learning is a fun challenge. Even learning inherently boring things is kind of fun: Examples from my own life have been things like learning some new IT technical toolset for which there wasn't formal educatation, or understanding and applying government regulations in the real world. It gave me a positive sense of accomplishment to figure it out, too.
There's also an issue of mindset. Just as a real-world example, I could frame something like speaking in front of a large group at a national conference as uncomfortable, or I could frame it as exhilarating. One of those framings is more enjoyable and productive for me, and it isn't the first one. Others may differ, and if that works for them, swell. But if you want to argue with my framing working better for me . . . well, I think we're back at grandstanding or braggadocio.
Sure, some physical goals involve physical discomfort, but take that too far and a person's gonna get hurt, which isn't productive or successful. Smart, well-planned, and hard-working is better than uncomfortable as a general guide, IMO. Not nearly as good a marketing hook, though, and hard to sell chest-beating books about compared to "I do HARD things", because smart plans and working hard are . . . sort of boring to talk about?
In that physical-goals case and some others, serious discomfort can even be counter-productive, and I'd put weight loss in that category for most people. It's not the only example. Discomfort can waste energy: Focusing on discomfort has the potential to be sort of a psychological analog to over-training.
I don't have a problem with people who prefer to float through life more gently, either. Odds they might achieve less in external/objective terms, but as long as they generally carry their own weight societally, I don't see the need to claim they're lesser beings. That's just more chest-beating, seems like.
If "going hard" or "get uncomfortable" is motivating, makes you (generic you) feel good about yourself, go for it. Nothing in my life has suggested to me that that's the guaranteed path to best outcomes; and looking down on people who use different strategies is just another example of people who sadly need to feel that their way is THE VERY BEST WAY.
It's all abstractions, still, though. Not a winnable topic. When it comes to abstract ideas like this, everyone has a different interpretation of the words, and we've seen that play out above.4 -
I agree with a lot of the thoughts above, and also agree it's totally subjective. Good responses, interesting how we all appear to position the thought a little differently.
For me it's a thought to consider, just neutral. I don't take it as a directive by someone "telling" me what to do. If I did, I probably wouldn't like it. I don't think the concept makes sense to apply to every aspect of your life, all the time. That's not really sustainable either.
I don't feel a need to champion the sentiment, defend it, or to put it down.
It does bring a couple thoughts to mind that I think are interesting.
I don't follow astrology, but I think we've all read characteristics of our birth signs. One for Pisces is that we are "happiest swimming up stream". I read that as a guppy and have pondered it my whole life. Like, who would be happiest struggling like that? I've spent the majority of my life enjoying cruising downstream. It's been a lovely cruise. And my best moments have been going up stream. Without a doubt.
The other thought I've had is a little tongue in cheek, but does make me grin.
In the 80's Nike said "Just do it!" and we got it. It was wildly successful and received as a battle cry for men and women both to take the challenge. The challenge was undefined, it was whatever it meant to you. Brilliant, right?!
Imagine, the same ad campaign in 2025... "JUST DO IT!"
I imagine the response today would be overwhelmingly...
"Don't tell me what to do!"
Not sure how we got here...
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Corina1143 wrote: »Thought provoking.
Not a good motto. Too "Hitlerish" for the average Joe.
A personal mantra? You choose. Certainly not for me.
You obviously did not had relatives impacted by Hitler.1 -
Wow, I've been familiar with this concept for decades and don't attribute the thought to anything current, trendy, capitalistic, corporate, dude-bro/roid-ish, toxic or having to do with Hitler for eff's sake.
You can find this sentiment in philosophy and religions throughout the world and throughout time.
To me, it simply means you're likely not growing, learning, understanding, improving etc...to the extent you could be, if you're floating downstream on the river of life rather than being challenged by it.
Challenge and adversity, whether physical, mental or philosophical causes focus and hopefully introspection. We're more likely to grow in this environment. Plants and animals thrive under adversity.
If you were to rephrase the thought as something like "Challenge is my friend" I doubt all the negative connotations would come to mind for most.
My .02
I can agree with that. If one isn't being challenged, they are not growing. And if one is being challenged they are going to be out their comfort zone.
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"Comfort is the enemy" sounds like something thought up by a guy who went straight from playing video games while his mom took care of him to playing video games while his wife takes care of him, then was slapped with the harsh realization that he's soft.
Is this the part where I do the disclaimer about how it's okay to have softness? I don't know. I grew up a chronic illness pincushion who cured her shyness with theater. Pretty sure I'm made of needles and glow tape.
All in all, your motivation is your own. I seek comfort like the treasure it is.2 -
Reading all these answers is interesting, and has made me examine my initial response and where I was coming from.
When I read the statement, it immediately struck me as one of those chest-beating, TikTok hustle culture mantras, where if you are comfortable, you're not working hard enough. "There are 24 usable hours in every day!" "If you have time for fun, you have time to make money!" type slogans.
I guess because if it just means "always strive to grow as a person" then its pretty obvious, and also totally overstated haha (and again. I'm not judging anyone who hits a point of being self sufficient and just cruises, more power to them!).
For me, learning more, earning more, building solid foundations (financially, socially etc) are fun, and comfortable. I have multiple degrees, a challenging job, and a very, very "comfortable" life and I am universes away from a kid who left home at 15, didn't finish year 10 and seemed on track to be a bit of a loser. At no stage in building any of that did I need to be told "comfort is your enemy", and having read that now, my reaction was "hell no, I'm doing enough, thank you - I don't need to make myself uncomfortable to keep achieving!"
So yeah, I think for me, a part of my initial reaction is the (patronising?) assumption that I found implied in the statement that comfort is only found in complacency and mediocracy. I can be both comfortable and successful - I consider being able to be comfortable an indicator of success, in fact.
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I think used in proper context it's not a bad saying. It's easy to dismiss it, but personal growth often comes from challenging yourself and stepping out of your comfort zone.
More than 4 decades ago, I had become familiar with the term "get comfortable being uncomfortable". It was often used in the military, especially in the more physical and dirty jobs. But it also proved to a lot of people that they could do things they thought they would never be able to do. In the Marine Corps there was also a term "embrace the suck". It came from certain (usually field related) physical or especially unpleasant tasks that we knew most would view as "sucking" to do. But if your head was in the game and you embraced it, it wasn't all that terrible to do.
Would I want to lose a loved one to tragedy, get fired because I set goals too lofty in a career, have major health concerns just to face some adversity and grow? No, and I'd assume many people feel that way.
But I can think of many cases where I grew as a person due to being faced with life challenges. And at times either pushed myself or allowed others to help push me to do things I didn't think possible at the time. In my view, overall it's not a bad thing.3 -
To me it’s a current catchy phrase that has long roots in history. The stoics are the first that come to my mind but certainly not the last. The Marine Corps and other warrior cultures are another. I know I don’t grow when I’m not challenged in some way.2
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I think the "Hitlerian" rhetoric is over the top. Waaaay over.
But when I think about the most effective, productive people I've known in real life, they were not all about "I'm going to make myself get out of my comfort zone!". They looked around, set a direction or goal, made a smart plan, put their heads down, and worked hard. In the cases I'd consider most effective, they didn't sacrifice all other aspects of life for that one thing, but that's kind of an individual values dimension. Uni-focus can be OK, if that's what a person wants.
Sure, some things will involve discomfort, but that's sort of a side trip, IMO: A byproduct at some stages, a distraction, or maybe a speed bump in certain cases. A few goals are all about discomfort, I dunno, maybe something like summiting the highest peak on every continent, or running a marathon every day for a year? Still, the discomfort seems like a byproduct, but I'm not the people who've done those things, so what do I know?
To me, the "get out of your comfort zone" theme - when posed as a universal necessity for progress - seems more ego-driven, braggadocio, more noise than seriousness. It makes me want to eye-roll.
The OP mentions learning as an area to get out of one's comfort zone. That's truly weird to me. Usually, I think learning is fun, even "extreme learning". There are exceptions, like learning from being in a country under siege, for example. But generally, learning is a fun challenge. Even learning inherently boring things is kind of fun: Examples from my own life have been things like learning some new IT technical toolset for which there wasn't formal educatation, or understanding and applying government regulations in the real world. It gave me a positive sense of accomplishment to figure it out, too.
There's also an issue of mindset. Just as a real-world example, I could frame something like speaking in front of a large group at a national conference as uncomfortable, or I could frame it as exhilarating. One of those framings is more enjoyable and productive for me, and it isn't the first one. Others may differ, and if that works for them, swell. But if you want to argue with my framing working better for me . . . well, I think we're back at grandstanding or braggadocio.
Sure, some physical goals involve physical discomfort, but take that too far and a person's gonna get hurt, which isn't productive or successful. Smart, well-planned, and hard-working is better than uncomfortable as a general guide, IMO. Not nearly as good a marketing hook, though, and hard to sell chest-beating books about compared to "I do HARD things", because smart plans and working hard are . . . sort of boring to talk about?
In that physical-goals case and some others, serious discomfort can even be counter-productive, and I'd put weight loss in that category for most people. It's not the only example. Discomfort can waste energy: Focusing on discomfort has the potential to be sort of a psychological analog to over-training.
I don't have a problem with people who prefer to float through life more gently, either. Odds they might achieve less in external/objective terms, but as long as they generally carry their own weight societally, I don't see the need to claim they're lesser beings. That's just more chest-beating, seems like.
If "going hard" or "get uncomfortable" is motivating, makes you (generic you) feel good about yourself, go for it. Nothing in my life has suggested to me that that's the guaranteed path to best outcomes; and looking down on people who use different strategies is just another example of people who sadly need to feel that their way is THE VERY BEST WAY.
It's all abstractions, still, though. Not a winnable topic. When it comes to abstract ideas like this, everyone has a different interpretation of the words, and we've seen that play out above.
Learning can be and often is quite uncomfortable. It's exposing yourself to ideas and concepts you are sometimes extremely uncomfortable with. Grappling with things you don't yet know how to do. If it's easy, chances are you're not actually learning, but rather doing something you were already able to do or already had the knowledge about. It can be fun, but it's difficult. I think that's really the op's point, that we need to expose ourselves to difficult things in order to grow. Not growing is fine too. But if you want to grow, there will be difficulties involved.2 -
sollyn23l2 wrote: »I think the "Hitlerian" rhetoric is over the top. Waaaay over.
But when I think about the most effective, productive people I've known in real life, they were not all about "I'm going to make myself get out of my comfort zone!". They looked around, set a direction or goal, made a smart plan, put their heads down, and worked hard. In the cases I'd consider most effective, they didn't sacrifice all other aspects of life for that one thing, but that's kind of an individual values dimension. Uni-focus can be OK, if that's what a person wants.
Sure, some things will involve discomfort, but that's sort of a side trip, IMO: A byproduct at some stages, a distraction, or maybe a speed bump in certain cases. A few goals are all about discomfort, I dunno, maybe something like summiting the highest peak on every continent, or running a marathon every day for a year? Still, the discomfort seems like a byproduct, but I'm not the people who've done those things, so what do I know?
To me, the "get out of your comfort zone" theme - when posed as a universal necessity for progress - seems more ego-driven, braggadocio, more noise than seriousness. It makes me want to eye-roll.
The OP mentions learning as an area to get out of one's comfort zone. That's truly weird to me. Usually, I think learning is fun, even "extreme learning". There are exceptions, like learning from being in a country under siege, for example. But generally, learning is a fun challenge. Even learning inherently boring things is kind of fun: Examples from my own life have been things like learning some new IT technical toolset for which there wasn't formal educatation, or understanding and applying government regulations in the real world. It gave me a positive sense of accomplishment to figure it out, too.
There's also an issue of mindset. Just as a real-world example, I could frame something like speaking in front of a large group at a national conference as uncomfortable, or I could frame it as exhilarating. One of those framings is more enjoyable and productive for me, and it isn't the first one. Others may differ, and if that works for them, swell. But if you want to argue with my framing working better for me . . . well, I think we're back at grandstanding or braggadocio.
Sure, some physical goals involve physical discomfort, but take that too far and a person's gonna get hurt, which isn't productive or successful. Smart, well-planned, and hard-working is better than uncomfortable as a general guide, IMO. Not nearly as good a marketing hook, though, and hard to sell chest-beating books about compared to "I do HARD things", because smart plans and working hard are . . . sort of boring to talk about?
In that physical-goals case and some others, serious discomfort can even be counter-productive, and I'd put weight loss in that category for most people. It's not the only example. Discomfort can waste energy: Focusing on discomfort has the potential to be sort of a psychological analog to over-training.
I don't have a problem with people who prefer to float through life more gently, either. Odds they might achieve less in external/objective terms, but as long as they generally carry their own weight societally, I don't see the need to claim they're lesser beings. That's just more chest-beating, seems like.
If "going hard" or "get uncomfortable" is motivating, makes you (generic you) feel good about yourself, go for it. Nothing in my life has suggested to me that that's the guaranteed path to best outcomes; and looking down on people who use different strategies is just another example of people who sadly need to feel that their way is THE VERY BEST WAY.
It's all abstractions, still, though. Not a winnable topic. When it comes to abstract ideas like this, everyone has a different interpretation of the words, and we've seen that play out above.
Learning can be and often is quite uncomfortable. It's exposing yourself to ideas and concepts you are sometimes extremely uncomfortable with. Grappling with things you don't yet know how to do. If it's easy, chances are you're not actually learning, but rather doing something you were already able to do or already had the knowledge about. It can be fun, but it's difficult. I think that's really the op's point, that we need to expose ourselves to difficult things in order to grow. Not growing is fine too. But if you want to grow, there will be difficulties involved.
That's the part I don't agree with. I don't think difficulty or challenge is synonymous with discomfort.
Maybe we just define "comfort zone" differently. I think difficulty can be fun, exhilarating.
In the realm of intellectual challenge, it's nearly always fun in my experience. I enjoy that kind of challenge. The implication that curiosity as a driving force, and enjoyment of the pursuit, isn't hard enough when not uncomfortable, so the person isn't growing . . . I just don't buy it. The implications of that are kind of offensive, even.
Maybe others' individual subjective experience differs, I can accept that. But I don't think I'm a person who's shied away from learning difficult things, including very challenging things. For sure, I've tried to learn some things that I didn't master. Yes, I didn't head further down those paths, because I thought I'd benefit myself and others by heading in directions - sometimes difficult ones
- where I had more aptitude. I still enjoyed making the effort, though. Succeeded or failed, the effort is more exhilarating and enjoyable than painful.
The only discomfort I can think of in that realm is learning about things that are truly painful. I'm not going to be specific, but you'll know what I mean. I'm talking about things like learning in detail about individuals' experiences in periods of history where people were abused, suffered in extreme ways. That's uncomfortable, but it's not the learning that's uncomfortable, it's the subject matter.
In other domains, I admit I haven't sought out challenges just because they were uncomfortable, but I've faced some reasonably difficult challenges in modern-life terms, stepped up in the way that the situation needed. Yeah, they were uncomfortable, and I grew from some of them. (Not all discomfort creates meaningful growth, IME, either.) Needing to think of all challenges as uncomfortable in order to create growth seems odd and kind of egotistical to me.
I grew up in a subculture that was not emotion driven and minimized emotional expression, and in which it wasn't appreciated when someone talked about how hard they worked to accomplish a thing. Working hard and dealing with what came up was just expected. That may be an influence here, the element that makes me think "go hard or go home" kind of thinking is a form of self-aggrandizement. (I recognize that that idea may also be offensive to some, but I'm trying to be transparent and emotionally honest here.)
I still don't think being uncomfortable is a measure of quality or progress in most domains. I agree that challenge is needed in order to grow. I just don't think all challenges are uncomfortable as a dominant characteristic, even difficult challenges. Sure, some challenges that are worth taking on are uncomfortable in one way or another, but I think that's a side effect, not the point. That wouldn't drive me to undertake that particular thing, but it wouldn't drive me away, either.2 -
sollyn23l2 wrote: »I think the "Hitlerian" rhetoric is over the top. Waaaay over.
But when I think about the most effective, productive people I've known in real life, they were not all about "I'm going to make myself get out of my comfort zone!". They looked around, set a direction or goal, made a smart plan, put their heads down, and worked hard. In the cases I'd consider most effective, they didn't sacrifice all other aspects of life for that one thing, but that's kind of an individual values dimension. Uni-focus can be OK, if that's what a person wants.
Sure, some things will involve discomfort, but that's sort of a side trip, IMO: A byproduct at some stages, a distraction, or maybe a speed bump in certain cases. A few goals are all about discomfort, I dunno, maybe something like summiting the highest peak on every continent, or running a marathon every day for a year? Still, the discomfort seems like a byproduct, but I'm not the people who've done those things, so what do I know?
To me, the "get out of your comfort zone" theme - when posed as a universal necessity for progress - seems more ego-driven, braggadocio, more noise than seriousness. It makes me want to eye-roll.
The OP mentions learning as an area to get out of one's comfort zone. That's truly weird to me. Usually, I think learning is fun, even "extreme learning". There are exceptions, like learning from being in a country under siege, for example. But generally, learning is a fun challenge. Even learning inherently boring things is kind of fun: Examples from my own life have been things like learning some new IT technical toolset for which there wasn't formal educatation, or understanding and applying government regulations in the real world. It gave me a positive sense of accomplishment to figure it out, too.
There's also an issue of mindset. Just as a real-world example, I could frame something like speaking in front of a large group at a national conference as uncomfortable, or I could frame it as exhilarating. One of those framings is more enjoyable and productive for me, and it isn't the first one. Others may differ, and if that works for them, swell. But if you want to argue with my framing working better for me . . . well, I think we're back at grandstanding or braggadocio.
Sure, some physical goals involve physical discomfort, but take that too far and a person's gonna get hurt, which isn't productive or successful. Smart, well-planned, and hard-working is better than uncomfortable as a general guide, IMO. Not nearly as good a marketing hook, though, and hard to sell chest-beating books about compared to "I do HARD things", because smart plans and working hard are . . . sort of boring to talk about?
In that physical-goals case and some others, serious discomfort can even be counter-productive, and I'd put weight loss in that category for most people. It's not the only example. Discomfort can waste energy: Focusing on discomfort has the potential to be sort of a psychological analog to over-training.
I don't have a problem with people who prefer to float through life more gently, either. Odds they might achieve less in external/objective terms, but as long as they generally carry their own weight societally, I don't see the need to claim they're lesser beings. That's just more chest-beating, seems like.
If "going hard" or "get uncomfortable" is motivating, makes you (generic you) feel good about yourself, go for it. Nothing in my life has suggested to me that that's the guaranteed path to best outcomes; and looking down on people who use different strategies is just another example of people who sadly need to feel that their way is THE VERY BEST WAY.
It's all abstractions, still, though. Not a winnable topic. When it comes to abstract ideas like this, everyone has a different interpretation of the words, and we've seen that play out above.
Learning can be and often is quite uncomfortable. It's exposing yourself to ideas and concepts you are sometimes extremely uncomfortable with. Grappling with things you don't yet know how to do. If it's easy, chances are you're not actually learning, but rather doing something you were already able to do or already had the knowledge about. It can be fun, but it's difficult. I think that's really the op's point, that we need to expose ourselves to difficult things in order to grow. Not growing is fine too. But if you want to grow, there will be difficulties involved.
That's the part I don't agree with. I don't think difficulty or challenge is synonymous with discomfort.
Maybe we just define "comfort zone" differently. I think difficulty can be fun, exhilarating.
In the realm of intellectual challenge, it's nearly always fun in my experience. I enjoy that kind of challenge. The implication that curiosity as a driving force, and enjoyment of the pursuit, isn't hard enough when not uncomfortable, so the person isn't growing . . . I just don't buy it. The implications of that are kind of offensive, even.
Maybe others' individual subjective experience differs, I can accept that. But I don't think I'm a person who's shied away from learning difficult things, including very challenging things. For sure, I've tried to learn some things that I didn't master. Yes, I didn't head further down those paths, because I thought I'd benefit myself and others by heading in directions - sometimes difficult ones - where I had more aptitude. I still enjoyed making the effort, though. Succeeded or failed, the effort is more exhilarating and enjoyable than painful.
The only discomfort I can think of in that realm is learning about things that are truly painful. I'm not going to be specific, but you'll know what I mean. I'm talking about things like learning in detail about individuals' experiences in periods of history where people were abused, suffered in extreme ways. That's uncomfortable, but it's not the learning that's uncomfortable, it's the subject matter.
In other domains, I admit I haven't sought out challenges just because they were uncomfortable, but I've faced some reasonably difficult challenges in modern-life terms, stepped up in the way that the situation needed. Yeah, they were uncomfortable, and I grew from some of them. (Not all discomfort creates meaningful growth, IME, either.) Needing to think of all challenges as uncomfortable in order to create growth seems odd and kind of egotistical to me.
I grew up in a subculture that was not emotion driven and minimized emotional expression, and in which it wasn't appreciated when someone talked about how hard they worked to accomplish a thing. Working hard and dealing with what came up was just expected. That may be an influence here, the element that makes me think "go hard or go home" kind of thinking is a form of self-aggrandizement. (I recognize that that idea may also be offensive to some, but I'm trying to be transparent and emotionally honest here.)
I still don't think being uncomfortable is a measure of quality or progress in most domains. I agree that challenge is needed in order to grow. I just don't think all challenges are uncomfortable as a dominant characteristic, even difficult challenges. Sure, some challenges that are worth taking on are uncomfortable in one way or another, but I think that's a side effect, not the point. That wouldn't drive me to undertake that particular thing, but it wouldn't drive me away, either.
I think the issue is conflating difficult with uncomfortable. Sure. Many, many people shy away from difficult things simply because they're difficult. They're allowed. But if one always shies away from anything difficult, there will be many important, worthwhile things you will never do. For me, math and numbers were difficult and caused an immense amount of mental distress for me growing up. Had I felt I never needed to do anything uncomfortable or difficult because nothing should ever be uncomfortable, I still wouldn't be able to add simply due to the reality that I really don't like it and it causes me mental discomfort to even look at numbers.4 -
sollyn23l2 wrote: »sollyn23l2 wrote: »I think the "Hitlerian" rhetoric is over the top. Waaaay over.
But when I think about the most effective, productive people I've known in real life, they were not all about "I'm going to make myself get out of my comfort zone!". They looked around, set a direction or goal, made a smart plan, put their heads down, and worked hard. In the cases I'd consider most effective, they didn't sacrifice all other aspects of life for that one thing, but that's kind of an individual values dimension. Uni-focus can be OK, if that's what a person wants.
Sure, some things will involve discomfort, but that's sort of a side trip, IMO: A byproduct at some stages, a distraction, or maybe a speed bump in certain cases. A few goals are all about discomfort, I dunno, maybe something like summiting the highest peak on every continent, or running a marathon every day for a year? Still, the discomfort seems like a byproduct, but I'm not the people who've done those things, so what do I know?
To me, the "get out of your comfort zone" theme - when posed as a universal necessity for progress - seems more ego-driven, braggadocio, more noise than seriousness. It makes me want to eye-roll.
The OP mentions learning as an area to get out of one's comfort zone. That's truly weird to me. Usually, I think learning is fun, even "extreme learning". There are exceptions, like learning from being in a country under siege, for example. But generally, learning is a fun challenge. Even learning inherently boring things is kind of fun: Examples from my own life have been things like learning some new IT technical toolset for which there wasn't formal educatation, or understanding and applying government regulations in the real world. It gave me a positive sense of accomplishment to figure it out, too.
There's also an issue of mindset. Just as a real-world example, I could frame something like speaking in front of a large group at a national conference as uncomfortable, or I could frame it as exhilarating. One of those framings is more enjoyable and productive for me, and it isn't the first one. Others may differ, and if that works for them, swell. But if you want to argue with my framing working better for me . . . well, I think we're back at grandstanding or braggadocio.
Sure, some physical goals involve physical discomfort, but take that too far and a person's gonna get hurt, which isn't productive or successful. Smart, well-planned, and hard-working is better than uncomfortable as a general guide, IMO. Not nearly as good a marketing hook, though, and hard to sell chest-beating books about compared to "I do HARD things", because smart plans and working hard are . . . sort of boring to talk about?
In that physical-goals case and some others, serious discomfort can even be counter-productive, and I'd put weight loss in that category for most people. It's not the only example. Discomfort can waste energy: Focusing on discomfort has the potential to be sort of a psychological analog to over-training.
I don't have a problem with people who prefer to float through life more gently, either. Odds they might achieve less in external/objective terms, but as long as they generally carry their own weight societally, I don't see the need to claim they're lesser beings. That's just more chest-beating, seems like.
If "going hard" or "get uncomfortable" is motivating, makes you (generic you) feel good about yourself, go for it. Nothing in my life has suggested to me that that's the guaranteed path to best outcomes; and looking down on people who use different strategies is just another example of people who sadly need to feel that their way is THE VERY BEST WAY.
It's all abstractions, still, though. Not a winnable topic. When it comes to abstract ideas like this, everyone has a different interpretation of the words, and we've seen that play out above.
Learning can be and often is quite uncomfortable. It's exposing yourself to ideas and concepts you are sometimes extremely uncomfortable with. Grappling with things you don't yet know how to do. If it's easy, chances are you're not actually learning, but rather doing something you were already able to do or already had the knowledge about. It can be fun, but it's difficult. I think that's really the op's point, that we need to expose ourselves to difficult things in order to grow. Not growing is fine too. But if you want to grow, there will be difficulties involved.
That's the part I don't agree with. I don't think difficulty or challenge is synonymous with discomfort.
Maybe we just define "comfort zone" differently. I think difficulty can be fun, exhilarating.
In the realm of intellectual challenge, it's nearly always fun in my experience. I enjoy that kind of challenge. The implication that curiosity as a driving force, and enjoyment of the pursuit, isn't hard enough when not uncomfortable, so the person isn't growing . . . I just don't buy it. The implications of that are kind of offensive, even.
Maybe others' individual subjective experience differs, I can accept that. But I don't think I'm a person who's shied away from learning difficult things, including very challenging things. For sure, I've tried to learn some things that I didn't master. Yes, I didn't head further down those paths, because I thought I'd benefit myself and others by heading in directions - sometimes difficult ones - where I had more aptitude. I still enjoyed making the effort, though. Succeeded or failed, the effort is more exhilarating and enjoyable than painful.
The only discomfort I can think of in that realm is learning about things that are truly painful. I'm not going to be specific, but you'll know what I mean. I'm talking about things like learning in detail about individuals' experiences in periods of history where people were abused, suffered in extreme ways. That's uncomfortable, but it's not the learning that's uncomfortable, it's the subject matter.
In other domains, I admit I haven't sought out challenges just because they were uncomfortable, but I've faced some reasonably difficult challenges in modern-life terms, stepped up in the way that the situation needed. Yeah, they were uncomfortable, and I grew from some of them. (Not all discomfort creates meaningful growth, IME, either.) Needing to think of all challenges as uncomfortable in order to create growth seems odd and kind of egotistical to me.
I grew up in a subculture that was not emotion driven and minimized emotional expression, and in which it wasn't appreciated when someone talked about how hard they worked to accomplish a thing. Working hard and dealing with what came up was just expected. That may be an influence here, the element that makes me think "go hard or go home" kind of thinking is a form of self-aggrandizement. (I recognize that that idea may also be offensive to some, but I'm trying to be transparent and emotionally honest here.)
I still don't think being uncomfortable is a measure of quality or progress in most domains. I agree that challenge is needed in order to grow. I just don't think all challenges are uncomfortable as a dominant characteristic, even difficult challenges. Sure, some challenges that are worth taking on are uncomfortable in one way or another, but I think that's a side effect, not the point. That wouldn't drive me to undertake that particular thing, but it wouldn't drive me away, either.
I think the issue is conflating difficult with uncomfortable. Sure. Many, many people shy away from difficult things simply because they're difficult. They're allowed. But if one always shies away from anything difficult, there will be many important, worthwhile things you will never do. For me, math and numbers were difficult and caused an immense amount of mental distress for me growing up. Had I felt I never needed to do anything uncomfortable or difficult because nothing should ever be uncomfortable, I still wouldn't be able to add simply due to the reality that I really don't like it and it causes me mental discomfort to even look at numbers.
My point is that not all difficult things are necessarily uncomfortable. Of course shying away from all difficult things has consequences, not necessarily good ones. I'm not even arguing we should avoid discomfort. Sometimes it's inherent in achieving particular goals, and a person has to step up and experience that discomfort in order to reach the goal.
I don't think people should avoid any discomfort at all costs. I just don't see it as a central requirement for achieving goals or growing. Sometimes it's part of the process - a side effect - sometimes it isn't. I don't see the point of celebrating the discomfort dimension of it, or pursuing discomfort when it isn't necessary to achieve particular goals.
The thread started with some comments about how common "do hard things" books are on the best seller list. I think that's rah-rah, chest-beating, marketing click-bait, etc. If it makes regular people feel good about themselves to look at life that way, that's fine with me. I just don't agree that discomfort and growth are inextricably linked. Challenge and growth, yeah. Discomfort and challenge, sometimes, sometimes not.1 -
sollyn23l2 wrote: »sollyn23l2 wrote: »I think the "Hitlerian" rhetoric is over the top. Waaaay over.
But when I think about the most effective, productive people I've known in real life, they were not all about "I'm going to make myself get out of my comfort zone!". They looked around, set a direction or goal, made a smart plan, put their heads down, and worked hard. In the cases I'd consider most effective, they didn't sacrifice all other aspects of life for that one thing, but that's kind of an individual values dimension. Uni-focus can be OK, if that's what a person wants.
Sure, some things will involve discomfort, but that's sort of a side trip, IMO: A byproduct at some stages, a distraction, or maybe a speed bump in certain cases. A few goals are all about discomfort, I dunno, maybe something like summiting the highest peak on every continent, or running a marathon every day for a year? Still, the discomfort seems like a byproduct, but I'm not the people who've done those things, so what do I know?
To me, the "get out of your comfort zone" theme - when posed as a universal necessity for progress - seems more ego-driven, braggadocio, more noise than seriousness. It makes me want to eye-roll.
The OP mentions learning as an area to get out of one's comfort zone. That's truly weird to me. Usually, I think learning is fun, even "extreme learning". There are exceptions, like learning from being in a country under siege, for example. But generally, learning is a fun challenge. Even learning inherently boring things is kind of fun: Examples from my own life have been things like learning some new IT technical toolset for which there wasn't formal educatation, or understanding and applying government regulations in the real world. It gave me a positive sense of accomplishment to figure it out, too.
There's also an issue of mindset. Just as a real-world example, I could frame something like speaking in front of a large group at a national conference as uncomfortable, or I could frame it as exhilarating. One of those framings is more enjoyable and productive for me, and it isn't the first one. Others may differ, and if that works for them, swell. But if you want to argue with my framing working better for me . . . well, I think we're back at grandstanding or braggadocio.
Sure, some physical goals involve physical discomfort, but take that too far and a person's gonna get hurt, which isn't productive or successful. Smart, well-planned, and hard-working is better than uncomfortable as a general guide, IMO. Not nearly as good a marketing hook, though, and hard to sell chest-beating books about compared to "I do HARD things", because smart plans and working hard are . . . sort of boring to talk about?
In that physical-goals case and some others, serious discomfort can even be counter-productive, and I'd put weight loss in that category for most people. It's not the only example. Discomfort can waste energy: Focusing on discomfort has the potential to be sort of a psychological analog to over-training.
I don't have a problem with people who prefer to float through life more gently, either. Odds they might achieve less in external/objective terms, but as long as they generally carry their own weight societally, I don't see the need to claim they're lesser beings. That's just more chest-beating, seems like.
If "going hard" or "get uncomfortable" is motivating, makes you (generic you) feel good about yourself, go for it. Nothing in my life has suggested to me that that's the guaranteed path to best outcomes; and looking down on people who use different strategies is just another example of people who sadly need to feel that their way is THE VERY BEST WAY.
It's all abstractions, still, though. Not a winnable topic. When it comes to abstract ideas like this, everyone has a different interpretation of the words, and we've seen that play out above.
Learning can be and often is quite uncomfortable. It's exposing yourself to ideas and concepts you are sometimes extremely uncomfortable with. Grappling with things you don't yet know how to do. If it's easy, chances are you're not actually learning, but rather doing something you were already able to do or already had the knowledge about. It can be fun, but it's difficult. I think that's really the op's point, that we need to expose ourselves to difficult things in order to grow. Not growing is fine too. But if you want to grow, there will be difficulties involved.
That's the part I don't agree with. I don't think difficulty or challenge is synonymous with discomfort.
Maybe we just define "comfort zone" differently. I think difficulty can be fun, exhilarating.
In the realm of intellectual challenge, it's nearly always fun in my experience. I enjoy that kind of challenge. The implication that curiosity as a driving force, and enjoyment of the pursuit, isn't hard enough when not uncomfortable, so the person isn't growing . . . I just don't buy it. The implications of that are kind of offensive, even.
Maybe others' individual subjective experience differs, I can accept that. But I don't think I'm a person who's shied away from learning difficult things, including very challenging things. For sure, I've tried to learn some things that I didn't master. Yes, I didn't head further down those paths, because I thought I'd benefit myself and others by heading in directions - sometimes difficult ones - where I had more aptitude. I still enjoyed making the effort, though. Succeeded or failed, the effort is more exhilarating and enjoyable than painful.
The only discomfort I can think of in that realm is learning about things that are truly painful. I'm not going to be specific, but you'll know what I mean. I'm talking about things like learning in detail about individuals' experiences in periods of history where people were abused, suffered in extreme ways. That's uncomfortable, but it's not the learning that's uncomfortable, it's the subject matter.
In other domains, I admit I haven't sought out challenges just because they were uncomfortable, but I've faced some reasonably difficult challenges in modern-life terms, stepped up in the way that the situation needed. Yeah, they were uncomfortable, and I grew from some of them. (Not all discomfort creates meaningful growth, IME, either.) Needing to think of all challenges as uncomfortable in order to create growth seems odd and kind of egotistical to me.
I grew up in a subculture that was not emotion driven and minimized emotional expression, and in which it wasn't appreciated when someone talked about how hard they worked to accomplish a thing. Working hard and dealing with what came up was just expected. That may be an influence here, the element that makes me think "go hard or go home" kind of thinking is a form of self-aggrandizement. (I recognize that that idea may also be offensive to some, but I'm trying to be transparent and emotionally honest here.)
I still don't think being uncomfortable is a measure of quality or progress in most domains. I agree that challenge is needed in order to grow. I just don't think all challenges are uncomfortable as a dominant characteristic, even difficult challenges. Sure, some challenges that are worth taking on are uncomfortable in one way or another, but I think that's a side effect, not the point. That wouldn't drive me to undertake that particular thing, but it wouldn't drive me away, either.
I think the issue is conflating difficult with uncomfortable. Sure. Many, many people shy away from difficult things simply because they're difficult. They're allowed. But if one always shies away from anything difficult, there will be many important, worthwhile things you will never do. For me, math and numbers were difficult and caused an immense amount of mental distress for me growing up. Had I felt I never needed to do anything uncomfortable or difficult because nothing should ever be uncomfortable, I still wouldn't be able to add simply due to the reality that I really don't like it and it causes me mental discomfort to even look at numbers.
My point is that not all difficult things are necessarily uncomfortable. Of course shying away from all difficult things has consequences, not necessarily good ones. I'm not even arguing we should avoid discomfort. Sometimes it's inherent in achieving particular goals, and a person has to step up and experience that discomfort in order to reach the goal.
I don't think people should avoid any discomfort at all costs. I just don't see it as a central requirement for achieving goals or growing. Sometimes it's part of the process - a side effect - sometimes it isn't. I don't see the point of celebrating the discomfort dimension of it, or pursuing discomfort when it isn't necessary to achieve particular goals.
The thread started with some comments about how common "do hard things" books are on the best seller list. I think that's rah-rah, chest-beating, marketing click-bait, etc. If it makes regular people feel good about themselves to look at life that way, that's fine with me. I just don't agree that discomfort and growth are inextricably linked. Challenge and growth, yeah. Discomfort and challenge, sometimes, sometimes not.
Agreed0 -
sollyn23l2 wrote: »I think the "Hitlerian" rhetoric is over the top. Waaaay over.
But when I think about the most effective, productive people I've known in real life, they were not all about "I'm going to make myself get out of my comfort zone!". They looked around, set a direction or goal, made a smart plan, put their heads down, and worked hard. In the cases I'd consider most effective, they didn't sacrifice all other aspects of life for that one thing, but that's kind of an individual values dimension. Uni-focus can be OK, if that's what a person wants.
Sure, some things will involve discomfort, but that's sort of a side trip, IMO: A byproduct at some stages, a distraction, or maybe a speed bump in certain cases. A few goals are all about discomfort, I dunno, maybe something like summiting the highest peak on every continent, or running a marathon every day for a year? Still, the discomfort seems like a byproduct, but I'm not the people who've done those things, so what do I know?
To me, the "get out of your comfort zone" theme - when posed as a universal necessity for progress - seems more ego-driven, braggadocio, more noise than seriousness. It makes me want to eye-roll.
The OP mentions learning as an area to get out of one's comfort zone. That's truly weird to me. Usually, I think learning is fun, even "extreme learning". There are exceptions, like learning from being in a country under siege, for example. But generally, learning is a fun challenge. Even learning inherently boring things is kind of fun: Examples from my own life have been things like learning some new IT technical toolset for which there wasn't formal educatation, or understanding and applying government regulations in the real world. It gave me a positive sense of accomplishment to figure it out, too.
There's also an issue of mindset. Just as a real-world example, I could frame something like speaking in front of a large group at a national conference as uncomfortable, or I could frame it as exhilarating. One of those framings is more enjoyable and productive for me, and it isn't the first one. Others may differ, and if that works for them, swell. But if you want to argue with my framing working better for me . . . well, I think we're back at grandstanding or braggadocio.
Sure, some physical goals involve physical discomfort, but take that too far and a person's gonna get hurt, which isn't productive or successful. Smart, well-planned, and hard-working is better than uncomfortable as a general guide, IMO. Not nearly as good a marketing hook, though, and hard to sell chest-beating books about compared to "I do HARD things", because smart plans and working hard are . . . sort of boring to talk about?
In that physical-goals case and some others, serious discomfort can even be counter-productive, and I'd put weight loss in that category for most people. It's not the only example. Discomfort can waste energy: Focusing on discomfort has the potential to be sort of a psychological analog to over-training.
I don't have a problem with people who prefer to float through life more gently, either. Odds they might achieve less in external/objective terms, but as long as they generally carry their own weight societally, I don't see the need to claim they're lesser beings. That's just more chest-beating, seems like.
If "going hard" or "get uncomfortable" is motivating, makes you (generic you) feel good about yourself, go for it. Nothing in my life has suggested to me that that's the guaranteed path to best outcomes; and looking down on people who use different strategies is just another example of people who sadly need to feel that their way is THE VERY BEST WAY.
It's all abstractions, still, though. Not a winnable topic. When it comes to abstract ideas like this, everyone has a different interpretation of the words, and we've seen that play out above.
Learning can be and often is quite uncomfortable. It's exposing yourself to ideas and concepts you are sometimes extremely uncomfortable with. Grappling with things you don't yet know how to do. If it's easy, chances are you're not actually learning, but rather doing something you were already able to do or already had the knowledge about. It can be fun, but it's difficult. I think that's really the op's point, that we need to expose ourselves to difficult things in order to grow. Not growing is fine too. But if you want to grow, there will be difficulties involved.
I think we're probably talking about degrees and semantics when it comes to discomfort, or perhaps to the tolerance of discomfort. My takeaway from the post above is that unless you are actively miserable and suffering, then you simply aren't learning and growing as a person. I see it as more of a spectrum, if anything. I'm currently learning Spanish. Being the grown *kitten* woman speaking baby Spanish to a waitress so I can get conversational practice in isn't as comfortable as just getting the job done in English or tapping buttons on a language app, but I'd hardly say it requires girding myself to meet "the enemy". Or firing people. It's not easy, even when it's deserved and no one teaches you how to do it. Sure I turned it around and around in my head and thought of a hundred different speeches or what I might say if they said such-and-such. But I would call that preparation, not grappling.
I know I have a flatter emotional affect than a lot of people and that may be coloring my perception. However, I see words like "enemy" and "extremely uncomfortable" and "embrace the suck" as loaded language and adding more drama to an activity than it probably needs.
I'm curious to hear what areas of discomfort and learning have come up for people that engenders such powerful descriptions.3 -
sollyn23l2 wrote: »I think the "Hitlerian" rhetoric is over the top. Waaaay over.
But when I think about the most effective, productive people I've known in real life, they were not all about "I'm going to make myself get out of my comfort zone!". They looked around, set a direction or goal, made a smart plan, put their heads down, and worked hard. In the cases I'd consider most effective, they didn't sacrifice all other aspects of life for that one thing, but that's kind of an individual values dimension. Uni-focus can be OK, if that's what a person wants.
Sure, some things will involve discomfort, but that's sort of a side trip, IMO: A byproduct at some stages, a distraction, or maybe a speed bump in certain cases. A few goals are all about discomfort, I dunno, maybe something like summiting the highest peak on every continent, or running a marathon every day for a year? Still, the discomfort seems like a byproduct, but I'm not the people who've done those things, so what do I know?
To me, the "get out of your comfort zone" theme - when posed as a universal necessity for progress - seems more ego-driven, braggadocio, more noise than seriousness. It makes me want to eye-roll.
The OP mentions learning as an area to get out of one's comfort zone. That's truly weird to me. Usually, I think learning is fun, even "extreme learning". There are exceptions, like learning from being in a country under siege, for example. But generally, learning is a fun challenge. Even learning inherently boring things is kind of fun: Examples from my own life have been things like learning some new IT technical toolset for which there wasn't formal educatation, or understanding and applying government regulations in the real world. It gave me a positive sense of accomplishment to figure it out, too.
There's also an issue of mindset. Just as a real-world example, I could frame something like speaking in front of a large group at a national conference as uncomfortable, or I could frame it as exhilarating. One of those framings is more enjoyable and productive for me, and it isn't the first one. Others may differ, and if that works for them, swell. But if you want to argue with my framing working better for me . . . well, I think we're back at grandstanding or braggadocio.
Sure, some physical goals involve physical discomfort, but take that too far and a person's gonna get hurt, which isn't productive or successful. Smart, well-planned, and hard-working is better than uncomfortable as a general guide, IMO. Not nearly as good a marketing hook, though, and hard to sell chest-beating books about compared to "I do HARD things", because smart plans and working hard are . . . sort of boring to talk about?
In that physical-goals case and some others, serious discomfort can even be counter-productive, and I'd put weight loss in that category for most people. It's not the only example. Discomfort can waste energy: Focusing on discomfort has the potential to be sort of a psychological analog to over-training.
I don't have a problem with people who prefer to float through life more gently, either. Odds they might achieve less in external/objective terms, but as long as they generally carry their own weight societally, I don't see the need to claim they're lesser beings. That's just more chest-beating, seems like.
If "going hard" or "get uncomfortable" is motivating, makes you (generic you) feel good about yourself, go for it. Nothing in my life has suggested to me that that's the guaranteed path to best outcomes; and looking down on people who use different strategies is just another example of people who sadly need to feel that their way is THE VERY BEST WAY.
It's all abstractions, still, though. Not a winnable topic. When it comes to abstract ideas like this, everyone has a different interpretation of the words, and we've seen that play out above.
Learning can be and often is quite uncomfortable. It's exposing yourself to ideas and concepts you are sometimes extremely uncomfortable with. Grappling with things you don't yet know how to do. If it's easy, chances are you're not actually learning, but rather doing something you were already able to do or already had the knowledge about. It can be fun, but it's difficult. I think that's really the op's point, that we need to expose ourselves to difficult things in order to grow. Not growing is fine too. But if you want to grow, there will be difficulties involved.
I think we're probably talking about degrees and semantics when it comes to discomfort, or perhaps to the tolerance of discomfort. My takeaway from the post above is that unless you are actively miserable and suffering, then you simply aren't learning and growing as a person. I see it as more of a spectrum, if anything. I'm currently learning Spanish. Being the grown *kitten* woman speaking baby Spanish to a waitress so I can get conversational practice in isn't as comfortable as just getting the job done in English or tapping buttons on a language app, but I'd hardly say it requires girding myself to meet "the enemy". Or firing people. It's not easy, even when it's deserved and no one teaches you how to do it. Sure I turned it around and around in my head and thought of a hundred different speeches or what I might say if they said such-and-such. But I would call that preparation, not grappling.
I know I have a flatter emotional affect than a lot of people and that may be coloring my perception. However, I see words like "enemy" and "extremely uncomfortable" and "embrace the suck" as loaded language and adding more drama to an activity than it probably needs.
I'm curious to hear what areas of discomfort and learning have come up for people that engenders such powerful descriptions.
This is very much me, and I am now wondering if the reactions to, and affect of, the statement actually shows the reader more about themselves than anything. Maybe people who do see every learning experience, every task outside their everyday bubble as a trial and a battle will take something from the statement, where someone like me, who embraces learning, and pursues adventure (and lacks a sense of self preservation lol) applies it to things that I do identify as truly outside my comfort zone, which are experiences which sure, I have grown and learned from, but would be crazy to want to voluntarily repeat.
4 -
I think we're probably talking about degrees and semantics when it comes to discomfort, or perhaps to the tolerance of discomfort. My takeaway from the post above is that unless you are actively miserable and suffering, then you simply aren't learning and growing as a person. I see it as more of a spectrum, if anything. I'm currently learning Spanish. Being the grown *kitten* woman speaking baby Spanish to a waitress so I can get conversational practice in isn't as comfortable as just getting the job done in English or tapping buttons on a language app, but I'd hardly say it requires girding myself to meet "the enemy". Or firing people. It's not easy, even when it's deserved and no one teaches you how to do it. Sure I turned it around and around in my head and thought of a hundred different speeches or what I might say if they said such-and-such. But I would call that preparation, not grappling.
I know I have a flatter emotional affect than a lot of people and that may be coloring my perception. However, I see words like "enemy" and "extremely uncomfortable" and "embrace the suck" as loaded language and adding more drama to an activity than it probably needs.
I'm curious to hear what areas of discomfort and learning have come up for people that engenders such powerful descriptions.
Since I was the one that introduced the term "embrace the suck" I'll give you an example of why such a term was used. If anyone thinks it's loaded and adding drama, I'd like to invite them to do it and then let me know how it was.
The Marine Corps spends a lot of time in the field, no matter what particular specialty they are involved in. Some call it forced marches, some called it rucking, most often we called it "humping gear". At the very lightest, someone in a paper pusher field that will never go near the front of any combat action will probably carry about 60-70 pounds of gear. Body armor, helmets, weapons, basic food and clothing. If you are lucky. IIRC the modern day boot camp hump to graduate is an 80 lb load on a 10 mile forced march.
Anyone more forward deplyed carries more gear, and often heavier gear. Radios, more food, medium crew served weapons (machine guns and such) and higher ammo loads. So you reach into the maybe 70 minimum up to 90-100 range for what they consider an approach march, that being the gear to sustain you short term with resupply available reasonably quickly. And to top it off, some of that gear had to be roatated person to person, since some was heavy enough to cause that need. So while you are carrying that 90lbs or so, you are lucky enough now and then to also carry another 28lb weapon for a while until you are gassed and pass it to the next person.
And since one of the major concerns is keeping unit integrity, when a person is falling back, others split their load so they can catch up. Even in training, unless a person gets pulled by a Corpsman for medical concerns, we had to keep them going.
Humping gear no doubt sucked. In a mild dry climate it was taxing and required quite a mental approach. In a hot humid environment it sucked hard by a mile or two in. The gear on your back allowed no air to breath against your body, and most peoples backs are soaked through all clothing from the shoulders down to their boots. If you could change socks every 2 or 3 miles, your feet might resemble normal. But you can't. What breaks do occur are usually to refill liquids, so maybe 5-10 minutes off your feet while vehicles passed water cans through the line. Standing back up only reminded you how sore your feet already were, and in most cases you have no idea how much farther you will need to go, only that you are expected to do it. Usually by the time you finish you know every single spot that any gear had contact with your body. Standing up the first time after dumping your gear almost feels like zero gravity or something. And this was for the "not super forward deployed" types. Some of the infantry types and other special groups might be lucky enough to do some of this with upwards of 120-130lbs loads.
Even at the less intensive loads, it was taxing. Often we had a minimum gear list, and the smart ones quickly learned another phrase. "Ounces equal pounds, and pounds equal pain." ANY optional comfort gear was not worth the pain, ever.
Usually the corpsmen would make the rounds and open some big blisters, apply some moleskin here and there, and give people some antibiotic creams and bandages for the worst body rubs. Then you get on with the rest of your training day. Great fun.
I have of my own free will:
Swam with migrating Hammerhead sharks with no protective gear
Jumped out of perfectly good (civilian) aircraft
Rappelled from reasonbly high levels, and from helicopters
Run a half marathon in the desert
Hung under a moving helicopter clipped onto a rope (SPIE rig)
Swam and surfed in waves with a face of 10-12 feet
All of those things I considered exciting, and except for maybe a few seconds of the initial "pucker factor" within my comfort zone once I decided to do them. Some I did on my own, some required some nudging from others, and some were expected/required when I was in the military.
But humping gear? Well humping gear sucked. And that was even if you could get your head into the mental part of the game and push through the pain and discomfort. There is a reason for the term "embrace the suck". Because if you don't.... well.... it will just suck even worse.
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@robertw486, I'm not arguing that military training/operations or some civilian activities are not uncomfortable, or that they don't lead to personal growth. That would be dumb, and IMO wildly inaccurate.
But that isn't the circumstances described or the premise advanced in the OP, as I understood it.
The OP says, about "Comfort is the Enemy":. . .
I've see this for years from what some would call hard core "macho" guys. Now there are NYT best selling books on the topic, even less "in your face" author promoting this.
I'm going to say it's pretty true. I like the phrase, "no growth happens in your comfort zone". IMO this applies to health and fitness, relationships, your job, learning, i.e., all parts of life.
. . .
That's what I'm responding to, the idea that there is no growth without discomfort in all parts of life, and to a lesser extent to the nature of that kind of idea in best-seller books or the popular press.
Can discomfort trigger growth? Yes.
Does all discomfort trigger growth? I think not, but am open to argument on that.
Is discomfort an absolute requirement in order to grow? Emphatically not, IMO, and that's the core issue I'm arguing.
Should people avoid discomfort? Their call, depends on their goals and outlook, but for sure we can't avoid all of it.
Should people pursue discomfort as an explicit goal in life? I think that's silly myself, but it's their call.
Does everyone need to "get out of their comfort zone" in order to be a reasonable, decent human? IMO, no.
On the best seller side of things, one of the best known is "75 Hard", which asks people to do a scattershot list of things in multiple domains for 75 straight days, some of which honestly seem arbitrary to me ("drink a gallon of water a day"), no exceptions or one must start over. The goal seems to be self-improvement, maybe polishing up self-image.
Picking on that one, if people want to do that, go them. With the lists I've seen - since there are variants - the individual things tend to be kind of non-dramatic, well within the realm of things quite a few normal people do and consider routine, and don't think of as some kind of noble quest or necessarily even find uncomfortable individually. What's unusual, and may be special-hard, is that multi-domain combination, and the absolute strict consistency for 75 days. (As an aside, I'm not sure 75 straight days of two-a-days is even a smart approach for fitness, alongside - presumably - a normal job/home life.)
Personally, I have more admiration for people who set a specific and challenging goal, then make a plan that leads to that goal in a serious, intelligent way. Some people do things that I think are at least that hard, maybe going from the couch to a marathon, while keeping up normal daily lives with jobs and families and obligations. Is that difficult? Yes, presumably. Do they grow? Almost certainly. Is it uncomfortable? Probably at times. Is discomfort a feature, or a side effect? Side effect. But that kind of thing isn't typically wrapped in the level of rah-rah rhetoric, it seems like, as something like 75 Hard.
My argument isn't that no one ever grows from getting out of their comfort zone - even way, way out of their comfort zone - or that they shouldn't do that if they want to. I'd even admire that, if the goal seemed proportionate to the pain.
My argument is that it seems absurd to me that no growth happens without discomfort in "all parts of life", that discomfort in itself is a thing to strive for (vs. being a side effect with certain goals), or the implied idea that people who don't take this approach are somehow lesser, stuck, non-growing human beings (which some PPs seem to imply).
Sometimes very, very uncomfortable things are required for certain goals and situations. It's a sign of good character, IMO, when people step up to that discomfort when it's necessary. I think that's common in the realm of the military-related activities you're talking about, but of course there can be more examples.
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