Courage or comfort?
What will you choose? Do you want your life to be remembered as one represented by courage, or as one represented by comfort?
The greatest stories in life – the ones we love to watch, read, and see – feature courage. Our favorite movies, books, and legends each feature main characters who face adversity, and in a moment of crisis, are forced to make a decision between being courageous or staying comfortable.
“Do I want to be courageous in this moment? Do I want to be brave and face the unknown, this obstacle, this adversity or do I want to be comfortable? Or do I want to stay where I am doing exactly what I am in this very safe place?”
You and I face these same questions every single day. If we watched a film about someone who spent the entire movie making safe decisions and never taking a risk, it would be the most boring moving we’d seen. Great movies involve an act of courage.
Yet most all of us live our lives like that boring movie. We play it safe.
But the best stories? In the best stories, someone steps out of their comfort zone and takes a risk. They stand up for something they believe in. They stand up for someone they love. They take on the monsters because they know that something or someone on the other side is more important than that monster. They are the last line of defense so they have to be brave.
We love those types of stories, yet we don’t live in the exact same way.
We choose our comfort zone over being courageous – every day. We allow our dreams to be something that we only talk about and never pursue. We spend years watching our dreams slowly die away because we lack the courage to step out toward them.
Our lives are too short and too meaningful to choose comfort every single. Courage is tough. It is not an easy thing to choose. It is scary. Being outside of our comfort zone is scary. We don’t know what’s out there and what awaits us. We don’t know what could go right or what could go wrong, and rest assured, we only focus on what could go wrong.
We never turn our eyes and consider what could go right. How amazing would it be if it goes right?
But instead of considering the positive potential outcome, we allow ourselves to look at what could go wrong and choose safety. We almost always choose our comfort zone.
Ironically, the people that we admire for their success or life, the ones that we tell others, “Man! If I could just be like that! If I could just live like that!” are the ones choosing courage over comfort.
You see them on Instagram and Facebook. The brave ones who travel, start businesses, and always seem to be reaching a new goal. They are only getting there because they’re forsaking their comfort zone for growth and the unknown. The only differences between them and us isn’t money or a string of “luck” – it’s their decision to take the risk and our failure not to do the same.
So this week, I am challenging to be courageous.
Choose courage over comfort this week. It doesn’t have to anything crazy to start, but one simple thing to step out of your comfort zone.
Talk to a stranger everyday on your way to work or once you get into your office. Buy a cup of coffee for someone behind you in line. It is simple. It is doing something out of the ordinary that puts you a step closer to getting out of that comfort zone.
The more you become comfortable being uncomfortable, the further you begin to push yourself – and the faster you’ll find success.
I love the workouts that make me hate myself during, the ones where I suck at a movement or am terrible at the weight. But I force myself to do those workouts. I force myself to go through it because I’ve found that the more uncomfortable I am willing to push myself during a workout, the more uncomfortable I am willing to push myself in my life – and the more success I can reach in all areas of my life.
You don’t find success within your comfort zone. It does not stay there. It doesn’t just come to you. You have to step out and go pursue it.
So this week, pursue it. Choose courage. You get one shot at this life. Do not waste it being comfortable.
Spend it being courageous.
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