I'm Afraid of Getting too Comfortable...
I've realized that getting settled in a routine where I'm seeing the same people and the same places each day, prioritizing feeling comfortable over having new experiences, tends to cause a couple of different outcomes.
One, that I end the day feeling unfulfilled, like there was more I could have done with myself, and two, that doing things that are uncomfortable feels so much more difficult, like trying to push a boulder up a hill Sisyphus style, except it's been a while since you've pushed a boulder and you've lost some of the strength to do it.
When I talk about discomfort, I'm not talking about it in the hustle-grindset kind of way where they tell you that you should just work until heart stops beating because "embrace discomfort" or whatever. If anything, keeping your head down and working constantly can actually become it's own bizarre form of comfort. I'm instead thinking about it more as doing things which cause your anxiety or cortisol to spike in the moment, which will differ significantly from person to person, but generally speaking I find that this involves being in situations that lack certainty. Things like having a difficult conversation with somebody, getting a new job, or joining a new activity where you don't know anybody.
Ultimately, what I'm really afraid of is my experience of life shrinking because I'm prioritizing what feels safe in the moment over doing something interesting or important. Because once you get into the habit of choosing comfort, it gets progressively harder to break that habit. But on the other hand, I'm also afraid of going into those uncertain situations and making mistakes because of it. I always hear about how you need to fail more often, and how you need to make mistakes in order to grow, which is true! But damn, sometimes it's hard to feel that way when you feel as though your mistakes somehow act as proof that something's wrong with you, that you're stupid, or careless, or weird, or some other adjective that you don't want applied to yourself. Easier to just stay home and avoid all that drama, right?
...right?
I could try to end this post with some clear cut answer of "just do hard things!" or "go out there and escape your comfort zone!!!" but maybe the need to find immediate answers for life's problems is also it's own form of avoiding discomfort. Instead of sitting down with yourself and reflecting on why you do something, it feels simpler in the moment to avoid all those uncomfortable emotions by watching motivational videos, or telling yourself that "tomorrow I will do this thing and my whole life will change!"
There is, however, one thing I can say with some amount of certainty, and it's that every time I allow myself to look directly at that anxiety and figure out what's causing me to avoid certain things in life, I find that I reduce it's power just a little bit more.