Comfort Zone – Grandpa Bob Encouraging Leadership

The Pressure Inside

Every now and then, I think about people who are no longer here and ask myself what they left with me. A lesson. A phrase. A moment I still can’t fully explain.

Mr. McNally left me a question.

He was teaching us about entropy in his AP Chemistry class and asked why the air in a bicycle tire doesn’t simply settle to the bottom.

Air has weight. Gravity acts on it. So why doesn’t all the air sink to the lowest part of the tire like a pile of sand? Why does it keep pressing outward against the walls?

It’s a simple image, which is probably why I still remember it almost fifty years later.

The air inside the tire is made up of tiny particles moving rapidly in every direction. They collide with each other, and with the inside wall of the tire. Those collisions create pressure.

Gravity is present but its pull is weak compared to the thermal energy of all those molecules.

The air fills the space it’s given. It presses outward. It resists settling.

That old chemistry question came back to me recently as a life question.

What keeps us from settling? From succumbing to the gravitational pull in all of us.

Staying where life feels familiar. Waiting for more certainty. Keeping the pattern because changing it will cost us something.

Waiting sounds reasonable. It borrows the language of patience, prudence, and practicality. And at times, those are the right virtues. Wisdom often tells us to slow down.

But inertia can dress itself up as wisdom. Fear can call itself realism. Comfort can pretend to be peace.

That’s when we begin settling to the bottom of our lives.

The air doesn’t fulfill its purpose by collecting in the lowest place. It fills the available space. It presses against the walls. It creates pressure because motion is still happening inside.

Human life has its own version of that energy.

Purpose. Discipline. Faith.

These keep us from sinking into the lowest-energy version of ourselves.

The tire reminds us that pressure comes from movement. A life with purpose has an outward push to it. It presses against fear, complacency, and inertia. It expands into the space it has been given.

We don’t have to be reckless or maintain constant motion. But we need enough internal purpose to overcome the quiet pull of our internal gravity.

I’m grateful Mr. McNally asked that question all those years ago. At the time, it was a chemistry lesson about entropy, motion, and pressure.

Decades later, it’s still teaching me.

The tire doesn’t fight gravity. It just has something inside it that never stops moving.

I think that’s all any of us can ask of ourselves.

Photo by Leon Seierlein on Unsplash

There’s nothing like your own bed, your own pillow, and nice warm blankets when it’s time to sleep. To confirm this truism, try backpacking for a few nights in freezing conditions. Your lightweight sleeping pad and mummy sack might keep you alive, but they’re no match for the comfort of home.

Or spend a couple of weeks living out of a suitcase, hopping from one hotel bed to another. It’s rare for a hotel bed to be anything but “hammock-shaped” with giant pillows that defy logic and offer little comfort.

We all love to be comfortable. Ask most people, and they’ll tell you they’d rather sit at home in their jammies in their favorite chair, watching their favorite movie with their go-to snacks and drink in hand.

Comfort is easy. It requires little effort, and even less thought.

It’s safe, predictable, and free of fear. We know exactly how to achieve it, and we stay there because it feels good.

That’s the problem. Comfort is about staying. It’s about achieving sameness.

Growth doesn’t happen in comfort. The magic begins when we step outside our cozy bubble.

Trying new things, exploring unfamiliar places, or learning new skills rarely feels comfortable at first. It’s awkward and often frustrating. But with time, practice, and patience, we adjust. The uncomfortable becomes comfortable. We expand our boundaries. We redefine what normal feels like.

We grow.

Comfort is incredible. It’s that perfect combination of warmth, ease, and familiarity. It offers a necessary break from life’s challenges. But if we make it our ultimate goal, it lulls us into complacency. It encourages us to settle, to avoid risks, to stop growing.

Celebrate the moments of comfort when they come. Appreciate them for what they are—a place to rest and recharge. But don’t let comfort hold you back.

Keep exploring.

Keep taking risks.

Keep pushing past the edges of your comfort zone.

That’s where the real magic happens.

Photo by Amy Humphries on Unsplash

Are You Really Outside Your Comfort Zone?

When you find yourself outside your comfort zone, what’s your goal?

In the 80’s, the message was, “Dress for Success.” Dress at least one level up, make a great impression, get promoted. The concept focused on impressing the gatekeeper (your boss, or your boss’s boss), moving up, achieving success. “Upwardly mobile” was a phrase people used to describe themselves. Inherent in this approach was the thought that your success was dictated by how far up you climbed in one organization.

In the 90’s, the message was, “Be nimble, move fast, deliver quality.” Tom Peters really came into focus in the 90’s with his thoughts on the “nanosecond” 90’s. Big companies needed to find ways to “bob and weave,” to adjust to the ever-changing market dynamics. We all searched for ways to shift paradigms, boost quality, and invent new ways of streamlining processes.

One by-product of this nimble and fast-moving behavior was rapid employee movement. Corporate downsizing, upsizing, and reorganizations, along with an even faster corporate merger and acquisition pace, made remaining in one organization for a lifetime as remote as winning the lottery.

Dress for Success was out. Upward mobility was out. The era of the entrepreneur was upon us (even though it had been with us since the dawn of civilization). The corporate version, the “intrapreneur,” became a big thing. This was the person in the meeting who was slightly quirky, a bit edgy and imaginative, and didn’t mind “poking the bear” a bit. He or she operated with a flair that the corporate mindset both embraced and slightly feared. This was the person that would help the corporation remain relevant in the face of fast-moving competition, but might upset the apple cart along the way.

Somewhere in the late 90’s or early 2,000’s I started hearing that we should “think outside the box.” “Think Different” became Apple’s calling card. It was only that type of thinking that would yield meaningful results. Anything else was just window dressing, or “lipstick on a pig.” Look at the top 10 companies in terms of market value (both public and private) and it’s hard to argue with this sentiment.

But, even those “renegade” companies struggle to stay “different” over the long term. What once seemed new, even revolutionary, becomes the new norm. Soon, there’s a clamor for the next version, the new invention, the new product, the next “thing.”

What’s the answer to all of this? Organizations and entrepreneurs try to operate “outside of their comfort zone.” Yeah! That’s the ticket. If we can get everyone pushing outside their comfort zone, maybe that will result in something different, and cajole some new ideas into fruition.

But, the truth is that none of us like it outside our comfort zone. Most companies and shareholders prefer their comfort zone as well.

We constantly seek our comfort zone, even as we talk about pushing ourselves outside of it. If we happen to venture out and actually operate for a while in the hinterlands, our deep subconscious goal is to regain our footing, by seeking approval or acceptance of our crazy ideas back in the comfort zone.

We may get used to operating in a new zone and call that our new comfort zone…but, it’s still our (new) comfort zone. This is one definition of progress.

People have varying perspectives on what’s comfortable. The free climber is happiest and most “alive” when climbing a 3,000-foot rock face without ropes. Another person’s comfort zone is speaking in front of a large audience. Still another person’s idea of comfort is analyzing reams of financial data about the performance of their company.

What is your comfort zone? When are you the most at ease?

What are you doing to operate outside that zone?

When you find yourself outside your comfort zone, what’s your goal? To return to the safety of the comfort zone, or to extend your reach to an even more uncomfortable spot?

Look closely and be honest with yourself. You’re probably spending most of your time inside your comfort zone or trying to find your way back there.

It’s up to you to determine whether this is okay, or not.

What’s it Gonna Take?

The biggest cost often isn’t in dollars…

Questions that (should) open our thinking to new possibilities:

Why?
Why not?
How might we?
Why don’t we?

Questions that point us toward solutions:

Which strategy fits best?
What if we…?
How do we get started?
How can we make this work?

The real question to be answered before anything actually happens:

What’s it gonna take?

What’s it gonna take to:

Start?
Find the girl (or boy) of my dreams?
Buy this house?
Get the job I want?
Forgive?
Get this project moving?
Get this person hired?
Run a marathon?
Find the real meaning in life?
See the Eiffel Tower? Iceland? The Northern Lights?
Stop pretending we have it all figured out?

Each decision, each action, and each direction you choose carries a cost.

That cost will be in dollars, time, energy, commitment, pride, comfort, or a combination of these. There’s also the opportunity cost associated with choosing one direction over another.

The biggest cost often isn’t in dollars. It’s in our pride and comfort.

How much time will you give to an idea? What if you’re wrong? Are you willing to risk embarrassment? Is it worth thousands of dollars to see the Eiffel Tower? Are you willing to step outside your comfort zone to try something new?

There’s no such thing as a free decision. And, the decision not to decide carries its own costs.

The challenge is understanding what it’s gonna take, and having the willingness to pay.