Why you need meditation and a support network to get out of your comfort zone

IN THIS BLOG SERIES I WILL GO THROUGH SOME OF THE EXPERIMENTS AND EXPERIENCES I WENT THROUGH ( AND STILL GOING THROUGH DAILY ) ON HOW TO BREAK OUT OF YOUR COMFORT ZONE AND WHAT MY LIFE IN THE LAST COUPLE OF YEARS TAUGHT ME ABOUT IT. I HOPE THIS WILL HELP YOU ON YOUR OWN PATH !

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Hey there! How did the creative process go?

In the last article I left you browsing through options and get creative with the possibilities around you that will allow you to get out of your comfort zone in small and big ways.

Today I will help you move further with a beautiful way to select the best option to choose among the many possibilities you found in the process.

So take pen and paper and just make a list of all the options you have considered so far for that particular issue. Some of them will be more appealing than others. Your mind will be running fast looking for the options that are less scary for you because it wants you to play small and stay in your comfort zone.

But I invite you to a different approach, meditate on them!

MEDITATE TO SELECT THE BEST OPTION

You have probably heard me talking about meditation before here and there in other posts, and it's because this practice is very simple and accessible and life changing! ( I'll write a whole post about my experience with starting a meditation practice very soon!).

Why meditation is effective in this case? It's because even if the most immediate benefit of meditation is to feel relaxed and clear your mind from the clutter of the day, it is also a beautiful tools to get some answers from your intuition about some decisions you have to take, both big and small.

How do I know? Because it happened to me many times that during a meditation ( and usually my meditations are pretty short, like 5 or 10 minutes ), by clearing my mind and freeing some space I was receiving some information coming to my mind, for example :

• Suddenly remembering where to find an object that I had been looking for ages ;-)
• Or thinking of a specific person that I haven't seen for long and having a desire to catch up for a coffee
• Remembering appointments that I was forgetting about or things do to
• And even more exciting, having great creative ideas flowing to me
• AND if I had a decision to take that was stressing me out for a few hours or days ( or more..) , I have usually had the right answer coming to me during a meditation. And it often wasn't the most comfortable answer, the one that my mind wanted to hear in that moment, but it was the one that FELT good in my heart.

So give it a try in this case. After having written down all the options, just leave the paper aside and go on with your everyday life for the day.

• Then set some time in your day for a meditation.
• Find a quiet spot in your home or work place
• Create a safe space by assuring that you will not be disturbed for the next 10 minutes or so
• Simply close your eyes and take a couple of deep breathes to relax
• Then focus your attention on your breathe and don't get caught up in your monkey mind
• Most importantly don't get ATTACHED to obtaining an answer in that moment. It may take a few meditations to actually allow yourself to absorb the decision to take, and out of a sudden you'll find yourself with an answer, the best option for you!

It will be up to you to accept it and take action , or reject it and follow another option. In any case you'll know which one feels better inside

DECIDE ON THE FIRST BABY STEP

Finally you have selected an option. What to do to move further now?

Break it down into baby steps and choose the first one to take. I can ensure you that if it is something that's been on your mind forever, and it's really a decision that it's out of your comfort zone, even taking that baby intentional step will feel amazing and so freeing!!

Also the advantage of breaking the task into baby steps will ensure that you don't feel overwhelmed and run away from it. You will actually build the TRUST that you can do it, because you survived the first step which is usually the scariest one :-)

CREATE A SUPPORT NETWORK

Even if now you're all excited about your steps and you feel like you can conquer the world, you'll have moments in which you'll feel alone in the process and you may loose your motivation. And that's perfectly normal and human.

That's why it is SO important to have some people around you to talk about it, and most importanly keep you ACCOUNTABLE.

Someone that you can see regularly, and that will ask you the question : "So, how did it go?"

I've realized quite recently the power of having a support network , of people that are non - judgemental and pragmatical and can check on you regularly . It is powerful because when you're doing something by yourself, having an idea that started from YOU and it's not imposed externally by an entity or person, it's so easy to loose your way and loose motivation.

So find a couple of people that you can trust , They don't have to be very close to you, but just people that are committed to support your progress ( I'm actually usuing this blog to keep myself accountable for moving forward on so many ways and it works because when you put something out there to the world, you feel more responsible to carry it forward)

With the help of this network you will take the second, third step and things will get easier and easier and in less time that you think, you'll have taken the leap and done that scary thing that was in the back of your mind forever!

Now it's your turn! What do you think of this process? Can you relate to it? What are ways you use to make difficult decisions and how to you keep yourself accountable?

I'm looking forward to hearing from you in the comments below !

With love and light,

Alessia