Who Knew Leaving a Comfort Zone would Be Uncomfortable?

When I left a job that for eight years felt like a calling, I didn’t connect the dots that leaving a comfort zone meant feeling uncomfortable.  All the affirmations that “this too shall pass” or “things are always working out for me” don’t change the felt sense of displacement and the nakedness of being such a beginner again. While I told myself it’s time to grow and stretch, I secretly believed I was being called to reach new audiences and have even a greater impact.  What arrogance! Right now the impact this change is having is on me, first and foremost.

I feel as though I’m being remodeled as a teacher and a spiritual director, and this remodeling is not simply switching out old cabinets for nicer ones.  I’m being stripped down to the studs of my ego so that I can be rebuilt. I get a glimpse that the remade teacher will be more creative and my spiritual directing will be more authentic, but I’m not there yet. The process, as anyone who has gone through change knows, is not pretty, not necessarily predictable, and not one I’m in charge of, hence the discomfort.

Being in a new place helps me see where I was coasting and thus hiding a little bit.  Every topic and session that was such a hit in the last place doesn’t fly with a new audience that lets me know immediately.  I’ve woken at 3:30 churning with a response I should have made, replaying a conversation I wish had occurred, until I’ve gotten up to write about it and been flooded with similar situations going back to when I was 12.  Gary Zukav would say that the unhealed parts of my personality are emerging to be healed by consciousness, and while I’m grateful for that—heck I apparently signed up for it in this change—I cannot weather this alone.

So I’m writing about it, talking about it, asking for help, and taking exquisite care of myself in the process.  I'm also praying like I haven't in a long long time. My spiritual progress is that the period between extreme discomfort and shame of not doing this very well to a sense of curiosity and willingness to have hard conversations is pretty short.  I’m noticing my first impulse to run, hide, quit is just that—an old response that won’t work today because I know too much and have tools that really work to enlarge my spirit.  I do want a larger comfort zone, and for that to happen, I have to travel through the territory of discomfort.