How comfortable are you with UNCOMFORTABLE situations?

“Getting comfortable with the uncomfortable” is a much-needed skill for leaders as they grow in their careers and lives.

In this post, I’d like to share two situations that made me uncomfortable and how I started getting comfortable with those by treating them as life skills.

1) Hosting podcasts in Hindi & Telugu: After joining the corporate, English has become part and parcel of my life & career cos over 80% of the time I speak the global language due to professional demand. I was comfortable interviewing guests on The Guiding Voice English platform, but when I started TGV Telugu last year, I started getting goosebumps and it was very difficult to speak as much Telugu as possible(on a public platform). Telugu is my mother tongue, but I studied in an English medium school and we speak Telugu at home and also when we step outside.

The same thing happened this year when I started TGV Hindi, initially, I was too much uncomfortable but slowly I started getting comfortable and getting better at Hindi.

Stepping outside your comfort zone and accepting the possibility of failure can lead to valuable insights and personal development. Trust me, it is helping me a lot.

2) Getting Rejected for the CAS program at GE: About 8 years ago, I applied for Corporate Audit Staff (a premier leadership program at GE). After a month’s pilot, I was not selected for the program(due to reasons which are not cited yet). The situation made me feel bad and dejected. My colleagues and leaders were surprised when they got to know that I was not selected.

Fast forward to 2023, my skin has thickened and I started getting comfortable and grew strong to digest the bad news. I started realizing that everything is not for everyone. While we have our plans, life/destiny has its own plans.

All we need to do is to muster the courage to face rejections and uncomfortable situations from a different perspective, they teach us a lot of things and help us prepare well.

There are other things that make us uncomfortable:

• Engaging in challenging conversations, such as addressing conflicts or giving constructive feedback
• Making bold decisions and taking calculated risks in your personal or professional life
• Attending networking events and engaging in conversations with strangers
• Quitting a high-paying job to start a new venture (you are losing the luxury of getting a monthly salary and at the risk of relying on the business outcome)

And the list continues.

We need to remember that getting comfortable with the uncomfortable is about pushing our boundaries, embracing growth opportunities, and building resilience.

It’s through these experiences that we often discover our true capabilities and achieve personal and professional breakthroughs.

Thanks for reading.

I am curious to read your stories about how you became comfortable with uncomfortable situations and what are those.

Originally published at https://www.linkedin.com.