Do you love staying in your comfort zone? In this spontaneous episode, Jen shares how she lets herself get comfortably uncomfortable by choosing a life of ‘yes’. You’ll hear about her latest challenge that got her so uncomfortable she had to accept help to get through it.

Did you enjoy the podcast today? Please let me know by leaving a review on Apple Podcasts. Every month I draw one lucky reviewer to have a free one-hour consultation with me. Also, remember to subscribe wherever you’re tuning in from so that you always catch the next episode.

SHOWNOTES

Recently I got so far outside of my comfort zone I just had to share it with you.

I live at the Gold Coast and have ridden a boogie board my entire life. I love the beach – I love it so much. When I was 55 years old, I decided to learn to surf. Why? Because I live a life of yes, and my PA, who is a gorgeous friend, said, “Hey Jen, let’s learn to surf” so I did. 

I’ve been learning to surf now for four years. I’m a super beginner and still afraid of the green waves – these are the waves behind the white water at the front, right before they crash. It’s strange, but I’m afraid of heights and going over the fall. I’ve also head-butted a sand bar a couple of times over in my last four years, but I digress. 

I can’t tell you how good it is to be out the back of the wave. Tomorrow I’ll be out on the water by 6 am, sunrise is around 6.10 am and the pure bliss of being in the ocean when the sun kisses the horizon on a cold crisp morning, it’s spectacular. It’s better than any meditation I know, just the pure joy and bliss just oozes through my body when I’m in the surf. It really is an amazing experience.

The actual time standing on a board riding the wave is quite short. I’ve measured that I only end up standing on the board for about a minute an hour. The rest of the time your either paddling or sitting on the board waiting for a wave to come through. It’s a crazy sport. 

I met a gorgeous friend through surfing, she’s an ex-army chick like me, and she said to me a couple of months ago, “Jen, the Kirra Longboard Classic is on, I think we should enter.” So, I said yes, because I live a life of yes. That is the life I choose to live.

I registered, and it was all good, I knew I was going to enter. But mid-week, before the competition, my brain started to go, “Jen, you can’t really surf, you’re a beginner surfer!” I had every story going through my mind telling me why I couldn’t do it, and I was honestly scared.

I’m not a competitive person; surfing is pure joy for me. I don’t do it to cut and carve; I do it to ride on a longboard and relax. The thought of having a 20-minute competition in the water with five other riders was doing my head in.

The day before the event, I rang up my friend and said, I’m 100% certain I will not surf in the competition tomorrow. But that evening we organised to register and pick up our shirts. My friend changed her heat at that point too so she could be in the same heat as me and I could feel safer to go out into the competition. 

I was scared, really scared! Scared because I’m not a confident surfer yet and scared because of the competition and paddling out with these other surfers. 

BUT I truly lead a life of yes.

The time came from the competition. I put on my jersey and went into that water. Let me tell you it was a 100% conscious conversation just to keep me moving forward into that water because my brain was doing that fright or flight thing and telling me to run.

In life, I do a lot of stuff where I let myself be comfortably uncomfortable. With this competition I was so far outside of my comfort zone – emotionally, physically – every level, but I had a great mate standing by my side because she knew the breakthrough, I would get doing it.

It was a constant battle not to run the other way, get in my Jeep and nick off. But I did it. I caught two waves and came fifth out of six people, so I didn’t come last. But the win in it for me was that I went out there and I let someone help me, to support me emotionally so that I could get that breakthrough.

I was scared, but I did it anyway. I let myself sit in that grossly uncomfortable stage – where I wanted to run but let myself do it. How I did that was to take control of my breath.

When we’re stressed out in life, we breathe really shallow and fast (trust me I was doing that) and we get stuck in our head. But if we can take deeper breaths and let ourselves just relax into the moment, we can get out of the story in our head and drop lower into our heart and find the fun or comfort in what we are doing.

I’ve done this episode as a spontaneous extra little session to remind you that the breakthrough is worth it.

So, the Healthy Life Hack I want to leave you with today is:

We’re all presented with stuff that is so frigging scary you just don’t know how you’re going to get through it. But the thing that helps you get through it is:

1. Let people help you when they offer
2. Let yourself feel uncomfortable but move through it and remember to breathe; it helps you reframe it

Discomfort means you’re ready to grow – you’re on a breakthrough point. 

I promise, the pain won’t last, but the memory will last forever. Life isn’t about sitting on the sidelines; it’s about being in the game, whatever that means for you.

Did you enjoy the podcast today? Please let me know by leaving a review on Apple Podcasts. Every month I draw one lucky reviewer to have a free one-hour consultation with me. Also, remember to subscribe wherever you’re tuning in from so that you always catch the next episode.

Are you looking for more great resources? Get a free copy of my Feed Your Body ebook here and be sure to explore my blog while you are there.