#ComfortZones #comfort #contentment #success
“Comfort zones aren’t meant to be permanent.”
So beings a TV ad for Regions Bank.
The message appears to be that the bank will be there for you through life’s ups and downs.
But let’s dig deeper into that sentence. We all look for, sometimes find and try to stay in our comfort zones.
Comfort zone equals contentment.
But if contentment is all one seeks, he or she is missing something.
Truly successful people not only leave comfort zones, they high-tail it out of them.
One doesn’t aim for success just to be content.
One aims for success to change the world, or, at least, his or her own world.
Real success is achieved when one goes beyond what’s comfortable to him or her, stretches his or her abilities and takes risks.
When one seeks only comfort, he or she probably is not dreaming, is not seeing himself or herself beyond, perhaps, what his or her parents and other elders suggested they seek in life.
Some people grew up being taught that dreaming is dangerous, and only for the, well, less stable folk.
Stability begot success in previous decades.
That stability, today, has all but vanished. When one is stable, he or she has a job that pays decently and, perhaps, provides benefits. His or her role is to behave well in the workplace, do his or her job well enough to please his or her boss and work until it was time to retire.
Such an existence is non-existent today. Very few people stay in the same job, with the same company, for decades. Some people stay with a company long-term, but their jobs change – often frequently.
What you are doing today probably won’t be what you’ll be doing tomorrow. Often, you won’t have any control over decisions made for you.
Wise leaders say one must prepare for success. It may start with preparing for the unexpected wherever you work. Most companies today have to change with the times and technology. If you do a certain job, and the job changes, will you change with it? If not, you could be gone.
Fortunately, there are programs available that allow people to prepare for the unexpected at work. They involve spending a few, part-time, off-work hours a week at endeavors that could put enough money in their pockets to allow them to roll with whatever rolls downhill at them.
These programs require no specific education, experience or background. They do require an open mind, a willingness to do something you perhaps never thought you would do. And, yes, they require you to get out of your comfort zone.
To learn about one of the best such programs, message me.
You may be comfortable sitting on your favorite couch or chair. But, as comfortable as that is, you don’t sit there forever. Success requires movement. Comfort, generally, requires sitting still. So the question becomes, are you satisfied just being comfortable, or do you dream of something much better? Whatever route you choose, it can be there for the taking.
Peter
Tag Archives: contentment
CONTENTMENT VS. HAPPINESS: GO FROM FORMER TO LATTER
#happiness #contentment #HappinessIsCreated
Most of us would probably say we are happy with the way things are for us.
Some, of course, would say they live one crisis after another. These folks may never see happiness, perhaps because they don’t pursue it. They wait for it to come to them.
But let’s talk about the former group.
Pose this question to yourself: are you HAPPY with the way things are for you, or are you CONTENT with the way things are for you?
Though it’s truly a blessing to be alive, let’s not talk about those who are just happy to be standing upright, or those happy to be on the right side of the dirt.
Let’s focus on those who say they are happy with their lives as a whole. If you are HAPPY with your life, you ALWAYS wear a smile. You have no worries about anything. The sky is never falling. Tomorrow will always be better than today.
If you don’t look at life this way, but feel that, when you balance your ups and downs, that life is OK, you are merely content. If you say to yourself, “I’d really like that, but I’ll settle for this,” you are merely content. If you look forward to your good days, but have occasional bad days, you are merely content.
So let’s take this premise a step further. Once you determine whether you are HAPPY, rather than merely CONTENT, what do you do next if you discover that what you thought was happiness was just contentment?
Chances are there are steps you can take to change your status. It’s not just a mood change, or putting on a façade of happiness. It’s a life change.
Ask yourself whether you are governed by your circumstances, or whether you are governing your circumstances. If it’s the former, what do you do to change to the latter?
To borrow from the song Dusty Springfield made famous, wishing, hoping and praying alone aren’t going to give you what you want.
You have to determine what you want that will make you truly happy. You certainly can live with contentment for a time, but you have to really aim toward happiness. Once you aim toward it, you have to pursue it relentlessly and continuously. That, for some, is the hard part.
You see, contentment may be good enough once some of us realize what it takes to achieve true happiness.
For others, they have the determination to achieve happiness, but need the vehicle that will get them there. If you are one of those, visit www.bign.com/pbilodeau. It’s one of many, and indeed one of the best, vehicles for those who not only know what they want to go from content to happy, but also want to take others on the same journey.
Going from content to happy may not always be easy. However, for some, it could be a simple adjustment in the way one leads a life or uses his time.
For those happy to be content, perhaps now, at least, you may understand the difference between contentment and happiness.
For those who want true happiness, find out what that is for you and do what you need to do. It seems simple, but, for some, it’s very hard.
Remember: happiness is not given. It is created.
Peter