Talking about discomfort

I have come across this interesting thought yesterday on Instagram:

"We have to be happy with the feeling of discomfort in the process to improve ourselves. We even have the obligation to look forward to it"

It hit something in my head.

First, let start with an explanation of what discomfort means. According to the Cambridge Dictionary discomfort is "a feeling of being uncomfortable physically or mentally". Let understand here that it's in general the feeling to not being at ease physically or mentally. It can be associated to pain, agony, soreness or ache. Somehow it's a way our body or our mind informs us of an unusual situation/state for him.

What interest me in the thought above is the application of the idea in any personal development, growth or optimisation process. We can even enlarge the application to the improvement of our society depending of what we want.

Generally, whenever we are trying new things or pushing ourself in a new direction, we may feel the tied insecurity of not knowing what will happen, or not being sure of what we are doing. Sometimes it may be a pain to keep the pace. Other times, it may be the unease of the weight of people's gaze and or judgements. Thoses feelings are manifestation of discomfort. This discomfort is in essence the opposition force applied by our body/mind or the society to come back to a "safe", "comfortable" state.

A simple example to a better understanding is the implementation of a new workout routine for the first time, the body send some signals as pain or soreness in different part during the effort asking to stop.

Base of professionalism or expertise is amateurism or being a starter. It's not depreciative, it means there is something to learn or work on. The feeling of discomfort appears for me in that same light, it's the way our body/mind is telling us that there are things it needs to learn. It's also can be a way to warn about something that doesn't feel quite well.

The advantage of discomfort here define what is needed to be overcomed, thought about, talked about. In sum, the gap to reach. In the same spirit it may be the indication of an issue or a bad way.

The process of improvement needs that feeling to help us know where we are on the path of building the kind of person we can be proud of. The main advice all personal development process will give is to pay attention to the small sign our body/mind can give us. I do believe, that we have all the answers to our questions inside us, the real project in our building is to find the way to make them rise up. When we give the chance to accept the discomfort inside us we are not just accepting the limitation of our knowledge and capacity in the time being, but also allowing ourselves to grow further and higher in our competences and moreover in our humility.

This is specifically important in the knowing that improvement come from hardness to reach a point. By searching the discomfort we allow ourself to explore what might be hard or complex for us. By knowing those, we identify what to focus our attention on and better use our strenghs. We may also find a way to ease or deepen what we already know or come easily. By all means our discomfort is a good teacher or a good friend.

In all process difficulty raise questions usefull to find a better way or to simplify the approch to the problem. In exemple, in implementing a new process to be more producive and effective, we find ourselves hitting a wall on new habit we try to create. This difficulty may raise the question of the way the habit is create, or the disposition which deeper block the way. Those questions are a mean for a better understanding of the self and an occasion to think about new way of getting to the point. This serves also in all type of relationship that we may create with ourselves and others.

Finally, passing throught the discomfort create a new range of motion. It's like seeing a new world because you get new view, a new perspective of your own abilities. You have a more accurate appreciation of the your struggles with a more suitable response to them. It give you a mean to understand your peers more and adjust your views. More over, it sharpen your skills and upgrade your level.

I'll let this thought of the pholosopher Criss Jamy writen in Killosophy to conclude and open the space to reflect :

“ There's sometimes a tugging feeling you get to push further when you aren't being challenged enough or when things get too comfortable. ”