8 Tips on How to Embrace Discomfort for Your Health and Well-being

After reading Part 1 of this post series, I hope you got convinced that embracing discomfort and stepping outside your comfort zone is good for you. Stress and discomfort are not only part of life but are essential ingredients for a healthy and fulfilling life. So, instead of numbing yourself with comfort food and distractions when you feel agitated and a bit anxious, move towards your discomfort and embrace what life calls you to do.

Now, the question is, how do you ensure discomfort is good for you rather than hurting you? You might have witnessed people doing ‘crazy’ things and thought this would be too scary or dangerous for you. This may be true for you, but not necessarily for them. Think of all the things you do today that you could not do in the past. It is a question of experience, perspective, and practice.

“The cure for numbing is developing tools and practices that allow you to lean into discomfort and renew your spirit.” (Brene Brown, Dare to Lead)

How to get good at stress and be more resilient

Here are 8 tips to sfaely embrace discomfort so that it contributes to your health and well-being rather than move you into feeling overwhelmed and anxious.

1. Change your perspective

If you perceive your stress response as something positive (excitement vs anxiety), you are more likely to have a good experience. Instead of forcing yourself to relax, “embrace the nerves, tell yourself you are excited, and know that your heart is in it.” (McGonigal). If you also believe you have the resources to cope with stress and think “I’ve got this”, this could mean the difference between feeling overwhelmed or feeling empowered by the stress in your life. In moments of stress, think of the bigger purpose behind what you are trying to do. You can also draw from previous experiences where you did well in face of adversity or conquered your fear to achieve something you thought too challenging. Some of the stressful situations we face also include opportunities for bigger responsibilities, to pursue your dreams, to become the new version of you. Open yourself up to opportunities, practice saying yes to them, and show up with curiosity and courage.

“Being resilient is having the courage to grow from stress” (McGonigal)

2. Persist when you want to stop

Push your limits by persisting through your first sign of wanting to quit or stop: do one more rep of that lift, run one more minute or kilometer than you did last time or write one more paragraph. Whatever you do, try to go a little past that point when you start feeling you want to quit or that you are uncomfortable and want to take a break. This is how you get the ‘runner’s high’, the feel-good feeling from working hard. But don’t go to the point of exhaustion.

3. Push very hard, but briefly, sometimes

This is the principle of hormesis. “Hormesis refers to adaptive responses of biological systems to moderate environmental or self-imposed challenges through which the system improves its functionality and/or tolerance to more severe challenges.” (Nature) In other words, it is the principle of “What does not kill you, makes you stronger”. Key stressors here are cold exposure, fasting and high intensity workout. They need to be near your max capacity to tolerate, but brief. You just sustain a few minutes of that high intensity workout or cold exposure to trigger the survival mechanism in you. For fasting, you need to experience real hunger, so not eating over few hours or days, depending on the formula you choose and your experience.

“Our genes didn’t evolve for a life of pampered comfort. A little stress to induce hormesis once in a while goes a long way.” (David Sinclair, Lifespan. Why We Age -and Why We Don’t Have To)

4. Take a step forward now

When you feel the agitation in face of a demanding task or stressful situation, the best thing you can do to feel better is to take the first step or one step towards your objective. If you get into action, all that energy that was building up is directed into helping you move forward which releases the tension. Your body will reward you with dopamine which will help you continue and repeat the action the next time. That is how we build resilience and new habits. This is also what Mel Robbins promotes with her 5 Seconds Rule: “If you have an instinct to act on a goal, you must physically move within 5 seconds or your brain will kill it.” If you wait too long, your inner critic will jump in and convince you to not do it and you will continue to feel uncomfortable.

Often, the discomfort we feel when not acting can be greater than the discomfort of acting in alignment with our goals and values.

5. Scale the challenge

Stepping outside your comfort zone does not mean getting overwhelmed and hurting yourself. You need to find the happy middle between feeling complacent and bored and feeling overly anxious and out of control. This also happens to be where we tend to experience flow. As Steven Kotler (the flow expert) says: “the sweet spot for flow is when a task is just the right level of difficulty.” So, what challenges us and makes us uncomfortable will be different for each of us and will change overtime. As you move outside of your comfort zone, what was once the unknown and frightening becomes your new normal. If you are experiencing something that feels too challenging for you, find a way to reduce it to something manageable: ask for help, get the resources you need, and ensure you are in optimal readiness state, i.e. rested and recharged. You want to make sure that demands don’t exceed your resources (real and perceived).

“The ideal stress response is one that gives us energy, helps us focus, and encourages us to act: the challenge response.” (McGonigal, The Upside of Stress)

6. Do the hard things first

If you start your day with a good workout, you will get a boost for the day. You are also better off to tackle that important thing you need to do that is either demanding or challenging first thing during the day. Once you are done with it, you will feel the relief from that pressure and good about yourself. If you don’t, you will drag this nagging feeling with you all day until you do it. These two things (morning workout and doing the most important first) will help you face any other challenges during the day with more ease and confidence.

7. Share the challenge

When you embrace a challenge along with others, you benefit from their support and the feel-good chemical that connection provides (oxytocin). You feel more capable to face challenges together. Plus, studies show that in a stressful situation, if you help others, you increase your ability to endure and perform under difficulty: “The impulse to connect is both a natural response to stress and a source of resilience.” (McGonigal) In other words, together, we are more hopeful and tend to be more courageous.

8. Make sure to rest and recover

The growth we experience when we face discomfort, challenge, or stress, does not happen while we face it. It happens in the period of rest and integration that follows. Make sure to include appropriate rest and recovery, including sleep, in your schedule. What you need and when you need it, depends on how long and how far you have pushed yourself outside your comfort zone. Read my previous blog post for recovery strategies and tactics.

As you can sense reading these tactics, they all require that you notice and pay attention to your thoughts, feelings, and sensations. You need to be mindful to be able to determine if you are in the right zone of challenge, i.e. neither being too complacent nor overwhelmed.

Remember that wellness is not achieved by remaining passive and comfortable. It is something you get by actively engaging in activities, making choices, and adopting a lifestyle that foster holistic health. It is doing things that are worthwhile and aligned with our purpose and values even though they may feel uncomfortable.

If you need help to reduce your overall stress level or increase your capacity to face challenges and discomfort, ask for support. As a Holistic Wellness Coach, I can help you gain clarity and new perspectives on your challenges, determine what actions to take to move you towards your desired health and wellness goals, and support you through the process.