Have You Had Your 'Jump Out of a Plane' Moment This Year?
Growth is scary, but scary is growth - get ready to jump
I can’t decide whether to shave off all my hair or let it grow into a long mane.
Ultimately, it’s a toss-up between courage and patience.
And while I teeter on the edge, not deciding either way, my hair grows wayward into a straggly mess. Neither resembling the iconic Sinéad O’Connor nor the wild lion I want to be.
I’m stuck in the safe zone, neither daring bravely to chop nor committing fully to the delayed gratification of years upon years of waiting.
Sometimes, if we want to truly live we have to be brave. We all need our jump out of a plane moment.
Comfort zones are for those who merely exist
I’ve struggled with self-confidence over the years but mask this well and hide my insecurities. Something that’s helped me boost my self-confidence is taking the advice of personal growth experts and making a concerted effort to leave my comfort zone.
I’ve left relationships, jobs and countries. I’ve started new relationships. I’ve created ventures and closed ventures. I’ve laid myself bare, exposed to potential ridicule and criticism. I no longer live a predictable life, and every now and then, this panics me. There’s comfort in predictability.
But getting comfortable with being uncomfortable helps us grow and doing things that scare us is all part of that growth.
I know what you are thinking: change is scary. And I agree. But it’s also liberating.
In the article The Value of Fear, the psychologist Dr Amy Bucher says that doing scary things is one way to “inspire exceptional outcomes.”
As Dr Bucher highlights, our go-to response is to avoid scary things.
Our reptilian brains trick us by playing negative image carousels of everything that could go wrong. But it forgets to showcase what could go right.
Our primal drive is survival and safety. Stepping into the unknown is perceived as risky, and there are just too many unknowns for us to feel comfortable.
What if we jump and our parachute doesn’t work? What if we leave a job or a relationship and we regret it? What if we start therapy, and it brings more hurt than peace? What if we take that career change and don't enjoy it?
The shackling effect of what-ifs only serves to keep us small.
In her poignant poem What If I Fall, poet Erin Hanson encourages us to think beyond our imaginings of failure and instead consider what could go right.
“There is freedom waiting for you,
On the breezes of the sky,
And you ask “What if I fall?”
Oh but my darling, What if you fly?”
Imagine the liberty of not fearing the consequences of our actions. We are shackled to the worry of what could go wrong. Inertia infiltrates our bloodstream, and we remain stationary and static, merely existing.
But we can not soar if we clip our own wings. Only we hold the power to stretch out our arms to their full potential and take to the sky.
I don’t know about you, but I want to feel alive. I want to fly.
Lean into your fear and feel alive
I have a coven of incredible aunts. Each of them brings wisdom, intellect, and thought-provoking insights into our conversations.
Recently, one of these incredible ladies told me she strives to have a jump-out-of-a-plane moment each year. The year she initiated this personal challenge, literally jumping out of a plane, was the year's accomplishment. She survived to tell the tale and continued with her quest.
She’s taken on something else of equal gravitas every year that's followed. Something that gives her the same sense of fear and excitement. Maybe it’s something she’s been curious about but actively avoided for years. Or perhaps it’s something that every fibre of her being wants to run away from.
It takes courage to do the things that scare us.
My aunt embraces her challenges with trepidation and uncertainty. Sometimes, the what-ifs try to curtail her progression, but she swats the pesky negative thoughts away.
Upon completing whatever that year’s jumping out of a plane challenge is, she experiences an inner glow of invincibility and euphoria — she expands as a person.
Our need for familiarity curtails our freedom
I get it; there’s always a reasonable-sounding excuse not to do something. But when we start to befriend our fears and embrace change, we start living.
I stayed in an unhealthy relationship for several years too long. And I’m hardly unique because the truth is, no one says they left a bad relationship too early, right?
Like many people I know, I overstayed in a job that brought me deep unhappiness and a disproportionate amount of stress. Again, no one says they left a job they had outgrown too early.
All too often, we leave big decisions too late. Instead of choosing to jump, we often wait until we are pushed—pushed by someone else, our health, or something else entirely out of our control.
The mere exposure effect is a cognitive bias that causes us to prefer things that are familiar to us. We would rather stick with what we know, even if it brings us unhappiness, than escape it and look for greener pastures.
But what a waste of possibility and opportunity. What a waste of precious years of our lives.
Deep within each of us is a seed of incredible potential. But this seed only germinates when we lean into what scares us and start to live bravely and boldly.
Find what scares you and run toward it. Have your jump-out-of-a-plane moment every year. Silence the what-if dialogue your mind will present you with.
Start something new, end something old. Take a leap of faith and trust that you will fly.
While I still fantasize about picking up the clippers and feeling their vibrations over my head. I think patience is going to win over courage. But that said, I am about to do something that terrifies me, and it’s all about social media and putting myself out there … wish me luck.
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You can also find my writings and musings on Medium, where I write about well-being, feminism & personal growth. I also own the publication Life Without Children.
