What It Means To Have Confidence That Change Is Good
Human beings love the comfort zone. The “comfort zone” refers to your personal space where you feel most comfortable. Besides encompassing actual, physical spaces, your comfort zone also includes people, restaurants, hobbies, TV shows, and a variety of other aspects of your life that bring you feelings of great comfort.
Hanging out in your “comfort zone” is great because you already know what to expect when you’re doing things that fall under your comfort zone. While the comfort zone sounds like a great place to be, there are some drawbacks to spending all your time there.
When you’re in the comfort zone, you’re far less likely to try new things, take risks, or speak to new people. Exiting your comfort zone is necessary to experience new things in life. If you never leave your comfort zone, you don’t give yourself a chance to grow, evolve, and learn more as a human being.
The urge to grow, evolve, and learn more requires an effort to make changes in your life. Change can be incredibly scary – when things in your life change, they are often fighting heavily against your comfort zone. However, in order to try something new, you must exit the comfort zone for a while to have those new experiences.
This urge to exit the comfort zone describes the idea in having confidence that change can be a good thing. When you encourage and trust yourself to get out of your comfort zone, you have confidence in your ability to change, grow, and learn more in life.
You believe that change can be a good thing and have confidence in yourself to spread your wings, try new things, and go on adventures so you can develop further as a human being.
4 Key Benefits Of Having Confidence That Change Can Be A Good Thing
First, consider just some of the key benefits of change…
- Change leads to new opportunities
- Change brings new experiences
- Change keeps life interesting
- Change is progress
- Change is exciting
- When one door closes another opens
- Facing change builds your resilience
- Facing change builds your inner strength
- Facing change is fulfilling and provides feelings of self-satisfaction
Having confidence that change can be a good thing comes with a variety of benefits for you:
1| Having confidence that change can be a good thing widens your social circle.
People who are willing to approach change with confidence meet tons of new people. As a result, they are more likely to make many new friends and professional connections. Rather than having only a small group of folks they consider to be a part of their lives, people who approach change with confidence establish tons of new relationships because they aren’t afraid to exit their comfort zone and get to know more people.
2| Having confidence that change can be a good thing helps you take more risks.
Risk taking can sometimes end favorably or unfavorably – that’s what makes a risk feel so uncertain! However, taking risks can sometimes lead to fantastic results, and if you never take risks, you don’t give yourself a chance to chase after the possibility of achieving those fantastic results.
Learning how to take risks can help transform your life in the best ways. When you have the confidence that change can be a good thing, you develop more comfort in taking risks and trying new things because you understand that the results could be incredibly worthwhile.
3| Having confidence that change can be a good thing gives you more life experiences.
By having confidence that change can be a good thing, you don’t limit yourself to the confines of your comfort zone all the time. Instead, you allow yourself to explore new places, meet new people, and try new things.
While you may spend some time in your comfort zone occasionally, you also make sure you’re giving yourself plenty of chances to explore and learn. A person with this type of confidence lives an exciting and varied life.
4| Having confidence that change can be a good thing encourages you to be a lifelong learner.
Lifelong learners are people who always strive to learn new skills and seek new knowledge. Rather than deciding that they don’t need to learn anything new after a certain point in life, they crave new knowledge and welcome the opportunity to learn more.
Lifelong learners don’t let themselves become too set in their ways or opinions. When presented with new information, a lifelong learner will consider it and learn more about it – even if it challenges an opinion they already hold.
Having confidence that change can be a good thing encourages you to keep learning throughout your entire life, even if it involves exiting your comfort zone and changing your mindset upon learning something new.
15 Tips To Develop A Strong Sense Of Confidence That Change Can Be A Good Thing
It is possible to develop a sense of confidence that change can be a good thing. Because change can feel very frightening, learning how to embrace change confidently requires practice to perfect.
To develop a stronger sense of confidence that change can be a good thing, consider the following strategies:
1| Allow yourself to start small when you’re experimenting with embracing change.
When you’re trying to acclimate to embracing change, avoid any major changes as your first attempt. Starting with smaller, more manageable changes is the gentler way to build your confidence in change being a good thing.
For example, you can try ordering dinner from a new restaurant instead of your usual favorite. You can try a new TV series rather than your old comfort-watching shows. Instead of going to your typical date spot with your partner, you both can try a different activity.
These types of changes are smaller and low risk. For example, if you don’t like the food at the new restaurant, you can opt to never order from there again. By making these small types of changes first, you can acclimate yourself to embracing change (and possibly discover some new places and things you enjoy in the process).
2| Practice accepting that you can’t have total control over everything in life.
Nobody will ever maintain total control over everything that happens in their lives. This simple fact of life is one of the reasons why change can feel so frightening: If you can’t guarantee a positive outcome, you may face a serious hardship by making a change.
Learning how to let go of control is an excellent way to boost your confidence about viewing change as a good thing. Relinquishing control is difficult, but when you learn how to begin doing it, you can start embracing change instead.
3| Get comfortable with using the phrase “I don’t know.”
Even the most knowledgeable and prepared people experience “I don’t know” moments. Life can be unpredictable, and everyone faces moments where they truly don’t know how something will unfold.
Learn to become more comfortable with saying “I don’t know.” Some people don’t like to admit when they don’t know something – they may feel stupid, weak, or incapable of dealing with something because they can’t accurately predict how the events will happen.
However, learning how to say “I don’t know” is a valuable step toward building confidence that change can be a good thing. When you don’t know how things will happen, making a change could go wrong….but there’s also a chance that things could go well.
4| Reach out to your support system for an extra confidence boost.
Talking to other people you trust about making changes offers an excellent outsider’s perspective. If you spend too much time obsessing over making a change, you may need to get “outside of your own head” to see the change more clearly.
Call up your best friend or talk to a trusted family member about a change you’re considering. Often, those people you trust most and consider a part of your support system will be able to boost your confidence about how a change you’re considering can be a good move.
5| Make a pros and cons list to determine the value of a potential change you’re considering.
A good, old fashioned pros and cons list can help you see the potential outcome of making a change more clearly. When you have the facts and possibilities written out in front of you, it can be much easier to embrace a change as a good thing.
The next time you’re feeling frightened or conflicted about embracing a change, break out the pencil and paper and begin creating a pros and cons list about what could happen if you choose to embrace the potential change. More often than not, you’ll likely discover that the pros outweigh the cons, giving you a confidence boost about how that change could be a good thing.
6| Keep your skill sets up to date.
Even the most educated and talented people in their fields can stand to learn more. As people advance through life, new discoveries are made. To build more confidence in embracing change in life, keep your skill sets current.
Participate in professional development, speak to experts in the field, and attend classes when needed to continue strengthening your skills. When an opportunity to embrace change arises, ensuring that your particular talents and skills are up to date will make it feel much easier to embrace those changes.
7| Change your mindset about change to be more forward focused.
When you’re weighing the potential outcomes of making a change in life, consider the following question: Will making this change get me closer to who I want to be or what I want to achieve? If yes, you can feel more confident when embracing that change.
Knowing that you’re doing something to improve yourself or advance yourself further is an excellent confidence booster in making changes. Even if the change is difficult to make, knowing that it’ll have an overall positive impact is often incentive enough to keep going.
8| Reduce the amount of ambiguity on the other side of making a change.
Uncertainty makes change scary. When you aren’t sure about what could lie on the other side of making a big change, you’re less likely to approach it with confidence (if you even decide to approach it at all). Your brain goes into “survival mode,” doing everything in its power to keep you away from a perceived danger.
To reduce that amount of ambiguity and boost your confidence in change being a good thing, give yourself plenty of time to brainstorm all the potential outcomes – whether they’re good or bad. When you have a full grasp of what could happen, making the change feels a lot less unpredictable.
9| Flip the script on making changes to be an adventure story rather than a horror story.
Perspective is key when you’re trying to change your attitudes about something, especially making changes. It’s easy to view change as a horror story with the unknowns lurking around in the background.
However, you can improve your confidence in change being a good thing by “flipping the script.” Instead of viewing making changes as something to be scared about, consider viewing it as an adventure instead. Rather than trudging toward some imagined inevitable failure, think of making changes as an adventure instead. Adventure stories often contain hardship, but they also involve valuable lessons and experiences along the way.
10| Get comfortable with your emotions.
A good way to boost your confidence in change being a good thing is to learn how to get comfortable with your difficult emotions. Making changes invokes all sorts of emotions and feelings, including fear and anxiety.
Learning how to feel and process those emotions can help boost your confidence in change being a good thing. Once you’re able to move past your emotions and focus on the actual act of change, doing what you need to do to embrace the change feels a lot less intimidating.
11| Learn to accept the inevitably of change.
No matter how hard someone may fight against change happening in their lives, it’s bound to happen one way or another. Human lives are full of change, whether they’re deciding to make changes themselves or facing the inevitable change that occurs to us all.
Learning how to accept this simple fact of life helps increase confidence that change can be a good thing. Doing this takes time and practice – to better embrace the inevitably of change, it helps to create mantras, meditate on the fact, and keep reminders of ways that change can be a good thing close by.
12| Get a better understanding of exactly why change makes you feel uncomfortable.
Change affects different people in a variety of ways. Spend some time really examining your issues with embracing change. Doing so can give you valuable insight about exactly why change makes you uncomfortable.
When you know why change makes you feel uncomfortable, you can begin addressing the specific problem behind your hesitation or fear. As you begin to address the root cause of the problem, you’ll notice your confidence in embracing change increasing.
13| Engage in some stress reducing activities on a regular basis.
Practice self-care, get regular exercise, and make sure you’re getting a restful night’s sleep. Whatever helps you reduce your overall stress, make sure you engage in those activities regularly.
Doing so can help you change your attitude about embracing change. When you’re feeling your best and experiencing less stress, you’ll feel more confident that change can be a good thing.
14| Reach out to a mental health professional
If your confidence that change can be a good thing feels nonexistent, consider reaching out to a therapist or mental health professional for assistance.
Talking to someone who can really help you break down your emotions and understand effective ways to process making changes can help you develop more confidence in embracing change.
15| Keep a list of positive experiences you’ve had with embracing a change.
When faced with a chance to make a new change, you may feel overwhelmed with the possibilities. To prevent this, keep a list of all the positive experiences you’ve had with embracing past changes.
By keeping a list of all the times you made changes that turned out well, you can have a constant reminder of how change can be a positive experience (even if it feels uncomfortable at first). Make a detailed list. Give it some serious thought.
As you experience new positive change experiences, add them to your list. Revisit the list any time you need a confidence boost that change can be a good thing.
Case Study: What Confidence That Change Can Be A Good Thing Looks Like
Examining an example of a person who has confidence that change can be a good thing can help you better understand what that type of confidence looks like. To gain a better understanding of this type of confidence, consider Glenna.
The last time Glenna really enjoyed her life was the 1980s – at this point, she was a teenager and then in her early 20s, and she felt like she was on top of the world. She had great friends, a job she loved, a great college experience, and the belief that she could go on and accomplish anything she wanted. She loved this period of her life and the culture of the time. She loved the music, the movies, and the social life someone experiencing young adulthood in the 1980s got to enjoy.
As a grown woman living in the 2000s, Glenna has experienced a hard time adapting to current trends. She was extremely hesitant to get a smartphone. She doesn’t enjoy paying all her bills online (or even worse, through an app on the smartphone), or using streaming services to watch TV shows.
She doesn’t understand the technology, let alone what passes for entertainment these days. She longs for the simplicity and enjoyment she felt in the 1980s – because of this, her technology, style, and entertainment preferences haven’t changed much since then.
Glenna’s children have encouraged her to embrace these changes because they think her life would be easier with the conveniences of modern technology. Although Glenna was afraid of all these new devices, she decided to hear their arguments about why she needed to “get with the times” and embrace new trends and tools.
Slowly but surely, Glenna decided to heed their advice and begin making small changes to step forward in the current trends. She decided to trade her old phone for a smartphone – during this change, she allowed her children to teach her how to perform different tasks on the phone.
Glenna also decided to try watching some newer TV shows with her children. To her surprise, she enjoyed most of them. Now that she’s embraced this change, they have something new to bond over each week when they gather to watch new episodes.
Although Glenna was extremely nervous to embrace new trends and technology, she realizes doing so added convenience and other positive aspects to her life.
She was afraid of learning these new skills, but with the help of her children as her support system, she was able to move forward in her learning and gain more confidence in her ability to adapt to new trends and technology successfully.
The Bottom Line
Increasing confidence in change being a good thing can be a frightening experience because of all the unknowns and mysteries that lie on the other side of making a change. However, building confidence in embracing change is important for living a fulfilling and exciting life.
As scary as embracing change may be, deciding to remain stagnant and change-less is even scarier. People who don’t embrace change never see any improvement or excitement in their lives.
Learning how to embrace changes leads you to tons of great experiences, such as learning new skills, meeting new people, and trying new things. When you build confidence in embracing change, you open your life to an infinite number of possible ways to grow and evolve.
