Sometimes our clients’ resistance is about staying in that place in which they are most familiar, the way it’s always been, the status quo, the ‘beast they know.’ That place is also called the Comfort Zone. There appears to be a safety component to staying where we know we can’t get hurt, where risk seems to be minimized, and where there is no movement. We all need a comfort zone and we all need the ability to return to safe-haven when we need to do so. And, it might be that some of our clients are nestled here because fear paralyzes them or because anything else seems impossible. What if we could stimulate our clients to dip a toe outside of their comfort zone and into the pool of possibility, or, at least peek out a window of opportunity toward their next step in the behaviour change process. Consider this representation of what that next step might offer:
Imagine what might be possible if we could work with clients to take them to that North Star visualization of where their magic might happen! What if you offered them the image above? And what if you asked them what their magic might look like? What might be possible in their new circle? What would it take to get them there? What is the cost to them of staying in their comfort zone? What are the benefits of staying there? What might be the costs of moving to where they might make magic happen? What are the potential benefits of that new place? What is their relationship to making magic happen for themselves? Are there support persons with whom they might want to go to this new circle of life? What if the place where the magic happens becomes the new comfort zone? Pema Chödrön, author of When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times offers this maxim, “To be fully alive, fully human, and completely awake is to be continually thrown out of the nest.”