The Crazy Wisdom Community Journal asked a number of leaders in southeastern Michigan’s conscious living community to reflect upon times in their lives that they’ve left their comfort zones to venture out in new ways. In the distant past or much more recently, we asked, what did you do, what inspired you, did it change you, inside or outside, big or little? Did you attend a new class, take an adventurous trip, go skydiving, stretch beyond a long entrenched boundary, start a new relationship, or end an old one, take a leap, retire, join the Peace Corps, go on a night trek in the wilderness, or just do something way out of the ordinary?
THE ULTIMATE COMFORT ZONE
By Brian O’Donnell
Life is calling me out of the comfort zone of middle age to the forbidding territory of old age. Middle age isn’t exactly my comfort zone either. If I’m honest I’m still clinging to youthfulness.
I miss the vitality of youth where the focus was on achievement, seduction, and risk taking. There was the constant thrill of expansion and unending discovery. Everything was in front of me. Life was filled with promise, the constant flow of new people, learning and developing physical mastery. My body was nimble and overflowing with boundless energy, libido, and beauty.
I realize that my youth had its perils as well: impulsiveness, chaos, intensity, plus the tumult of romance and its painful wake. Yet, I hold onto its idealization.
My middle years were devoted to settling down. I developed a successful career and built emotional and financial security. I opened the door to the ongoing nourishment of Spirit.
Gone was the swirl of new friendships and instead the deepening of those that I had. The excitement of younger years was still present but balanced with predictability and certainty. Maturity stabilized the excesses of youth. Innocence evolved into hard earned perspective.
My body has begun its inevitable diminishment which I have fought every step of the way. I still push myself daily at the gym lifting more weights, increasing my running time, adding extra laps in the pool. There is a life affirming energy in this, and it is also fueled by vanity and grasping for the past.
When I look in the mirror, I wonder who that white haired man is who is looking back at me with such pathos. Aging is fraught with loss, decline, and grief. Aging ushers in and challenges the previously fortified denial of death. It is an uncomfortable new landscape to gaze upon. I want to look back and not ahead.
From my inner work I also intuit that old age has its own promise and gifts—wisdom, the softening of egoic pulls, profound surrender, and the full flowering of Love. There can be the liberating force of “nothing to prove.” Gone will be
the perpetual focus on the past or the future and instead an embrace of the now moment will prevail.
Yet the entrance to this promised land is the deep acceptance of impermanence, imperfection, and frustration. This is my humbling and enlivening practice.
Being young has nothing on the kind of freedom and equanimity that emerges from this act of yielding to life on its own terms.
Leaving My Comfort Zone and Finding the Right Path
Leaving my comfort zone. These words alone take me to an uncomfortable place. I generally like to be in one place, get comfy, and stay there! Think long marriage, long career, grown kids, long time in one home, long time in one office, the list keeps going.
My biggest leap out of comfort was leaving Arbor Hospice after 17 years to pursue a private practice full time. I loved working at Arbor Hospice because it was meaningful work with wonderful colleagues. At the same time, there were parts of me that were saying it was time to be brave and try a new path.
I have discovered, as I go through life, that some of the best parts of my journey have been totally unexpected.
When I graduated from Michigan State University, I had a variety of jobs including working for the AFL-CIO, as bookkeeper for an advertising agency, and as an office manager for a tool and die manufacturer. I was at a point in my life where I felt like I had no focus. I had tried so many jobs that I enjoyed, but they were never places I wanted to stay. I felt like I needed to find my reason for being on this earth, and the idea that I could use my skill set to help others sounded perfect. It was then, that I decided to be a social worker. After making that decision, so many things fell into place. I was able to focus on being a full-time student and prepare for a career of truly helping people. In one of my first classes, my professor said that a social worker’s job is to manipulate the environment to benefit their clients. I loved that idea and have held onto it for almost 40 years.
I thought I wanted to work with kids, but one of my siblings became very ill, and my family was struggling to deal with her diagnosis. I thought I would take a medical social work class so that I could help. Suddenly, I had a new path, and I became a medical social worker.
I worked in several area hospitals and enjoyed it. When Arbor Hospice built their residential facility near my home, I was very drawn to the concept.
I applied, was hired, and suddenly had a new direction. I barely understood what hospice was, but it seemed like the right place to be. I loved the ability to meet with people in their homes and help them process the hardest time of their lives. I truly believe that I was given a gift to help people in difficult situations, and it was my job to make the best of that gift. When people asked me how I could do this work, I told them I was smart enough to use the gifts I was given.
But as much as I loved working at Arbor Hospice, private practice called to me. More specifically, working with abused and traumatized people called to me. I realized I needed more training to do that kind of work. So, I sought training in EMDR and Internal Family Systems. Both protocols were fascinating, and I learned a lot about myself as I learned how to help others.
One of my coworkers at Arbor Hospice asked me once if I would ever consider leaving to start a private practice. I couldn’t imagine I would ever do that, but here I am!
When I was in college, I thought I wanted to be a lawyer. (It was kind of the family business.) I did so poorly on the LSAT my father kindly said, “Maybe try something else.” I had no idea what else to do, I was so sure I was supposed to be a lawyer. I really struggled with how to be okay with my “failure.” What I have come to realize in my journey is that the best path is not always what I thought it would be.
My family thought it was quite amusing when I became a hospice social worker. I had to drive all day (long before GPS) and I have no sense of direction. I also worked in a medical setting even though I can’t stand the sight of blood. Still, it was the right career for me. I discovered that with enough maps and directions I would eventually find my way. If I was caring for a patient, I could do whatever was necessary to help that patient and family.
As I work with my clients in my practice, I try to help them change the negative narrative in their heads and help them find the right path for them. It is often difficult to find the strong compassionate parts of ourselves and use them to support us, but it is a skill set that can be learned and life can be so much better as a result.
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Life is calling me out of the comfort zone of middle age to the forbidding territory of old age. Middle age isn’t exactly my comfort zone either. If I’m honest I’m still clinging to youthfulness.