Before I really start, I have a few confessions to make. I don’t really like camping. (I’ve never actually had an enjoyable camping experience.) I am scared almost to the point of immobility by spiders. I like to shower every day.
None of that really seems to go along with being a World Racer, does it? So when people ask me, “But won’t you miss ______ (insert a creature comfort)?”, my answer is generally, “Yes, I will.” But I also know that I cannot learn to fully rely on God in the comfortable environs in which I have spent the last twenty-two years of my life. I cannot fully grow into the woman of God that God has created me to be here. I’m too comfortable here. It’s often too easy here. Please don’t misunderstand, I am infinitely grateful fo the blessings God has bestowed upon my family, but I need to leave my comfort zone– to be stretched– to truly learn about all those ‘abstract’ concepts like trust, reliance, and deep relationships.
So, last night, a scene in The Proposal really resounded with me. (SPOILER ALERT: If you haven’t seen the movie, go see it, and then finish this post! And if you’ve seen it, go see it again, because it’s really cute!) Ryan Reynold’s character has just professed his love for Margaret (a loveably mean and awkward Sandra Bullock) and she denies him, declaring that she’s “more comfortable alone.” She says that it’s easier the way it is now. Easier… but not fulfilling.
How many of us live our lives in the comfort zone, staying within the bounds of what’s “easy”? And it’s not just physically, though material objects do keepy some people rooted down when their spirit secretly years to go galavanting off somewhere. It’s all the ‘scary’ emotional stuff. I put quotations around the word scary, and it makes it seem flippant, but emotions CAN be scary. And they’re not always easy things.A mountain man who lives a hard life in the mountains is taking the easy route if what he fears is being with people and being truly known by them, isn’t he?
I really have spent a long time trying to quell my emotions. A good friend called me out on it a few times in the past few years, and my reaction was generally anger– my previous go-to reaction. If I ever began to feel sad, I’d convert it to anger. Even feelings like rejection and loneliness were traded in for a dose of anger. So, I had happy and I had angry. I was actually proud of having the emotional range of a rock. Because, for me, those two choices were ‘safe’ emotions; they were ‘easy’ emotions.
Enter in The World Race and training camp. Walls that I’d so carefully constructed came tumbling down. And I’ll admit, a tiny, tiny part of me still yearns to feebly begin placing those pebbles one on top of the other, trying to reconstruct a semblance of the barrier I’d had for so long. But you know what I found when the walls came down? Deep, real connections. Genuine, heartfelt , completely honest relationships. It was like moving from a world of muted colors into one of Technicolor. I’ve oftentimes feared that if I couldn’t be funny, people wouldn’t like me. If I can’t make someone laugh, I feel out of my element. Even if they’re laughing at me, I need that smile to know that people want me to be around. But the walls came down and I was able to be myself. If I was angry, I was angry. If I was crying, my teammates were still there beside me. I was able to let people in and, in the process, love myself a little more. It’s not easy moving out of comfort zones. Growing pains aren’t just for growing teenagers, after all. Nope, not easy…but fulfilling.
“A ship in the harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for.”
