The life-changing magic of seeking out discomfort
Finding purpose has everything to do with how much discomfort you invite into your life.
Freezing water sucks.
That was my first takeaway this week during my visit to Elahni, a wellness experience in New York that puts you through rounds of sauna and ice plunges.
In the tub, I couldn’t stop shivering, it was hard to catch my breath, and my limbs went numb.
But that’s just it. Elahni cofounder Nick Rizk told me the point of the ice is to improve how we respond to discomfort. The less you try to fight it, he said, the better you’re able to deal with it.
He was right.
By the third and final plunge, I doubled my amount of time submerged. The water wasn’t any warmer, I was simply more comfortable in the ice.
Here’s our starting point today: Trying something new first requires you to be okay with being bad at something.
Stand out in a crowd
Achieving anything means making peace with being at the very bottom of a learning curve or hierarchy.
Starting a job, trying a sport, creating something new — we’ve all been there. You slam into walls and fall into traps in the hope of becoming halfway decent. It’s not easy, especially if you’re used to being a high performer in other parts of life.
Still, those who are most comfortable testing new ideas or embracing inexperience are often those who stand out most.
Anthony Park, a real estate agent in New York, has built a reputation catering to some of the wealthiest buyers in the city.
The thing about Park is that he has over 400,000 followers across his social media platforms, accrued through posting videos about his life and work. Since April 2021, he’s posted nearly 500 videos ranging from luxury apartment tours to day-in-the-life insights as a real estate professional.
You wouldn't guess from watching his videos, but he told me that he didn’t have full confidence in his content until around the 300th video.
“When you make a video after you’ve already achieved success, it’s a lot easier,” Park said. “But for your first videos, or the first of a new type of a video, there’s doubt. Hesitation about what your friends think, stuff like that. I'd attribute a lot of what I do to my ability to experiment [on TikTok]."
Putting himself out there online, he explained, has led to more business, and it makes his work more enjoyable. Now, he gets clients reaching out to him because they stumbled upon his videos.
Plus, he says his creative work helps distinguish him from other agents.
“If I meet someone and they find out I’m a real estate agent, they respond neutrally at best," Park said. "But if the conversation turns to my videos, or if someone recognizes me from my content, it makes me interesting in something beyond real estate.”
More discomfort, more meaning
There’s a direct connection between the amount of discomfort you invite into your life and how meaningful a task becomes.
The reason? There’s nothing quite like witnessing your own progress. Progress is satisfying. Discomfort subsides as you get better, and eventually the difficult becomes routine.
But as the challenge shrinks, so does your sense of fulfillment. Operating on autopilot doesn’t inspire or motivate.
The trick is to keep generating new ambitions for yourself so you don’t go too long without discomfort.
By imposing your own goals, deadlines, or projects onto yourself, you can effectively engineer meaning from nothing.
Here's the kicker: As it turns out, whether you reach your goals doesn’t actually matter because purpose doesn’t come from achievement.
Purpose comes from the pursuit of achievement. It ultimately comes down to:
Keeping yourself on a learning curve with new challenges
Setting an ambitious goal
Often, the more impossible the task, the more inspired the work (as long as you don’t let the odds prevent you from taking action).
For me, I know I’ll probably not write the very best newsletter in the world. But by striving toward that, I'm inspired and challenged enough to keep pushing.
