Within the past year, I have become addicted to spin classes. Thanks to a spiritual mentor and a beautiful community of women, I found a place where I could strengthen my physical body through cycling and experience positive growth mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. As I continue this workout venture, I often hear instructors say something like “You should be uncomfortable!” or “Uncomfortable is where the change happens.” Throughout the workouts, I have developed a love/hate relationship with phrases like these. Of course, I exercise in hopes of seeing change, but being uncomfortable is hard. Being uncomfortable means I have taken a risk and pushed myself further than I thought I could go.
Outside of the spin studio, I have noticed that my life takes on a similar pattern, and I bet your life does too. Life seems to be composed of a plethora of opportunities to play it safe or get uncomfortable, leaving the choice up to you and me. Choosing the uncomfortable means being vulnerable and putting yourself out there. It means ignoring the whispers of fear and failure and believing the results will be worth the leap.
It’s uncomfortable to start a new job, go on a first date, ask for forgiveness, open your heart again, move to a new city, make new friends, confront others, be the one to speak up, be the one to be quiet, begin something new, pick something old back up, and step up into the person the King created you to be. Living in our true identities as princesses from a heavenly kingdom is uncomfortable because we do not belong here. We are outsiders on a pilgrimage home. However, we are called to pick up others along the way to join us on this journey. To lead fellow sojourners to the heavenly kingdom, we must act and speak as though we belong there. We must be counter-cultural and out of the box in the best way possible, reflecting the light of Christ in the dark places even if it is risky. As we step into our zone of discomfort, others are able to experience the comfort of Jesus’s forgiveness, grace, and love. Through each risk and act of obedience, you and I are becoming the person we are designed to be. We are breaking the mold.
“I am coming to you now, but I say these things while I am still in the world, so that they may have the full measure of my joy within them. I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.”