Your Business, Your Nervous System: Staying in vs. Leaving the Comfort Zone
Introduction
This is an excerpt from Delightful Sites — a weekly email series helping therapists, coaches, and entrepreneurs build sustainable, values-aligned businesses, through the power of website marketing. 💐
Since starting my private therapy practice, most of my business decisions have come down to one of two choices:
stay in my comfort zone 🙂
step outside of my comfort zone 🥲
For example: the multiple times that I have re-assessed the financial & energetic sustainability of my practice, I’ve had the choice to:
stay at the same fees & keep the same structure, like weekly 50-minute sessions (my comfort zone option)
make a change in my practice, like raising fees or introducing a new offering like therapy intensives (the outside-my-comfort-zone option)
Maybe you’ve faced similar crossroads in your practice.
to stay in your current niche… or pivot / expand to another niche that excites you more
to keep marketing in the same way… or try something different (like showing more personality in your social media posts, upgrading to a new website platform, or re-writing your “About Me” page to reflect more of your authentic self)
Whether we choose to stick with what we already know, or to experiment with something new… every decision we make in business (& in life) has a nervous system impact.
(As this is an email list of therapists, coaches, & healers, I know I’m preaching to the choir here!)
🍃 Staying in our comfort zone can feel regulating & grounding.
🔥 Stepping outside of our comfort zone – with intentionality & autonomy – can support our nervous system systems as well, in a completely different way.
Even though staying in our comfort zone feels, well, comfortable… it can also come at a cost.
If I had stayed “comfortable” and kept my practice exactly the same as when it started – same fees, same schedule, same structure of offerings – I would probably feel burnt out & overworked today. The 2023 version of my practice would not align with who I am & what my capacity looks like in 2026.
Meanwhile, stepping outside my comfort zone has yielded results that have been worth the temporary discomfort.
For example: when I first started marketing therapy intensives a couple years ago, I felt shy & overcome by imposter syndrome.
(Therapy intensives = extended sessions, 3+ hours, billed at a higher hourly rate than typical weekly sessions.)
A part of me didn’t even believe in the value of my own service (which was a huge block to work through).
Eventually, though, bookings for intensives started to roll in (thanks to strong website SEO). I became more confident in myself as a practitioner, and my clients started experiencing deeper healing in the intensive format.
As my nervous system integrated these experiences, my comfort zone expanded, the impostor syndrome quieted down, and my business became more financially abundant… which opened up more time, space, and capacity for me to serve my clients (w/o burnout), take care of myself, & live my life w/ a focus on community (one of my core values).
This is one example of how venturing beyond the comfort zone can be so, so worth it.
To add nuance here: I’m not saying that we should do every single thing that makes us uncomfortable, all at once. In order for any change to be sustainable, we need to move at our own pace & discern when it’s time to rest and when it’s time to stretch. That’s where our own individual wisdom/intuition comes in.
But I do hope that this is a gentle nudge for you to peek around the corner, beyond the spaces that you’ve already traveled, and explore if there’s something more waiting for you… whenever you’re ready to take the next step.
Here’s to listening to our nervous systems, in business & in life,
Liz
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