Your Success Might Be a Growth Trap
I was at brunch with friends recently when the topic of living comfortably came up. We were talking about that specific groove you get into when things are running smoothly. You know the feeling: the calendar is managed, the meetings are predictable, and you feel successful because you aren't facing any major fires.
But as we talked, I realized that living comfortably is often a mask for stagnation. When we are in that groove, we aren't being challenged. We feel successful only because we’ve stopped trying anything new. We have traded the messy middle for a polished plateau.
The Toddler Lesson
Think back to when you were a child learning to walk. If you took two steps and fell on your face, the adults in the room didn't groan in disappointment. They cheered. They celebrated the fall because it was undeniable evidence that you were pushing your limits.
As adults and leaders, we lose that. We begin to view failure as a personal defect rather than an operational necessity. We start to value the absence of mistakes over the presence of progress. In the world of growth operations, I see this all the time: founders who are so afraid of a messy process that they never build the mechanism required for true scale. This happens in life as well, we stay in the relationship or living at home because it is just easier than making a decision or moving out. We like to the feeling of comfort rather than striking out on our own into the unknown where we may fail.
Embracing the Relationship with Failure
We need to stop fearing the stumble and start embracing our relationship with failure. If you are a founder or a leader and you haven't been rejected or hit a wall lately, you need to ask yourself if you are actually growing or if you are just managing a comfortable status quo. If you haven’t failed in the last three months then you must not be challenging yourself to try something new or pushing past your comfort zone.
In my work as a CEO shield, I help leaders build an anti-burnout firewall so they have the safety net required to take those big swings again. The goal of managed chaos isn't to have a perfect, mistake-free business. It’s to have a system that is resilient enough to handle the falls while you learn to run. The foundation to set big goals and understand that even if not achieved you learned along the way.
The Challenge
This week, I want you to look at your wins. Are they easy wins because you’re staying in your lane, or are they hard-fought victories on the edge of your comfort zone?
Don't be afraid to fall. If you aren't failing occasionally, you aren't trying anything new enough to actually move the needle. Set a new goal, fail 10 times this week. With that as the goal what things would you try? Let's get back to the toddler mindset: find a way to fall, and then find a way to celebrate it.
