What Growth Really Is

Change

First before we talk about growth, let's talk about change. Essentially, change as we all know going from one state to another; water to ice, riches to rags, etc. Another way to describe change is the change in size of your comfort zone. Take for example picture one. It is a basic summation of you, which happens to encompass three basic dimensions, body, mind and spirit. With that kept in mind, picture two shows your comfort zone. In this picture, it is represented as the black outline around all three dimensions. In essence, change is the difference in size of the black outline from one point in time to another. (For example, the comparison between picture two and picture three. One is smaller than the other.)

Growth:

Now where does growth come into play? Well growth is positive change. I don't necessarily mean ‘good' change when I say positive, but ‘staying in the positive' rather than the negative. So if we were to represent the black outline as a number, picture two is at a 25 and picture three experienced negative change going down ten points; it only has 15 points. (Don't get caught up in numbers, I just want to show the positive and negative relationship.) If you grow positively, your outline will get bigger and if you grow negatively, your outline will get smaller.

The Dimensions:

One thing to keep in mind is your overall outline is dictated by the size of your dimensions. On a micro level, your dimension comfort zones work the same way as your overall comfort zone. So positive growth in the body dimension means that circle got bigger etc. This tells us that each dimension has its own size and can be different. They are not necessarily equal as depicted in the pictures above. Here is an example:

The Goal:

So the whole point of growth is to expand that outline as far as it can go. Simple as that, so how do you achieve this goal? Stretching past your comfort zones. Let's say you are afraid to take this crazy hard upper division course because you don't want to put your GPA at risk, but it's apart of your core requirements so there's no other way to get out of this other than dropping out or changing majors. This is an issue of self-confidence. Do you feel confident enough in yourself to keep your GPA in good standing? Well in this example obviously not.

I would say that an issue like this would fall under the mental category. (This may not seem like it, but keep in mind each dimension has sub-dimensions.) If you decided, ‘you know what, I want to grow more spiritually,' then one thing you can do is take that class. You will feel scared and uncomfortable, but once you feel that you know that that in itself is growth and you are pushing past your limits.

Another example I can use is health. You want to raise your physical health so you decide to work out four days out of the week. Initially it was hard to do, but over a few weeks it became easier and you started enjoying working out. After three weeks you decide to step up your goal to five times a week. Again, in the beginning it's a little harder but nothing you can't handle. Soon after you find working out five times a week is easy as well. Each time you decided to up the anty you were enlarging your dimension(s). In this case, I would say that both the body and mental dimensions would apply here.

DON'T FORGET

Try and remember to always keep growth in mind because sometimes we don't grow and when we don't grow, we are either stagnant or falling behind. What I mean when I say ‘falling behind' is negative change. Remember, growth is positive and change is negative. You go up when you grow; you go down when you change. We have all experienced both growth and change. When you find yourself changing, don't get mad. Use it as an opportunity to realize, ‘hold up. I'm not going in the direction I want to go. I've got to change something.' Once you realize you have to make some tweaks, do them and they'll get you back on track.

Think about the mountain analogy. The goal is the peak. If you don't stop every now and then to pay attention to where you're going you are heading off course like this guy:

Continue to push yourself. Don't forget that you will never feel comfortable about something if you don't comfort it.

"Do your worst, for I shall do mine."

-YoYo