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Welcome to episode 382 of the Non-Anxious Leader podcast. I'm Jack Shitama. If you are new to this podcast, you can connect with me at jack@christian-leaders.com with your questions, comments, and suggestions for future episodes. And you can get more resources at thenonanxiousleader.com, where you can find out about my coaching practice, speaking engagements, books that I've written, and the courses that I offer. You can also subscribe to my Two for Tuesday email newsletter and get your free AI Family Systems Coach at the website or at the links in the show notes. Finally, if you would like to support my work for as little as $5 a month, you can get more information and sign up at the link in the show notes. Thanks in advance for your consideration. And now, without further ado, here is episode 382 3 Ways You Should Choose Challenge Over Comfort. The idea for this episode comes from a Wall Street Journal article, Don't Get Too Comfortable, Your Quality of Life Depends on It, by Moshe Barr. I'll put a link to a gift article in the show notes so you can read it, but you will have to set up a free account if you want access to it.

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I'm gonna quote from the beginning of Barr's article, and it's pretty long, but I think it's worth reading to you so you get the full gist of why this is important. He writes, "We've built a world that can numb discomfort instantly, and we're surprised we feel less alive. As artificial intelligence makes life frictionless, we risk removing the very frictions that keep human beings healthy: effort, challenge, learning, and forward motion. The next public health crisis may be stagnation, not stress. Progression is engaging in challenges that expand our future capacity—physically, behaviorally, and mentally. When we do this consistently, as research conducted in my own labs as well as many others shows, we improve mood, strengthen resilience, enhance health, and slow many processes associated with aging. Humans thrive when they grow. This matters biologically. The fix isn't another pleasure, it's progression. Sustained engagement with manageable challenge produces a condition scientists call vitality, a functional state in which the body and brain become more resilient and flexible, and stress regulation and brain plasticity systems operate efficiently and in coordination. People in this state show greater long-term health." As I've said many times before, Edwin Friedman emphasized that he had a bias for challenge over comfort.

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Challenge is one of the primary ways you grow your capacity. Comfort can keep life manageable, but it rarely expands you. Challenge does. It stretches your tolerance for discomfort, strengthens your courage, and reveals the parts of yourself that only show up when something is required of you. In Family Systems terms, challenge is often the moment when you choose self-differentiation instead of reactivity. You don't wait to feel strong before you act. Strength is formed in the act of showing up. Challenge also prevents fear from taking over. Comfort can convince you that safety is the highest good and that risk will lead to failure, but most meaningful callings, especially in ministry, require uncertainty, patience, and resilience. Choosing challenge means you're willing to have the hard conversation, make the clear decision, and stay present when others want you to retreat. Growth rarely comes from what is easy. It comes from situations that ask more of you than you would have chosen on your own. Most of all, challenge clarifies purpose. Comfort asks, how do I avoid discomfort? Challenged asks, "What am I here for?" One path offers temporary relief. The other leads to maturity, clarity, and impact. Scripture's call to be strong and courageous is not an invitation to feel heroic.

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It's a reminder that courage is often the doorway to becoming the person God is calling you to be. That is, to go be yourself. In Family Systems terms, it's a response that aligns your behavior with your values, even when anxiety is high and the outcome is uncertain. It's integrity in the moment of choice. It's self-differentiation. Challenge doesn't just grow you, it keeps you moving toward the life and leadership that reflects your goals and values. So if growing as a non-anxious leader means choosing challenge over comfort, how do you do that? We'll cover that next. Moshe Bar maintains that progression shows up in 3 everyday domains. That is, if you want to grow toward vitality, then you want to engage discomfort in each of these 3 areas. The first is physical. As Bar puts it, "Move your body forward, boost your life." He notes that aerobic exercise in particular improves mood, cognition, and cardiovascular health. I'm sure this is not a revelation to you, but he emphasizes that when you gradually increase effort over time, then endurance, strength, and/or skill increase. It's what he calls progressive overload. Your body adapts to challenge, which builds capacity over time.

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When I was a freshman in college, I almost failed out. Fortunately, I didn't. I asked someone who was 2 years ahead of me if it got any easier. He said, no and yes. No, you actually have more work to do as you go along. And yes, it gets easier because you just get used to it. That's progression. Barr's second domain is what he calls daily behavior. He writes, advance with small actions, gain big momentum. He notes that mood often improves after you take action. Not before, so if you're waiting around to feel motivated, you are more likely to avoid and procrastinate. The key here is the word small. My experience is that in virtually any behavior, the hardest part is starting. There is friction involved which makes it difficult to do. This is why a common hack to get you to exercise in the morning is to lay out your exercise clothes the night before. It reduces friction. Focusing on small acts also reduces friction, which makes it easier to start. More importantly, research has shown that the best way to develop motivation and purpose is to make consistent incremental progress. Or as Barr writes, "Forward movement itself is the ingredient that rekindles energy and a sense of agency."

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A major life moment for me was when I read Gary Keller and Jay Papasan's book, The ONE Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth, Behind Extraordinary Results. Their principle of think big, act small was life-changing for me. I realized that if I wanted to write a book, I needed to think in terms of small daily actions. In my case, working on it for 30 minutes a day, 5 times a week. I didn't always hit that goal and sometimes I exceeded it, but the main thing was I was making incremental progress and that increased momentum. Energy, and motivation. Barr's third domain is the mind. He writes,"Explore uncertainty, improve your mood. Thoughts can progress as well. The mind can become trapped in narrow loops of worry and rumination, or it can move outward, forming new associations and imagining multiple future possibilities. Our own research shows that when thinking is broad and exploratory, taking novel and uncertain mental paths, it can improve mood, cognitive flexibility, and creativity. Thinking that it is instead repetitive and narrow, like circling in our mind around that tactless comment from last night, or all the possible ways an upcoming trip could go wrong, is linked to depression, anxiety, and diminished vitality.

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When thought moves forward, it recruits the brain systems involved in learning, motivation, and future planning. And this forward engagement helps energize the very physiological systems that support resilience and well-being." Edwin Friedman wrote that leaders not only need to learn to embrace discomfort, they need to learn to love it. This is progression. It's thinking about an uncertain future with imagination instead of fear. Friedman also wrote in A Failure of Nerve that imagination is a key component of leaders who make a difference. This is one reason why Leadership Through Self-Differentiation focuses so much on clarifying your goals and values. If you do this, then when you're thinking about an uncertain future, it gets easier to get a sense for where God is calling you to lead. That's how you develop vision. And the most important thing about vision isn't that it's correct. It's that you, as a leader, are able to clearly communicate it to others as a non-anxious presence. People want to know what the leader thinks and believes. When you don't tell them, it increases anxiety in the relationship system. When you are clear on your goals and values, and when you are able to embrace the discomfort of an uncertain future, it makes imagination possible.

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I find Bars work helpful because it's a reminder that your body and mind are built to respond to forward movement. When you take steps that stretch your capacity, your mood often follows. But feeling good isn't the same as growing. Plenty of habits can lift your mood without strengthening anything in you. They soothe, but they don't build. Progression works differently. It usually asks for effort and a little discomfort, yet it leaves you more capable than you were before. That's why the satisfaction of hitting a goal fades quickly while steady engagement and meaningful challenge supports long-term well-being. The benefit isn't in the achievement; it's in the ongoing movement. In a culture shaped by burnout, avoidance, and mental fatigue, progression gives you a practical way forward. You don't need a dramatic reset; you need one manageable challenge at a time—walking a bit farther, returning to something you've been avoiding, or letting your thinking move beyond its usual patterns. The question shifts from, does this feel good, to does this move me forward? And when you move forward in body, behavior, and thought, vitality follows. And it's this vitality that protects what matters most: your ability to adapt, endure, and stay fully alive.

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This is how you learn to lead as a non-anxious presence. That's it for episode 382. Remember, you can connect with me at jack@christian-leaders.com and find more resources at thenonanxiousleader.com. Anxiousleader.com. And if you found this episode helpful, please share it with someone who would benefit and please leave a review on your podcast platform of choice. Thanks in advance for your help. Until next time, go be yourself.