Dare to Grow: How Positive Risks Shape Our Lives
Taking risks can be intimidating; if it weren't, it wouldn't be a risk. However, staying stagnant and not challenging ourselves prevents growth. As human beings, growth is essential. We learn, adapt, make changes, and evolve. By taking risks, we can achieve small successes, feel empowered, and experience the positive effects of moving in a direction we desire in our lives.
When I mention “risks,” I’m not referring to risky behaviors or actions that could lead to negative consequences or harm to yourself or others. Instead, I’m encouraging you to consider taking actions that may feel uncomfortable or unfamiliar. By doing so, these actions can lead to positive outcomes and support your growth. This type of risk-taking is expansive and helps plant the seeds for new opportunities to flourish.
Risks don’t always have to be significant. They can include simple tasks, such as asking a friend, partner, or co-worker for help when you usually wouldn’t. Often, we tend to handle things ourselves or suppress our needs. A risk can also mean stepping outside your comfort zone and trying a different approach instead of sticking to your usual methods. These kinds of risks can initially feel uncomfortable, and your mind may try to talk you out of them by presenting various reasons to avoid taking that step. However, taking these risks can help you build confidence, trust, and new skills, even if the outcome isn’t what you expected.
Do you remember the first time you stepped onto your yoga mat? That was a risk. You didn’t know if you would like it, it may have felt weird, and you may have felt nervous. Yet, the science behind risk-taking is well-documented. The Cleveland Clinic, in its health article library, wrote that dopamine is a monoamine neurotransmitter and “plays a role in our body’s reward system, which includes feeling pleasure, achieving heightened arousal, and learning.” Even if you had other feelings before taking the risk, as you moved into the action of that specific risk, especially if you felt you were successful, that you accomplished what you wanted, then that increases the feeling of pleasure, and more dopamine is released.
Our yoga mat is a great place for positive risk-taking. You can safely move out of your comfort zone on your mat and try a new posture or do a pose in a different way than you are used to. A teacher may instruct you to breathe differently, to vocalize, or teach a new yoga philosophy that you decide to try for a day or a week. All these seemingly little risks add up to help build confidence, to use what you learned, to try again if the risk fails, and to cultivate resilience.
When I first became a yoga teacher in 2012, I taught wherever and whenever I could. I held classes at a dance studio, a Taekwondo studio, and even in a gym that also functioned as a hair salon. In those early years, I drove all over the Twin Cities in a single day to share my passion for yoga. Each time I arrived at a new location, I felt nervous; I didn’t know what to expect, who would show up, or how the students would receive me. I wasn’t in my twenties, when people are more inclined to take risks; instead, I was in my forties, had a career as a special education teacher, and was raising two teenagers.
Taking the risk to explore something new and expand my career turned out to be a positive decision. I continued to teach yoga, began offering meditation classes, became a Zen priest, and a life coach. Although I encountered some setbacks along the way, these challenges taught me resilience and the ability to cope with difficult moments or situations that didn’t unfold as I had hoped. By embracing positive risk-taking, I have developed a reservoir of optimism in my mind. I believe that, nine times out of ten, things will turn out well.
When considering positive risk-taking, what area of your life are you looking to create positive change? This could involve trying new methods or approaches. It might be a situation where you take a risk and see what the outcome is. Through this process, you may learn something valuable, gain confidence, and experience personal growth.