Imagine stepping out into an environment unlike anything you’ve ever seen, where danger is ever-present and even the weight of your own body is unfamiliar. Imagine being filled with such wide-eyed curiosity that it is worth risking everything simply to experience and learn about something utterly new.
What is the furthest you have ever been outside your comfort zone? Why did you choose to go there?
The first time I went skydiving is probably the furthest I’ve been outside my comfort zone. I wanted to know firsthand what it was like. I jumped static line, alone, from 3500 feet. I had to deliberately climb outside of the plane and hang from the strut before letting go. My free fall was limited to a few seconds before my chute opened but the ride seemed to last forever. It was an incredibly beautiful and exhilarating. I had a successful landing. I measure my life more by experiences more than by minutes or days. I believe in the end we more often regret the things we didn’t do more than the things that we do.
In 1974 I traveled in Iran for a week, the end of an 8 week ramble about Europe. I had joined up with a loose group of hippie travelers and had no idea what it meant to go to Iran. I became very aware of the stark oppression of women. There were women in modest Western dress, always accompanied by men. Most women, especially those who seemed poorer, wore chador, covered except for their eyes. Their eyes were downcast, unwilling to make eye contact.
On the street and public transportation, I was frequently felt up, squeezed, and verbally assaulted. I finally bought a chador and wrapped myself in it over my jeans and hiking boots. It stopped the touching, as the men seemed confused – but increased the name calling.
When I got home to my Kansas college town, I came to realize that the cultural oppression of women I had experienced in Iran was only different in how overt it seemed to me compared to the treatment of women in the US. My college had rules about what clothes women could wear on campus and off. My friend who was raped was told she asked for it because she was out by herself at night in an area where there were bars. I could not get a credit card. My husband signed all the documents to buy our car and his name was on the title – even though he was blind and could not read the documents or drive.
The experience in Iran – far outside my comfort zone – changed my life.
What is the furthest you have ever been outside your comfort zone? Why did you choose to go there? ….. I spent 7-years “trolling the waters” of internet porn, looking into the most taboo sexual paraphilias I could find. At first it was out of arrogance and thoughtlessness – a sort of “how dare “they” tell me what I can and cannot do?!?”. But as I saw the darkness, and the twisted cruelty, I got snared by flashbacks of what had happened to me, as a child (ie: yes, I remember that … oh, god; I know how that feels … and the like) … it dragged me down into a 7-year well of despair, depression, and more and more dramatic flash-backs (from my PTSD). It was the studpidest thing I’ve ever done. I hope I never get that “arrogant” again. That’s one trip down memory lane I never want to take again. And then, the end-result of it all was, of course, I got caught with all that obscenity on my computer. So Now I’m a registered sex offender; and I just recently finished probation (last summer) and so am allowed back on the Internet; but it put a permanent rift between me and any community I try to live in.