Now that we've all run out of compliments for the new season allow me to say...

Happy 2024!! I wanted to go with the classic "Happy New Year!" but it is the 19th of January and I do not think we can still go around and call this year 'new' as if we haven't already lived a lifetime and a half between the first and today (forgive my image that's implying its still a new year). Don't get me wrong, I am having a blast! I am not sad at all or musing about how it is going to be another long year of me just aimlessly surviving. No no! I am happy, excited, expectant, geared up, hopeful, and and and (add adjectives that express joy). See I got a marvelous opportunity to move from my comfort zone and the thing about comfort zones is that they are, wait for it, comfortable. 

I got a job as a receptionist in 2018 when I started uni and up until the time I graduated, the job was perfect. I had the most amazing coworkers (shout out to Munya and Mr T) and I was making just enough to cover my basics and one or two luxuries as well. However, after graduation, I began to feel stuck. I am generally a person who loves being challenged. I thrive in environments where I am constantly challenged and the work I was doing as a receptionist was becoming redundant. I think I especially felt this after graduation because school had been filling that void by bringing the challenge(s) in the form of assignments and exams. The schoolwork kept me distracted for four years and when it was snatched away from me by graduation? I felt lost and stuck. I was living the same day over and over and over again and it did not look like it was going to change anytime soon because living in Zimbabwe did not afford me such a luxury.

Everyone close to me knew that I hated my job and I was desperate for a change but the funny not so funny thing is that I had gotten comfortable. I was so comfortable in my misery that I barely had time to try and claw my way out of it. I just accepted it as it was for a long long time so much such that when I got an opportunity to leave the place I was terrified. I wanted to leave and I knew this but I was so afraid of the unknown. I was so afraid of not fitting in at the new place and not making friends and a whole lot of things. I even began to have nightmares about the move and my appetite was non-existent because my stomach was constantly upset. All this because I was afraid. I went to the word of God which reminds me in 2 Timothy 1:7 that God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. The fear did not go just like that. I just talked myself into acting brave and acting like I was not afraid.

The good thing is that I acted brave until I somehow actually became brave. I saw the opportunity for what it was and I decided not to dwell on what could go wrong because hello?? God is in my corner! All things actually do work together for good for me because I love him and I am called according to his purpose. You may be wondering why I just gave you a vague snippet of my life dear reader I know I would be wondering the same if I were reading this. Dear reader the moral of my story is please take that chance. Grab that opportunity with both hands and run with it. Fear? It's human to be afraid but in the words of someone famous who I don't know "Feel the fear and do it anyway!" If you feel the fear and choose to stay in your comfort zone you will definitely be comfortable because that's what you're used and who doesn't like a little comfort but are you growing? Is there growth in your comfort zone? Take that chance because the funny thing is that chance you're so afraid of leaving your comfort zone for is another comfort zone that you have yet to explore. Take a chance and see where it takes you. You might like it there.