Pain is good: why discomfort drives growth

"We are kept keen on the grindstone of pain and necessity." H.G. Wells, The Time Machine

We're conditioned to treat pain as the enemy. We screen our calls, dodge hard conversations, and quietly overrate our own work, all to avoid feeling uncomfortable.

I'd argue the opposite. Pain is good for you. Without it there would be little learning, little growth, and not much reason to do more than exist.

To be clear, I mean discomfort, the mental kind. Physical pain is another matter entirely and not something to go looking for.

Pain drives learning

One of my earliest memories is falling off a chair while hunting for cookies in the top kitchen cabinet. Not you? Well, it was me.

What did I learn? Find a sturdier way up, and open cabinet doors with more care. If it hadn't hurt, I'd have had no reason to improve my cookie retrieval methods.

The principle scales. Most of Maslow's hierarchy of needs is about reducing discomfort of one kind or another, from hunger to loneliness. And every gym has the same four words on the wall: no pain, no gain.

Go looking for it

Most people avoid discomfort out of habit, without ever noticing they're doing it. So start noticing.

For one week, write down every situation that gives you that anxious feeling: public speaking, being more assertive, talking to people you don't know. See how long the list gets.

Then rank it. I'm far more uncomfortable talking to strangers than standing in high places, so I know where my work is.

Take the top item and plan to put yourself in that situation on purpose. Think through the setting, the likely hurdles, and how you'll handle them. Rehearsing in advance means you walk in with a strategy instead of dread.

Will the anxiety vanish the first time? Of course not. It may take many rounds, but each one teaches you something and makes the next one easier. Psychologists call this systematic desensitization, and they use it to treat phobias like spiders and heights. There's no reason it can't work on presenting to the board.

Make each pain a goal

Treat each item on your list like a project. Define what success looks like and work backward from it, the way I described in Lead with the goal.

For your career, some places to start:

• Compare your resume with the role you want, then close the gap with a course, a certification, or experience.
• Find a mentor and talk honestly about your path.
• Join a professional association and actually attend.
• Ask to join a project in a supporting role.

And celebrate your progress. Change is hard. Introspection is hard. Any real step forward deserves recognition.

Pain leadership

Once you've done this for yourself, do it with your team.

In your one-on-ones, ask people what makes them uncomfortable, and work out together how to take it on. Challenge them to see the growth on the other side of it. Track progress however suits you: a notebook, sticky notes, the annual review. Meet regularly, and celebrate the effort as much as the result.

It won't happen overnight. With steady guidance and feedback, though, you'll have a team that walks toward discomfort instead of around it.

My first mentor told me that people rise to their level of need and sink to their lowest level of comfort. If nothing hurts, there's no incentive to grow.

So aim for a steady diet of discomfort, and think of it as accelerated training. The next time something makes you anxious, add it to the list. Raise your bar.

A longer version of this article first appeared on LinkedIn in 2016. Read the original there.