Many people experience anxiety when moving away from home. Especially teenagers when they are trying to live on their own for the first time. Many factors contribute to this stress, including leaving our loved ones, finding a new job, or general confusion about the future. It is tough to put ourselves into new challenges, knowing that we could have stayed where we were and enjoyed the old life. This is why many teenagers are forced into work by their parents, simply because they do not want to step into unknown territory. The anxiety becomes much stronger if we move to another city or country. Not only do we have to face all the problems mentioned above, but we also need to deal with cultural and perhaps language differences. This is probably one of the most challenging tasks to conquer. However, all these factors can be summed up into one core concept: leaving our comfort zone. 

Above is a picture showing four levels of the human mind. What we want to achieve in this learning resource is successfully moving from our comfort zone to our growth zone. The majority of our stress and anxiety come from the fear zone. For example, we want to find a new job in a new environment, but we are scared that our resume will get denied or our new co-workers will be hard to get along with. We cannot succeed at anything when we are too scared of failure. So as a teaser, the number one technique for easing our anxiety is not to have too much hope and give up control. Many famous people have mentioned this concept more than once: the higher the expectation, the greater the disappointment. So by keeping our hopes low, the disappointment we receive when we fail would hurt us much less. In addition, It is impossible to have everything under control in our life, so we have to learn to let it go sometimes. Make sure to get used to this mentality so that failure will not negatively impact your life.

Activity – Step Out of Your Comfort Zone

No amount of essay reading or lecture listening can help you conquer anxiety if you do not apply the techniques discussed above in real life. For this activity, you will attempt at least one thing that causes you anxiety, and to manage this anxiety, you will use a technique taught in this lesson to ease your negative feelings. You will record the difference in how you feel before and after trying out your coping strategy. Post your experience below in the comments.