About stepping out of your comfort zone

A wise man once said “the further you get away from yourself, the more challenging it is. Not to be in your comfort zone is great fun.” I don't know how wise the man, Benedict Cumberbatch is, but he his right. How does comfort zone apply to photography, because this post is about photography?
Let's say you take good photos. No, you take really good photos and you're happy with that. Could you do that for the rest of your life? Would you be happy creating the same good photos day in, day out? I wouldn't.
The moment when you stop growing is the moment when you start dyeing. If you're not prepared to stop, get ready to be uncomfortable.

I'll explain in a minute the connection between the photo above and the comfort zone.

The comfort zone has lots of great qualities. It's cozy, safe, makes you fell warm on the inside. But comfort zone can't provide one thing: growth. This zone's sole purpose is to make you feel safe, that's it.
Growth is triggered by diversity, by challenging yourself and by adversity. Adversity is the number one enemy of comfort zones.
Ok, back to the image above. I said in some earlier posts that I photograph a lot of reenactment events. I love them. Doing that,I also met a lot of reenactors, some really great people. Most of the portrait work I do is either there on the spot or with people I know and I feel comfortable.
The mother daughter above were some total strangers I met once at a festival. They've asked for my phone number so we can communicate after the festival to see how can I send them their photos.
One day I got a call from them telling me that they were in my area and would love to have their pictures taken by me.
This was with just 2 hours before sunset, with no location in mind and without knowing them very well.
I'm a bit uncomfortable around people I don't know.

My first thought was to say that I can't, that I'm busy just so I would'n have to deal with leaving my comfort zone and maybe failing at that particular photo session. I fought my inner self and accepted, though I was not feeling very comfortable.
The thing I was most afraid it was that I wouldn't be able to produce the images that I would have liked, that impromptu sessions are not my thing and that I would lose my visual signature.
As I would find out later, if done right, growth doesn't remove your trademark, your signature, it only refines it, takes it to the next level.

Stepping outside your comfort zone could mean as little as shooting with just one lens for a period of time, or learning a new lighting technique, or shooting impromptu portraits.
No one wants to endure failure, in fact our brain works non stop in preventing us to do things that could potentially fail, thus giving us emotional pain. But if you want to grow, you need to step outside the zone, face your fears and accept that failure is part of the process.
All great accomplishments are built on trial and error and a very big chance of failing.
Yes, it’s scary it’s uncomfortable to be vulnerable, specially when you’re taking risks in front of other people. But it’s worth it.