Most leaders strive to build environments that feel safe and predictable. We carry responsibility for people, for teams, for families. Predictability makes that easier. But the same predictability that builds trust can also dull movement. What feels like steadiness can gradually turn into resistance.
An IT organization running like clockwork may look successful, yet that same perfection can start blocking growth. In chaotic companies, stability creates relief. In stable ones, too much of it becomes a quiet obstacle.
There is a word from my studies that describes what happens next: Reflektionsentlastet, which means “relieved of reflection.” It’s the state in which tasks have been repeated so many times that the brain stops paying attention. Typing without thinking where the letters are. Executing processes without noticing their purpose. For me, typing is comfort zone; for someone in a manufacturing plant, it may be a complex skill that requires full focus. Everything depends on what has been practiced long enough to feel automatic.
This is how comfort zones form; not from laziness, but from repetition. To leave that state often requires an external push: a deadline, an unexpected pressure, a changing market, or, quite often, a shrinking budget. Such pressures bring awareness back. They interrupt routine and make room for new thinking.
