Keeping In Touch With Your Intuition: Ashley Easter Of Courage 365 On How To Get In Touch With Your Intuition And When To Trust Your Intuition When Making Decisions
I allowed myself not to be perfect. We live in a culture that values perfection. The thing is, humans are not perfect. As much as we may try, there will always be things we could look back at and want to do a little bit differently. Perfection will hold you back if you let it. Instead, I had to allow myself to move forward and do it messy. It’s better to make progress than to make perfect.
It feels most comfortable to stick with what we are familiar with. But anyone who has achieved great success will tell you that true growth comes from pushing yourself out of your comfort zone. What are some ways that influential people have pushed themselves out of their comfort zone to grow both personally and professionally? As a part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Ashley Easter.
Ashley Easter is a cult survivor turned abuse survivor advocate. She is also the founder of Courage 365, a non-profit for abuse survivors. She is passionate about creating a safer world by uplifting survivor voices.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we start, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your childhood backstory?
I grew up in an Independent Fundamentalist Baptist Church and in the Quiverfull Movement. It was a very patriarchal religious environment that systemically devalued women and focused on dominating the culture with our version of religion. There was a lot of isolation due to being homeschooled, and mostly connecting with folks in the church and not many outside of this community.
I experienced a variety of different types of abuses within this cult. And it wasn’t until I turned 21 that I started breaking free ideologically.
I was introduced to the concept of equality for women by a man I met at a coffee shop and in this completely changed my life.
I didn’t actually leave the group until I got married at 22 to my amazing husband, Will Easter. I’m very much a feminist, but I am not ashamed to say he rescued me.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
“Feminism is the radical notion that women are people too.” -Sarah Bessey
Learning about equality for women was a huge life lesson for me. Growing up in a very male dominated world, caused me to devalue myself, and doubt my ability to make good decisions.
When I realized my full humanity as a woman was able to take charge of my life and start making decisions that were actually good for me.
Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?
I read a book, called “Quivering Daughters”, which described what it was like inside the quiverfull movement, which I had been a part of.
I read this book while still inside of the cult but beginning to question all the things I had been taught.
I remember locking myself in my bedroom, so I could be alone and secretly purchasing this e-book online.
Tears streamed on my face as I read descriptions of my life, through the eyes of someone else. It also, very clearly laid out how the community would react if I decided to stand up for myself. I think the knowledge I gained in that book gave me the confidence to continue following my own
path, because in some sense I knew what to expect from people pushing back at me when I broke free.
Let’s now shift to the main part of our discussion. Let’s start with a basic definition so that all of us are on the same page. What does “getting outside of your comfort zone” mean?
For me, getting outside of the comfort zone is all about trusting your intuition. I believe the small, wise voice inside of us dreams bigger than our fear does.
It was my intuition that caused me to question my old beliefs. It was my intuition that guided me to leave the only community I had ever known. It was my intuition that gave me the vision for how I could then reach out and help other people.
All of this was outside of my comfort zone. Fear wanted to keep me inside the comfort zone, but I began to learn that there was such a greater reward outside of that small box.
Can you help articulate a few reasons why it is important to get out of your comfort zone?
Fear is the main thing that keeps us inside of our comfort zones. Our fear brain is wired to look at everything as a life or death decision even when it’s not. While this may be useful if a bear is running at you in the woods it’s really not useful when you’re trying to decide who you should get into a relationship with, if you should take that job, or if you should go against what your community expects of you.
Fear leads you down a path where you are living your life for other people. Getting outside of your comfort zone is when you start to live for yourself.
I don’t know about you, but when I get to the end of my life, I wanna look back and know that I did all of the things that I came here to do. I don’t want to look back and regret staying small because of what other people expected of me.
Is it possible to grow without leaving your comfort zone? Can you explain what you mean?
Think of a potted plant. It can only grow as large as the vessel holding it. At some point it has to stop growing because there’s no place for it to go.
It’s the same way with humans. There’s a saying that goes, “if you’re not growing, you’re dying”. I would add a caveat to that, you’re either dying or you’re stagnant. Neither of those states of being help us progress in our life.
When we allow ourselves to break out of the box, there is infinite possibility. We can grow, evolve, and become the best versions of ourselves.
Can you share some anecdotes from your personal experience? Can you share a story about a time when you stepped out of your comfort zone and how it helped you grow? How does it feel to take those first difficult steps?
In the community I grew up in women were not allowed to be in meaningful areas of leadership. Since I was a child, I was drawn to leadership positions, but I had to squelch those desires because I was in a small confined community.
When I left the cult, I felt a burning in my soul to step up and become a leader within the survivor movement. My intuition told me to start a conference to help elevate the voices of other survivors, and to build a community where survivors knew they were not alone.
Honestly, this was terrifying. I had so much imposter syndrome, and so much baggage from my past. My mind was constantly telling me that I couldn’t do it, and that if I did, it was somehow wrong because I was a woman.
I chose to trust my intuition, and started a conference for survivors, and eventually a non-profit, Courage 365, where we could all come together and heal.
The rewards of getting outside of my comfort zone have been amazing. I cannot tell you how much I have healed personally as I’ve taken these steps. And thankfully, I’ve been able to see so many other survivors empowered, as I’ve taken these steps forward.
What are your “five ways to push past your comfort zone, to grow both personally and professionally”?
#1 Allow yourself to dream
For long time, my vision for my life was the vision others had given to me. The first step to leaving my comfort zone, was allowing myself to dream about what could be possible if I stopped, letting their opinions rule my life.
#2 Ask For Support
It’s easy to get discouraged when you’re leaving the comfort zone because everything in you is telling you to go back to the familiar. I found other people who had been in the same place I had been. I allowed their stories and their courage to support me as I moved forward on my own journey. I’ve learned that asking for help is not weakness and asking for support is a sign of strength.
#3 make a plan
The quickest way to fail when you step outside your comfort zone is to do it without a plan. Every time I’ve left my comfort zone it was based on planning and calculation. I made sure that I had my support systems in place and I made sure that I had educated myself as much as possible to make that step.
#4 I allowed myself not to be perfect
We live in a culture that values perfection. The thing is, humans are not perfect. As much as we may try, there will always be things we could look back at and want to do a little bit differently. Perfection will hold you back if you let it. Instead, I had to allow myself to move forward and do it messy. It’s better to make progress than to make perfect.
#5 Being pure of heart
Ultimately, I trusted that as long as I had good intentions, and that I kept taking steps as my intuition lead that things would work out one way or another. Even if things didn’t go as planned as long as my heart was in the right place, I was able to create good for myself and others.
From your experience or perspective, what are some of the common barriers that keep someone from pushing out of their comfort zone?
I’ve watched people who came right up to the line, but then fell back. I’ve seen people who wanted to take that leap of fate, and to get outside their comfort zone but at the last minute they stopped themselves. Usually this comes down to fear. What you have to remember is that fear is simply a feeling in your body. Fear has a very narrow perspective. If you can recognize that your fear is not who you are but simply something you are experiencing in the moment it’s much easier to move through it.
I’ve also seen people stay in their comfort zone because they cared so much about what other people think. I’ve had to come to a place in my life where, as long as I can, lay my head down at night, knowing that I followed my intuition, it really doesn’t matter what other people think. You can’t let small minded people keep you from being great.
There is a well-known quote attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt that says, “Do something that scares you every day”. What exactly does this mean to you?
Is there inherent value in doing something that pushes you out of your comfort zone, even if it does not relate to personal or professional growth? For example, if one is uncomfortable about walking alone at night should they purposely push themselves to do it often for the sake of going beyond their comfort zone? Can you please explain what you mean?
Fear can be very useful in a handful of situations. You should listen to your fear if it is telling you how to respond to a legitimately dangerous situation. When we experience fear, our legs have the capacity for running faster, and our jaws strengthen for biting harder. These are evolutionary traits that helped us thousands of years ago and can help us in some physically dangerous situations today.
However, having fast legs and strong jaws is not helpful when you’re in a situation where you’re trying to decide between buying this house or that house. Fear is not useful when you’re in a situation where you are deciding whether you should marry this person or not.
In those cases fear needs to take the backseat.
Intuition should be in the driver seat. Intuition feels calm, cool, clear, concise and emotionless. It doesn’t waiver back-and-forth like fear does and it doesn’t come with hyper energy.
Most of the time fear is simply holding you back from experiencing new things.
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?
I am a proud member of the abuse survivor movement. I believe that ending abuse would not only create a safer world for vulnerable people, but it would help us end war, famine, and then the mental health crisis. If people would learn to be kind and compassionate to each other, everything would be different. That’s a movement I want to be a part of, bringing Justice to victims and empowering survivors.
Is there a person in the world whom you would love to have lunch with, and why? Maybe we can tag them and see what happens!
I love Taylor Swift. Her music was a huge part of my healing journey. When she went to court and sued, the man who sexually harassed her that bumped her up to the top on my list. I so appreciate a woman using her power to advance the Survivor movement.
How can our readers follow you online?
Facebook: Ashley Easter
Twitter: @ashleymeaster
Thank you so much for sharing these important insights. We wish you continued success and good health!
Keeping In Touch With Your Intuition: Ashley Easter Of Courage 365 On How To Get In Touch With Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.