“Adventure is a place where we can learn how to be in control. Choosing when and where to stop is an important form of control in life.”
control, and that might be described as the ‘comfort zone,’ or ‘zone of achieved development (ZAD),’” as Vygotsky termed it. Into the unknown. But growth does not lie in this zone. “Growth lies in what’s beyond, in what we’ve called the challenge zone, the stretch zone, the risk zone,” says Leahy. “We have lots of names for it. Vygotsky called it the ‘zone of proximal development,’ or the ZPD, that next area that encompasses the things that we want or need to learn and to expand into. We need to go there if we want to grow.” This is where adventure gets tricky, though. Get too far from the ZAD and people enter what they perceive as the danger zone. Each individual’s comfort zone and ZPD is unique, so it’s not easy to know or predict when they will enter or exit them, or when they will feel stretched too far or stuck and unable to
continue. Facilitators and guides need to be ready to assist at any moment.
“When people leave their comfort zone and move into the risk zone, they need more sensitive instruction, they need more support. They need to be helped with the choices and helped with the options. They also need to be protected from danger,” says Leahy.
THE COMFORT ZONE—AND BEYOND
Another key concept to understand is the “comfort zone,” the area of the ordinary, familiar, and ease. To learn and grow, or to experience an adven - ture, people must leave their comfort zone. But if you stray too far from your comfort zone, you may experience panic and terror. How can a guide or facilitator find that place where people are in a position where they can best learn or have fun? “Lev Vygotsky, a Russian psychologist,” says Leahy, “was one of the first to rec - ognize that for all of us, there’s things that we are comfortable with, things that we’re good at, things that we’ve learned to do, things where we feel in
CASCADING INTO FEAR
Once people leave their “comfort zone” and explore new terrain (figuratively as well as literally), some quickly get so far outside their comfort zone they become paralyzed and incapable of motion, let alone learning. Often, facilitators, guides, and other participants offer encouragement, which only makes matters worse. “They hear your encouraging words,” says Leahy, “but it shows up as pressure and expectation.” The cognitive dissonance between fear and expectation can over - whelm participants, leaving them stuck. “What’s really at the core here is that in any other place in life, these people would have some level of control, they would simply stop,” he says. “But now they are caught in a social structure and on a course where the design leaves them feeling like they cannot turn back. They lose control, first over the sensations in their bodies, then over their emotions, and then over their own responses and what they’re going to do. And when we lose control, we get emo - tional. And that can be terrifying.” Our brains at work. It’s important to recognize how the brain functions, he says. Our “strategic brain” allows us to think and make conscious decisions. Our “sensory brain” provides other information from our bodies—we feel tired, strong, shaky or stressed, for ex - ample. Our “affective brain” is the seat of our emotions. When we are under stress, the emotional part of our brains holds primacy and suppresses the strategic / cognitive functions. This can jolt us into a “fight or flight” response. In that state, we become incapable of strategic thinking, the use of our voice, the control of our body, or any sort of action. >> continued
Tom Leahy took what he learned from more than 47 years in experiential education and earning his master’s degree to publish his first book.
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