Most of you know my story.

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Not only did I go to the University of Nebraska, but so many of the key moments that defined my career stemmed from that decision. A part of me wanted to continue to follow my sister, Kassy, and attend Wichita State University. The easy choice would certainly have been to follow my sister to college.

Getting out of your comfort zone and not getting too comfortable is important. If you stay in the bubble of what you know, you won’t give yourself the opportunity to learn what you need to know.

I needed my own name and my own game. But to do that, I also knew that I had a lot to learn. I felt something that I know to be a basic truth in life: sometimes the hard choice is the right choice.

Stepping out of my comfort zone made me feel empowered in ways I’d never felt before. It steered me forward to learn so much more than I could have ever known staying in the comfortable shadow of my sister. As tempting as I know it can be to follow the comfortable, well-lit path, taking chances is so dang rewarding. We grow and mature through experiences, in life, in our careers, and everywhere. One approach that eases stepping out of your comfort zone is asking questions. It’s about embracing a growth mindset. 

When I started out at Nebraska, I was so young but also so willing to learn what I needed to, in order to level up for collegiate bowling. I surrounded myself with those who could teach me what I needed to know. And when I didn’t know something, I embraced it by asking questions.

I say this about a lot of things, but…I’ll say it again. You get to choose your own adventure in life. That’s so empowering. As a part of that, you get to choose to seek answers and embrace what you don’t know in order to grow.

I always ask the question to understand why. And that is what enabled me to go on and win at a high level. I’m still learning every day, on and off the lanes.

Often, people get into the habit of just passively accepting that they simply don’t know something. Or, in the bowling world, I’ve seen people relying too much on their coach instead of asking questions to understand. Personally, I’ve always been one to ask my coach questions, not to challenge them but to seek to understand so that I could move towards teaching myself. The more we seek answers, the more we can grow. It keeps us learning. The end goal is not knowing everything. The aim is just to keep learning. You learn not only from the answer but from searching for it too.

But that takes effort. And frankly, most people are too lazy.

Asking so many questions prepared me for one of the most difficult jumps out of my comfort zone in my life, transitioning from collegiate bowling to professional bowling. When I was still in school, there was always someone behind me and someone to talk to and bounce ideas off of.  I had a coach every collegiate tournament, every single frame for years. You lean on your coaches, because that’s why they’re there. 

And then something happened that felt so weird. One day, I turned around from the approach and no one. was. there. 

I had to think through my entire game myself, 100% of the time, without someone behind me with whom to talk through each frame. Luckily, I was always someone to ask my coach questions. So, all along, as much as I was learning the answers to the questions, I was also learning how to be a coach to myself. Stepping out on my own didn’t require as much of a mindset shift as it would have been if I hadn’t already had a growth mindset all along. Those learning moments themselves are teaching you something. All of those days, asking your coach questions can be considered preparation for the moment when they aren’t there anymore. 

If you aren’t always in the mindset of asking questions and you’re relying solely on your coach to guide you, it can become a problem when that phase of your life is over. If you’re not asking those questions, and you’re just blindly following your coach, then suddenly, when you’re out on your own, you will flounder. No one’s there to support your game and you haven’t learned how to support it yourself.

In so many areas of life, you need to learn to be dependent on yourself. With a growth mindset, you can become your own best coach. 

There’s a difference between not knowing the answer and not seeking it out. For everything that you could ever want to know, there’s a way to seek it out and learn it.

For the longest time, I didn’t know how to drive a stick shift. I’ve always had automatic vehicles, and I don’t know when and if I’ll ever need to know how to drive a stick shift. But I’ve always been curious about things I don’t know. So I remembered that a friend drives a stick shift car. So I asked him to teach me. It was hard at first, but I now at least have some knowledge. (key word is “some” …I am pretty sure I couldn’t drive stick shift right now but it was fun to do the research on how to!) Same with changing a tire. I’ve never had to do it myself, and I don’t know when and if I’ll have to, but I wanted to learn. So I asked someone to teach me.

If having a growth mindset and asking questions isn’t already the way you think, reframing your thinking just takes practice. It’s part of the mental game. Asking questions sets you up for your future in more ways than you’ll ever know in the current moment.