By Carrie Garcia — Last Updated: June 11, 2025

Taking risks can be intimidating; if it weren't, it wouldn't be a risk. However, staying stagnant and not challenging ourselves prevents growth. As human beings, growth is essential. We learn, adapt, make changes, and evolve. By taking risks, we can achieve small successes, feel empowered, and experience the positive effects of moving in a direction we desire in our lives.

When I mention “risks,” I’m not referring to risky behaviors or actions that could lead to negative consequences or harm to yourself or others. Instead, I’m talking about actions that may feel uncomfortable or unfamiliar. These are the feelings of risk that come from stepping outside our comfort zone. It feels scary, but taking these risks can support growth and lead to positive outcomes. This type of risk-taking is expansive and helps plant the seeds for new opportunities to flourish.

Risks don’t always have to be significant. They can include simple tasks, such as asking a friend, partner, or co-worker for help when you usually wouldn’t. Often, we tend to handle things ourselves or suppress our needs. A risk can also mean stepping outside your comfort zone and trying a different approach instead of sticking to your usual methods. These kinds of risks can initially feel uncomfortable, and your mind may try to talk you out of them by presenting various reasons to avoid taking that step. However, taking these risks can help you build confidence, trust, and new skills, even if the outcome isn’t what you expected.

Do you remember the first time you stepped onto your yoga mat?  That was a risk. You didn’t know if you would like it, it may have felt weird, and you may have felt nervous.  Yet, the science behind risk-taking is well-documented. The Cleveland Clinic, in its health article library, wrote that dopamine is a monoamine neurotransmitter that “plays a role in our body’s reward system, which includes feeling pleasure, achieving heightened arousal, and learning.” Even if you had other feelings before taking the risk, as you moved into the action of that specific risk, especially if you felt you were successful, that you accomplished what you wanted, then that increases the feeling of pleasure, and more dopamine is released.

Our yoga mat is a great place for positive risk-taking.  You can safely move out of your comfort zone on your mat and try a new posture or do a pose in a different way than you are used to.  A teacher may instruct you to breathe differently or to vocalize in ways you’re unfamiliar with. They may introduce a new yoga philosophy that you might decide to try for a day or a week. All these seemingly little risks add up to help build confidence, to use what you’ve learned, to try again if the risk fails, and to cultivate resilience. 

When I first became a yoga teacher in 2012, I taught wherever and whenever I could. I held classes at a dance studio, a Taekwondo studio, and even in a gym that moonlighted as a hair salon. In those early years, I drove all over the Twin Cities in a single day to share my passion for yoga. Each time I arrived at a new location, I felt nervous. I didn’t know what to expect, who would show up, or how the students would receive me. I wasn’t in my twenties, when people are more inclined to take risks; instead, I was in my forties, had a career as a special education teacher, and was raising two teenagers.

Taking the risk to explore something new and expand my career turned out to be a positive decision. I continued to teach yoga, began offering meditation classes, became a Zen priest, and then certified as a life coach. Although I encountered some setbacks along the way, these challenges taught me resilience and the ability to cope with difficult moments or situations that didn’t unfold as I had hoped. By embracing positive risk-taking, I have developed a reservoir of optimism in my mind. I believe that, nine times out of ten, things will turn out well.

I encourage each of you to consider positive risk-taking: what area of your life would you like to change for the better? Are there new activities you’d like to try or skills you’d like to learn? What new approaches to problem-solving could you try? Taking positive risks can lead you to learn something valuable, gain confidence, and experience personal growth. Yes, risk-taking is uncomfortable. Change is uncomfortable. But the rewards are overwhelmingly great.

Take classes with Carrie

Carrie Garcia is an RYT 500 yoga and meditation teacher and Success Coach. She is certified in yoga through Lifespan Yoga with specialized training in vinyasa, yin, and Rainbow Yoga. Carrie creates spaces for people to share movement, mindfulness, and laughter. She grew up in Minnesota, immersed in music and watching her mother practice yoga from a library book. She has been practicing meditation since 1992 and was ordained as a Soto Zen Buddhist priest in 2022. Carrie brings her passion for yoga and mindfulness to adults and youth with an intention to decrease racism, bullying, isolation, and anxiety and to increase compassion, connection, and well-being.

Carrie is deeply grateful to her amazing teachers including Gopala Yaffa (Rainbow Yoga); Francoise Freedman (Birthlight - fertility to school-age yoga, and Street Yoga trauma-sensitive yoga); Michelle Pietrzak-Wegner (yin yoga); Amelia Ruth (vinyasa/power yoga); Michael Moore (Iyengar yoga), and Ben Connelly (Soto Zen Buddhist Priest at Minnesota Zen Meditation Center). And she is grateful to the many wonderful human beings who she has met in elevators, on the streets, and on mountaintops – all her teachers.

Emotional Well-Being