How to Develop Discipline

What is discipline?

Discipline starts every morning when that alarm goes off beside your bed. What do you do when that alarm goes off? Do you snooze it every five minutes? Or are you immediately jumping out and making your bed to start your day?

If you’re doing the latter, congratulations—you pass the test.

Discipline - verb is defined as, “ the ability to train oneself to do something in a controlled and habitual way”. In other words, to do something in a focused manner on a consistent basis.

When starting your fitness journey, you may suddenly get the motivation and urge to head to the gym after seeing a cool video on TikTok. However, it’s your discipline that brings you right back, day after day.

Discipline is doing the same thing, the correct way, whether someone else is watching or not. You’re completing these tasks, these habits, not for anyone else’s approval but your own. To build good habits that you will benefit from in the future.

Why is discipline important?

Without discipline, goals will never be achieved in a timely manner, if at all. Discipline provides people with the rules to live their lives by, efficiently and effectively. Building good habits, through self-discipline, will only create a system for yourself to have maximum output in everything you do.

In simple terms, think of a college student just starting out in school. Let’s say there’s Bob, who blocks out specific slots in his schedule throughout the week to complete assignments and studying. Then there’s Chad, who goes through each day, willy nilly, not knowing what to do with himself—”Should I study for my exam tomorrow, or go out with Brad and the boys for a drinky?” … Which one do you think is going to excel in the near future? Get it? Be more like Bob.

When you have discipline in your life, then you make small sacrifices in the present, for a better life in the future. Read that again.

Short term pleasures are just barriers for long term success. As cliché as it sounds, it’s completely true:

“What you do today can improve all your tomorrows.”

The insightful thought from Michael Beckwith covers discipline very well: “The gift of self-discipline is that it has the power to take you beyond the reasoning of temporary emotion to freedom. Think of how empowered you’ve felt on occasions when you haven’t given in to the ‘I don’t feel like it’ syndrome and honored your commitment to yourself. What does not feeling like it have to do with it? The combination of love for something with the willingness to do what it takes to practice it—discipline—results in freedom.”

How can YOU develop discipline?

Get enough sleep

Sleep plays a factor in MANY aspects of your life and could be covered in a completely different article, however by creating an effective sleep routine (i.e. going to bed and waking up at the same time everyday, laying out fits and necessities for the next day, BRUSHING YOUR TEETH, etc.), you’re taking the first step to habitually creating self-discipline for yourself!

Manage your tasks properly

Getting caught up in insignificant, mundane tasks constantly can be distracting to your overarching goal. Prioritize your important tasks everyday and look to achieve those consistently.

You don’t need to be perfect either. Just do the hardest things on your list first, and focus on one thing at a time. Before you know it, all your tasks are accomplished for the day and after a few days, weeks, or months, those tasks add up and you’re closer to your goal than you thought.

Learn how to say ‘NO’

Learning how to politely say “no” to people was one of the hardest things to get used to growing up. Mastering it, however, shortly becomes one of the most important tools to have in order to take control of your life.

Anytime someone asks you to do something, take a step back and ask yourself, “what value is this opportunity providing to me or my goals?”. If you feel that it’d be beneficial to stay at home on a weekend to focus on you, then so be it! You’re goal is to make YOU happy, not everyone else (just don’t be mean to everybody you meet, though. You get what I mean).

Just like we mentioned above, make the small sacrifices in the present, to benefit a better life in the future.

Learn to EMBRACE discomfort

If you ever want to get though life with any type of meaning, then the most important thing to have in your arsenal is the ability to embrace discomfort. When striving towards new goals, adversity is always going to be prevalent. In fact, if adversity and discomfort is NOT present, then you’re likely not going down the right path. Anything worth achieving in life requires some sort of adversity discomfort, otherwise it’s most likely not worth your time. Discomfort is an absolute necessity in order for GROWTH in life.

Stepping out of your comfort zone will help push you to do things you never thought you could. Plus, it will instill feelings of motivation, power, and self-discipline. Psychologist, Tasha Eurich, notes that, “When we experience new things, we create new neural pathways that kick start our creativity… In addition to making us creative geniuses, new experiences enhance out memory”.

Every wonder why the day seems to go by slower when doing new things throughout the day? That’s because you’re creating new neural pathways that are different from those of your normal day-to-day life. Once those new things become a part of your routine, then they will eventually become natural to you. Make a habit of those new things, which will benefit you in the long run!

In the end, your success starts with your ability to maintain self-discipline, in pretty much any aspect of your life. Whether the goal for you is to lose weight and become a shredded warrior, or to excel in school and graduate with great honor, having discipline in life will only benefit you in the long run. Your future self will thank you.

Until Next Time.

#KEEPPLUGGIN

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References:

Chapman, Jeremiah. “The Importance of Discipline.” Performance Course, https://www.performancecourse.com/blog/2017/06/the-importance-of-discipline#:~:text=Discipline provides people with rules,become who you are daily.

Leadem, Rose. “7 Ways to Gain Self Discipline and Strive towards Greatness.” Entrepreneur, Entrepreneur, 2 Dec. 2017, https://www.entrepreneur.com/slideshow/300212.

Ritter, Eric. “Fitness Is about Discipline.” Eric Ritter: Digital Marketing Consultant, 31 July 2015, https://helloericritter.com/fitness-is-about-discipline.

“+1: Blissipline (#392).” Optimize, https://www.heroic.us/optimize/plus-one/blissipline.