First draft of my thoughts about discipline Jan-Feb 2024.
We all know that discipline is a superpower.
Having abundant internal motivation to get stuff done or achieve challenging goals is like living in God mode.
So what would happen if we could make it easy and natural.
Before we do that let’s first get some clarity on what it is.
As a term, or an idea, discipline is a bit of a loaded and vague concept with all sorts of connotations that depend on our individual experiences or relationship with with it. As you are reading this then I am going to assume that you see the value of discipline in your life but you probably have some negative views on the subject. Or perhaps you lack clarity on what discipline is or how it really works as a function of progress.
This is true for many people because we often see discipline as a way to force ourselves to do something that we don’t want to do. The dreaded obstacle to the thing that we want. The equivalent of drinking those awful Kale smoothies to have better health. A bitter pill, so to speak.
The word conjures up images of military men taking orders, athletes in training that work out with unrelenting intensity or getting up at 5am to go running in the rain, or eating Kale. (yuck) Discipline doesn’t have to be about bitter pills or extreme workouts. These are just ideas that you have put in your own head about discipline.
Our problem is that we don’t have good examples of how discipline really works and we end up conflating it with doing stuff we don’t like and attach that negative feeling with the idea and practice of discipline.
Most of the time people will only think about discipline when there is something in their life that they want to change or fix. They will then reach for discipline as a trick, tip or a hack to provide a short term solution. Like a hammer that you pull from a toolbox to hang a picture then shove back into the toolbox when you are done with it.
In other cases we see our lack of discipline as a personal shortcoming that prevents us from finding success in life. We tell ourselves that we don’t have the discipline to stick it out.
Only seeing discipline as a temporary tool is probably the first mistake. Seeing it as an intractable character flaw, that can’t be fixed, is the second.
Discipline is a mindset, or an intentional culture of good choices over bad. It is a base level practice that you can easily build into your everyday life. To leverage discipline for better outcomes you must first have discipline. It is not a tip, trick or hack that magically changes your life after reading some bullet list post on twitter. It is a practice that you cultivate over time and it’s easy to put into practice.
Everyday survival Discipline.
We all have discipline to some degree. But to what degree depends on what level of chaos you want to live with in your life. Many will only have enough discipline to get by. To be just function enough to be considered functional. Basic maintenance mode. You have enough discipline to wipe your arse, brush your teeth and go to work to pay your bills. That sort of thing.
In your free time you will go with the flow of where your emotions take you in the moment. Come home, watch TV, scroll socials and jerk off to porn. This sort of thing has become the default mode for far too many.
I’m not trying to make a moral judgment about you here. I’m not saying you are a good or bad person either. I just want you to examine the role that discipline plays in your life at this moment. Or, let’s be honest, the lack of it.
We have become complacent with our very convenient first world lives and I would suggest that has cost us our connection with a deeper purpose and has compromised our personal values and standards.
Many people are not fully intentional in their lives and they will only do what they have to do to get by. Or they are reactively disciplined. They wait for life to come at them before they do what needs to be done. Dishes piled high on the sink before they will wash them or get fired from their job before thinking about levelling up their career skills, sort of people. They don’t make the time or the effort to cultivate resilience or growth into their lives.
This is what a life of chaos looks like. It lacks intention, purpose and agency. Again I’m not making a personal judgment about you. I have been there and in many ways I am still that person myself. Most of us are. But if we want better for ourselves then we will want to leverage at least some discipline to break out of just getting by.
Have a think about the stuff you let slide before you finally accept that you need to do something about it.
Most of us are just lacking a fresh purpose and a path to drive our behaviour to a better place. This lack of purpose leaves us without the opportunity and clarity to drive good choices. When you decide your purpose then you can create clarity on the actions that reflect that intention. Then you will order your thoughts, values and actions towards an intentional self.
Yes, finding purpose will be challenging. There is no app or button to press that is going to tell you in an entertaining way, in 3 minutes or less, what your purpose looks like. You will need to reflect on that and it will take time to flesh out. But keep in mind that you don’t have to create one purpose for the rest of your life. You can have several over a lifetime and they can even change if needed.
But before you even consider chasing that next level you first need to bring order to the here and now.
If you don’t just yet have a convincing purpose to guide you at the moment you can still decide to live on purpose.
Undisciplined people are generally emotional reactionaries. I don’t FEEL like doing that or I don’t LIKE that, kind of people. They are typically apathetic about their future, complacent with their free time and far too interested in the affairs of other people and events. With little to nothing guiding their choices they create chaos that keeps them busy, without good reason, and plenty of excuses to justify why they live this way.
The first thing you can do is use discipline as an antidote to the existing chaos in your life. (Living on purpose) Make the choice to clean up the mess that exists and be aware of the mess you invite in. Keep a clean and orderly home. Stop concerning yourself with what other people think, say or do unless it directly and explicitly impacts you. (This would include news media) Don’t make commitments that might become a burden to you time and attention down the road.
Creating some order in your home environment is an easy way to establish standards and values. Not involving yourself in other peoples behaviour, choices or demands allows you the time and attention to reflect on your own choices and behaviours.
Using discipline to address the chaos in your life will also establish the credibility of discipline as a tool, that you control, to move the needle towards your own progress. The more you practice it the more you will learn that you can actually trust yourself to make good choices and establish new standards and preferred values.
After just two months of practicing basic discipline I was surprised by the feeling of self trust that emerged in my consciousness. It gave me the confidence to see that I was on the right track but it also indicated that I unconsciously hadn’t trust myself in the past.
Discipline is not about self control for the sake of itself. Discipline is a tool that goes hand in hand with other ideation tools that collectively contribute to you ability to maintain order and shape your progress. Such as purpose, habit and and focus. Purpose gives us clarity to focus on what matters most and discipline is leveraged to create new habits in line with that clarity.
What holds us back
A good reason why we struggle with the idea of discipline is that we don’t have clear purpose, standards or values to guide our preferences. Once you create some clarity around these things it becomes easier to know what to say yes to and what you say no to.
Without a good reason for discipline in our lives we, quite reasonably, seek to fill the void. This in turn will lead us to place a higher value on low value stuff. Then trying to work out things like purpose and standards becomes hard to do because we start to think small. The gap between where you are and where you wish you could be will grow wider. Deep down you know that you should care but you just end up procrastinating about it.
Another reason why we resist the idea of discipline in our lives is that we assume that it will take the fun out of life. Nope. Disciplined people can have guilt free fun and be spontaneous. But people with less discipline are generally hedonistic. Their idea of a fun time doesn’t consider the cost of that behaviour. And there is a cost.
Disciplined people make better choices because they have values and standards beyond short term gratification. They know that getting drunk on a Friday night will cost them on Saturday so they may choose to drink in moderation and still go to bed at a reasonable time. While you are wrestling with a hangover on Saturday they will be day sailing on Port Phillip Bay.
It could be framed as using discipline to divert short term impulsive gratification for long term and lasting gratification that is more rewarding. Discipline is not about all or nothing choices or abstinence of fun. It’s about being intentional with our lives. We prefer to make better choices and are measured about things like attention traps tv, gossip, ect because short term-ism has a long term cost to our future through the compounding effect of those choices.
But even if you want to live the life of a complete degenerate you can still cultivate the discipline to make your bed each day. If that’s all you want to do. Thats the great thing about discipline, you can shape it any way you want.
Discipline to maintain order in my life, in line with my preferred values and standards, contributes greatly to how I see myself. It helps me see how I contribute to my circumstance and therefor my outcomes. Being disciplined in one area cause me think about values and standards in other areas. It becomes a feedback loop of sorts.
Your choices collectively contributed to where you are in your life today.
That one sentence should scare the shit out of you. Are you even close to living your best life? have you made good choices? For all the time you have been alive and this is the best you have to show for it. The choices that you make going forward will shape where you are tomorrow and in 5 years from now.
If you think that the small choices you make today won’t effect you down the road then you are dead wrong. Nobody gets fat, lazy and stupid from one big choice in life. That happens from several, seemingly insignificant, choices that you make throughout each day.
How about you don’t fuck up the next 5 years of your life.
So what do from here.
Discipline works best when you narrow your focus, change habits and reorient your values.
Narrow your focus– One does not become disciplined in all areas of their life all at once. Pick one or two small things that you want to direct your energy towards. Seriously, keep it small to start or you will trip yourself up.
Change a habit– Your lazy habits reflect your accepted values and your internal identity. Bad habits often form when we fail to delay gratification. If you watch TV after dinner then consider swapping that out for doing the dishes and cleaning the kitchen first. Then watch TV.
Reorient your values– Two things dictate general behaviour, your habits and your values. Your existing values give you the life you have now. Do you want to have a clean kitchen or watch a TV program that’s probably a rerun. What is the better choice?
Focus, habit and values all work together when you want to create discipline around something specific and significant.
The 2 Minute Rule
There is also another way that you can build a culture of discipline on the fly with random acts of discipline by using the 2 minute rule. This is one of my favourite acts of discipline that I borrowed from David Allen- Getting Things Done. If I come across something that will take 2 minutes or less to do then I just do it. It is such a low friction way to practice discipline in the moment without creating a project out of it. It’s not as affirming as purpose driven discipline but still a good practice that is consistent with the values of discipline.
Something extra:
You need to convince not only your logical brain but also your heart ( emotional mind ) to make the better choice. While it is easy for your brain to see the logic in the better choice it is usually your heart that causes the true resistance. Change is hard for the emotional mind. It doesn’t feel like doing things differently. It’s happy and content with things staying the same as they are. It will often take time for your emotional brain to come around to new things. The emotional brain won’t except wholesale changes to your life. But it will usually concede to small and easy changes in routine. Especially so if you can provide an alternate behaviour of equal value.
Bonus Reading:
I discuss how to trigger the desire to make change in an article called The Genesis Domino. Be sure to check it out.
Authors notes:
Discipline is an interesting topic and I expect to write much more on the topic as I continue to study the principles of what helps move us from the default of mediocrity and live fulfilling and intentional lives.
I spent almost two months writing this article as I explored and implemented discipline into my everyday life. I wanted to write an authentic article from real experience and thoughtful consideration, hence the time. There were many amendments and adjustments made as I learned about the subject from that first hand experience. No doubt, as I continue to practice discipline, I will learn even more as I peel back the layers to uncover new levels of awareness.