In this chapter, I will explain:
1. The muscle of self-discipline
2. How do I apply it?
3. The kryptonite of discipline
The Muscle of Self-Discipline
The good discipline is self-discipline, otherwise it is imposition (an order from someone else). In other words: discipline is not imposed; one is gifted with it. Can discipline be taught and learned? Of course, as any skill can, and here we are, you and me.
The Dalai Lama once said that true discipline is not imposed. It can only come from within ourselves; I agree, one hundred percent. As you will see, self-discipline is self-esteem, and love cannot be imposed; it is a choice, or even more, it is a surrender, and that is how I understand the nature of discipline.
Self-discipline = Self-esteem
Let us continue. To me, there are two kinds of disciplines: internal and external. The first has to do with the attentive observation of thoughts, beliefs and feelings. The second has to do with behaviors, habits and actions. To have discipline, you first have to be disciplined. As always, being comes before doing. To behave in a determined way, first you have to be someone who corresponds with that behavior, internally.
1. Internal discipline.
2. External discipline.
Metaphors help us to understand, and here is one that will help you visualize discipline as a skill that can be harnessed and trained. The same as if you went to a gym or to the track. When you understand that discipline is a muscle that expands with use, and that elevates your life as it grows, you will not stop training it to develop it at your leisure. You will sculpt your life.
“I believe that self-discipline is like a muscle. The more you exercise it, the stronger it becomes.” Daniel Goldstein
But be careful, muscles also need rest. Training demands a time for recovery. If you exhaust your discipline, you are forcing the machine of will. You abandon inspiration and enter transpiration, what before was pleasure becomes effort. You no longer generate energy, but rather expend it, and that weakens you. You go from power to force.
Let us say that, every day, you wake up with a reserve of mental and physical energy, and every decision you make spends part of that total available balance. When, at mid-morning, you exhaust your daily reserve, you end up making either bad decisions, or spending more time that would otherwise be required to make those decision (or simply postponing them).
To not waste that energy, you must convert as many decisions into programmed routines or habits in which you can delegate the decision making process. That way, you are not “clawing after” the results that you are seeking, but rather “get on” a habit, and that habit takes you there.
You leave your home in the morning, and your chauffeur (a habit) at the wheel of a Marine Blue Bentley Continental (programmed routine) that takes you where you tell him to go (results)... Sounds good, right? Well, you will see that it gets even better as we go along. You can get an entire fleet of vehicles at your disposal, but first, you must “build it.”
Look, the only way I know to recharge your energy is by love, the strongest force in the universe. This takes us to the next universal principle:
Everything by devotion, nothing by obligation.
I am serious: do not force yourself to anything. You have tried that strategy before, and it has not worked... more than likely it backfired on you. Acknowledge it.
For that reason, in this entire book you will never read me praise the “force of will,” because, in reality, you do not need it at all. If, at any time, you find yourself forcing yourself to do something... you’re going all wrong about it. If your strategy is based on forcing your will, you are playing against yourself. In my unlimited discipline method, the source of energy comes from passion.
The fatigue from the imposed discipline occurs when we enter in the mode of attrition, “force of will.” It is a scam.
The good discipline that I will speak to you about, of self-esteem in action, may tire your body and mind, but it will never exhaust your spirit. They are different things, think about it. Every task requires that you rest at some point, but when it is well oriented, it does not demand quitting or abandoning it. When you understand this, you understand how life operates. My life philosophy does not entail using strength, but rather being guided by inner power.
Can you be disciplined in all you do? No, of course not, only in that which you are passionate about, that which is your priority, that which you love. Being disciplined in what you detest is masochism, a sad self-flagellation. That is why you may have heard many personal development authors insist in the importance of dedicating your life to that which you love to do. Why? Because they know you will never be disciplined in that which you do not love!
What has been said: train the muscle of discipline, use it daily, and recover over the weekend; that way, you will develop the Superpower of Champions. Discipline has the power to give you everything.
How do I Apply It?
When you simplify your trivial decisions, you reserve mental energy and time for those that are important. Will, concentration and focus. You are a laser, and you move at light speed. You get more results, quicker.
Less is more.
Less decisions, more time and more energy available.
More discipline, less wavering.
When you simplify decision making, you automate processes. For example, where and what you have for breakfast. Decide now, and then become your choice, in an automation in which there is no coming back to think until a new order is given.
For what? To pass to focus in another detail in your life, another, more important, detail. A habit like this prevents you from spending time every morning thinking about what to eat, and where. In my case, I have two types of preestablished breakfasts: regular mode and intermittent fasting mode. Once I decide in what mode I am starting my day, the rest is already part of a protocol.
Even though it may seem trivial, it is the sum of many trivial decisions, such as that one, taken daily, that exhaust your mental energy. Remember that we said that you have a daily reserve? And that, once spent, bad decisions are made...
More examples, in my case:
- I always have the same thing for breakfast, even if I am staying at a hotel.
- I...