Discipline. I’ve thought about how some people have better discipline than others, and that we always blame peoples lack of it for not reaching their goals. Goals in anything. Weight loss, being the champion taco eater, twerker of the year, you get the point. We look at people who has their shit together and we go ”wow, I wish I had the discipline to do what they do! Why is my shit not that well put together!?”
Discipline, in my head, goes hand in hand with addictions and habits. You might think what the hell is she talking about right now, but hear me out. What is discipline? It’s making yourself do or restrain yourself from doing certain things that feels uncomfortable. You disciplined yourself to go to the gym everyday and you don’t eat a whole cake before bed anymore. The discipline turned your desired behavior into a habit, that developed into an addiction. Am I making sense here or just totally out in the water with my bicycle? Meaning that I don’t make sense if you didn’t get my clever metaphor.
Addictions can be a bad thing but it can also be a very good thing, depending on the addiction of course. Drugs? Not the best choice. Exercising and helping others? I like the sound of that. An addiction happens fast, whether it’s to something or someone. Human beings adapt to things fairly fast, it’s in our biology for survival. Have you heard about the statement saying it takes about 21 days to develop a habit? I bet you have. 21 days is three weeks, we are not even talking about a full ass month here! It’s fast enough to make a possible change, and slow enough to realize when a habit is starting to form and then deciding to continue adapting to it or not. I could change up my habits every month if I so please, and had the discipline to do so.
What I believe is that people with better discipline than others realize the fact that by pushing themselves to do something for a short period of time, they will start doing this thing naturally. Out of a habit, out of an addiction. Disciplined people know that if they don’t push themselves over the threshold nobody else will. Three weeks can stand between you and a life changing habit.Three weeks! Do you understand how insane that is? I couldn’t even grow my own tomatoes in that time! Or maybe I could..? I don’t know that much about growing your own tomatoes. Well, back to the point, three weeks in exchange for a life time. Pretty sweet deal. But then we also have those three weeks to force ourselves into uncomfortability, which is why most people don’t do it.
Discipline is your mindset to look at something that seems impossible as no big deal. Visualize yourself succeeding and by doing this you’re making your mind strong enough to put your body into werk! People are lazy biologically (even this a survival instinct) and the only recipe for strong discipline is a strong mind and a strong will to accomplish something.
I don’t know why I started thinking about discipline all off a sudden, but it’s December, almost the end of the year and I feel that a lot of people tend to ”lay off” or put their goals ”on hold” until the new year. It’s now that we need our discipline more than ever. Finish strong and make a way for an even stronger and more productive new year. Just because the year is ending doesn’t mean that you are ending. So focus, visualize, and discipline yourself into the new year and a better you.