Is discipline destiny?

When Ryan holiday called his book “discipline is destiny”, just a quick thought will tell you that this is actually true. This is not withstanding the fact that there are a lot of other ingredients that we need to successfully make our destiny a masterpiece it ought to be.

When we look at the average person in this information age they rarely have a problem of lack when it comes to what they ought to do. Most of us falter when it comes to the sheer consistency that is needed to produce tangible results.

This is a panoramic subject as it affects studies, personal prayer life, eating habits, self improvement, physical fitness, name it all. Some we can be disciplined in one aspect of our lives and then just give caution to the wind in another.

But learning how we can harness the capacity of being disciplined people is a growing endeavor especially is a time as “kairos” as ours where our culture is essentially fast food in most aspects. And this is where a book as this one comes in to play. It tries to enlighten us on how we can do better.

A brief run through the book.

The book open up with a chapter of MIND OVER MATTER. Like I said most of us literally know what we ought to do to improve our results, eat healthier and etc but the part of remaining committed to that is always the challenge. So Peter Hollins explores some of the obstacles to self discipline (according to Buddhism) : doubt, anxiety, giving in to the five senses etc. One of the most interesting concepts in this chapter is the realisation that we humans are motivated by two systems: pain avoidance; and reward/pleasure seeking, with the former being the most potent. We will go an extra mile to avoid pain whether physical or psychological and that explains most of our failure to be disciplined. In almost all instances discipline comes at a cost of some pain which we avoid overlooking even the promise of rewards discipline later on. This is important because to attain discipline we have to see beyond that pain to the rewards our discipline will furnish. For Christians this what the author of Hebrews is alluding to when he says this concerning Christ. “ Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.” Heb 12:2

The second chapter talks about the cycle of laziness and breaking it. This chapter shows you our laziness is not isolated but a chain reaction and how we can hopefully stop it in it’s tracks. We give ourselves reasons why we should not do the needful with slogans like: we will all die, life is short so enjoy it, you only live once. For Christians it can go as far misusing scriptures proclaiming “all is vanity” like the great preacher said. But we do all this to avoid psychological discomfort which some sort of pain, and you already know we do everything to avoid pain. Then we do some other stuff in the name of productivity. And for this to be broken it goes from changing your perspectives about discipline, work and finding practical ways of managing your time better.

The third one was practical one for me. It is the YES or NO principle. This where you answer a given question for example “ did you arrive on time?” a one word answer no explanations. This is important because when we explain we give room to excuses which just furthers the cycle of laziness. In this instance we harness our on ego which is treated as an enemy to help us.

There is a detailed chapter on the neuropsychology of discipline. Some goofy goofy stuff but explained in layman’s language to keep us up to speed about how the whole thing works on a psychological level.

Then another important thing to help us is developing daily habits. The more something becomes a habit the less sheer discipline we need to keep doing it, and there is a lot of modern literature on how to develop daily effective habits.

We see that it is important in work, academics, relationships, spiritual practice and other things to be disciplined. We can all be motivated but it is the disciplined who reap results. In a world of shortcuts we can be discouraged left, right, and centre but we should be anchored in principles other than the metrics the world use to define us.

This is crucial especially for men.

Remember “discipline is destiny”.