Success is something I spend a lot of time thinking about. I wrote about it in my ebook. I speak about it every week with my church in our Sunday Success Series. And I talk about with other people as I go about my day-to-day life.
I like to ask questions like, “What is success? What does it mean? And how do we attain it?” These are the things I think about a lot because they’re important. Figuring out the answer to these questions can help us get to where we want to be in life.
We talk about success a lot here on the blog, too. In fact, most of the topics we cover are related to it in one way or another, even if we don’t use that word explicitly. Things like time management and goal-setting are key components of success, and that’s why we talk about them.
Anytime we discuss a topic, I want you to keep this question in the back of your mind: What can I take away from this that will help me be more successful? That’s my goal here. Because success and health go hand-in-hand, and that’s the whole point of what we’re doing here, right?
Today, I want to talk about another foundational component of success, and that’s discipline. I spoke about discipline in a spiritual context last week at church, but this topic is so important to success and health in every area of our lives that I wanted to introduce it here as well.
If you’re going to be successful at anything in life, whether it be at work, in relationships, in a physical competition, or anything else you might want to achieve, you’ve got to have discipline.
What is discipline, you may ask? It can be defined a few different ways. First of all, it can be defined as a noun:
discipline — an activity, exercise, or regimen that develops or improves a skill; training
Or you can define it as a verb, an action:
discipline — to train by instruction and exercise; drill; to bring to a state of order and obedience by training and control
Whether you treat it as a verb or a noun, discipline basically means applying a structure to your life that sets you up for success. It’s choosing your everyday actions in such a way that they get you to where you want to be.
I like to think of discipline as a stepping stone towards success. With discipline, you can form good habits that lead to a healthy lifestyle, which ultimately leads you down the road to success. And it all starts with the simple choice of exercising discipline in your life.
Discipline comes in many different forms depending on your desired outcome. If you want to work on your physical fitness, you might start by becoming more disciplined about your nutrition, exercise, and sleep habits. But if you’re more focused on improving your relational health, you might become more disciplined about reaching out to people and showing them kindness. You get the picture.
But no matter what you’re being disciplined about, it always starts with being intentional and focusing on your goal. With that in mind, you start forming small habits that will eventually lead to the lifestyle you’re looking to have.
These habits will be difficult at first. They’ll require sacrifice, attention, and patience. But with time and effort, they’ll become more natural. Eventually, you’ll master them! And then you’ll be ready to apply your discipline to the next step, and the next, and the next. Before you know it, you’ll find yourself much closer to where you want to be, all thanks to the discipline you’ve chosen to practice over time.
There are no shortcuts to success. If you want to get there, you have to work. You have to focus, make sacrifices, and constantly put in the effort that it takes to get you where you want to be. In a word, success takes discipline. And discipline starts with the simple step of choosing to take your goals seriously.
Discipline as a lifestyle takes time to master. I’m not sure anyone ever becomes perfect at it. I surely haven’t. But I’m constantly practicing discipline, improving myself, and working towards achieving success in life. I hope you’re being disciplined in your life as well, and if you aren’t, I hope you’ll start today.
I want success for each of you. If you take anything away from my blog post this week, I hope it’s this: Success begins with discipline, and you can start today. So why don’t you?
I’d like to leave with you a few suggestions. These are habits you can begin to form if you’re looking to improve in a certain area of your health.
- spiritual: pray first thing in the morning, read the Bible using a reading plan, participate in your church community, help someone in need
- physical: exercise for thirty minutes, prepare a healthy meal, go to bed at a decent and consistent time
- emotional: make a list of things you’re thankful for, control your temper, choose to focus on positive things rather than negative
- mental: praise yourself for your achievements, replace toxic thoughts with wholesome ones, be grateful for something good in your life
- relational: reach out to a loved one, show kindness to a stranger, encourage someone who’s had a positive impact on you
- financial: save a little bit of money, invest in something that matters, make a budget
No one can tackle all of these at once, but if you’re looking to start getting disciplined in your life, pick two or three of these and get started today. You’ll be amazed how far a little bit of self-discipline can take you.
That’s all for this week. I’ll talk to you again very soon.
To your fitness!