Full Discipline Guide: How To Do The Hard Work
What is discipline & why is it so hard to get?
Discipline is the ability to choose behaviors that are based on principles, not fleeting emotions.
It’s Saying to yourself,
“I don’t feel like doing it.”
Then doing it anyways.
Discipline isn’t hard to cultivate.
It’s just hard for YOU because you’ve never been taught how to do it correctly.
Like a young boy trying to teach himself how to fix his car…
It becomes easy once he finds a mechanic to teach him the ropes.
Luckily for you, that’s where I come in.
If you’re tired watching your life get progressively worse year after year.
And you finally want to make goals & stick with them long enough to see them become a reality…
This guide is for you.
Important Note:
Right now the worst habit you have is procrastination.
In order to lose, your enemies don’t need to stop you…
They just need to delay you long enough to take what should’ve been yours.
Every time you procrastinate, your letting your enemies win.
I’m telling you this because you’ll probably read this guide and say,
“I’ll do this later.”
You see it’s that exact phrase that’s been ruining your entire life.
If you want you life to change from this very moment this is all you need to do:
The second you learn what to do…
GO DO IT.
When I tell you to go make your bed…
Pause the article.
Then literally go make your bed.
If you put off doing the things that actually build your discipline, you might as well quit now.
Why?
Because until your change your behaviors, your life won’t change.
So if you refuse to act immediately, quit reading now and go back to scrolling Tiktok.
Tomorrow does not exist, only today does.
So If future you always puts things off till tomorrow…
You will NEVER improve.
You’ve been warned.
The Foundations Of Discipline
This is gonna sound lame but it’s true.
Discipline is just your habit of how often you listen to your conscience.
You have no discipline right now because the second something becomes uncomfortable you override your conscience and take the easy choice instead of the right choice.
I know I shouldn’t eat this BUT…
I know I should be studying BUT…
I know I should go work out BUT…
You’ve built the nasty habit of listening almost exclusively to your emotions instead of principles.
Your Conscience = The Voice Of Principles. (Delayed Gratification)
Your Emotions = The Voice Of Pleasure. (Instant Gratification)
Principles build up your life, pleasure tears it down.
If your life is currently in shambles, it may just be because you’ve been listening to the wrong voice your entire life.
This is extremely common in men who were raised in homes with absent fathers like I was, as their actions often had few or no consequences.
So then how do you build your discipline?
The same way you build a weak muscle.
Start using it on small things.
Then as you use it more…
Start lifting heavier things.
This is called progressive overloading.
Here is the complete list of exercises I have done or currently do to progressively overload my discipline.
Exercise #1: The Seed Of Discipline
How hard is it to plant a seed?
It’s not hard, you literally take the seed and put it in dirt.
Then you just water it daily.
For you the seed of discipline is this:
Think of some tiny task you really don’t want to do every morning…
Then do it.
This is why Lesson #1 in the military is…
MAKE YOUR BED.
Why?
It gets you to start doing things you don’t care to do literally from the moment you wake up.
Here are some few examples you can apply to your own life.
Note you only need to do ONE of these, not all of them.
If you try to do too many at once your discipline will fail & you’ll be back where you are now.
Make your bed.
Meditate for 2-minutes.
Put on sunscreen.
Do some sit ups.
Go for a 2 minute walk.
Read a chapter in your religion’s Holy Book.
All of these tasks are tedious and small.
They’re enough to get you to flex your currently weak discipline muscles. But not so hard as to make your muscles fail & cause you to quit immediately.
To do this effectively start every single day for the rest of your life doing one of these tasks.
Then immediately after doing it, say to yourself.
“I just operated on principles, not feelings.
Therefore I AM a disciplined person.”
This will lead us into exercise #2, creating a new identity.
Exercise #2: Leaving Old Things Behind, How To Create A New Identity.
Our actions change how we view ourselves.
How we view ourselves change our actions.
If you want to become a disciplined person…
Start telling yourself that’s who you are.
Let me explain.
Back when I was beginning to get disciplined I found some research on the science of mantras right?
Essentially the theory was that anything we repeat to the brain enough times the brain eventually comes to believe as true, whether or not it actually is.
Then once you believe something is true, you start to act like it is.
So… once you think you’re a disciplined person…
YOU START ACTING LIKE ONE.
So how can you use this?
It’s simple.
Each morning simply do this:
#1. State to yourself, “I am a disciplined person.”
#2. Whenever you’re faced with a decision ask yourself,
“What would a disciplined person do?”
— THEN DO THAT.
The first 14 days or so when I started this I saw no difference in my results.
But around day 14 or so my brain automatically started prompting itself with the question, “what would a disciplined person do?” whenever I was faced with a difficult decision.
Then as I selected the thing a disciplined person would do, the more it reinforced my new identity.
When you act like a disciplined person, you see yourself as one, then because you identify as a disciplined person you start acting even more disciplined.
It’s a vicious cycle in the best possible way.
On the flip side of the same coin, the more you act undisciplined the more you solidify your believe that you’re an undisciplined person.
Meaning that each action you take will either spiral you up, or down.
No individual action is unimportant, as each step either takes you one step towards heaven or one step towards hell.
The choice is yours.
Exercise #3 Make The Correct Behaviors Rewarding
Disciplined people aren’t actually disciplined, they just find a way to make the right thing more fun.
This is the part where we start using discipline practically.
For this step I want you to get a pen and paper and answer these questions RIGHT NOW:
#1. What’s your biggest goal this year?
For me it’s to make $5,000 a month on medium right?
Okay now that we know our biggest goal let’s go to step #2.
#2. Okay, now if I wanted to guarantee I FAILED this goal this year what are the 5 most effective ways to FAIL at this goal?
I say fail because the brain is much better at coming up with negative solutions as opposed to positive ones.
So if I wanted to FAIL at making $5000 on medium what would I do?
- I would never write.
- I would delete all of my articles.
- I would make sure no one clicked my articles.
- I would make sure to bore them immediately.
- I would make sure to disappoint them so badly they never wanted to read me again.
#3. List the opposites of step 2.
So by knowing exactly how to fail, you now know exactly how to win if you do the opposites right?
So let’s list the opposites of step #2:
- I would write articles so good they wanted to read all of my work.
- I would make sure to retain their attention throughout.
- I would make highly clickable titles & thumbs.
- I would cross reference my articles.
- I would write regularly.
These are the behaviors I need to apply discipline too.
#4. Ask yourself, how can I make the list from step 3 more fun?
Fun means to turn something into something you HAVE to do, into something you WANT to do, right?
How can I make myself want to do these things?
- Start small until I’m comfortable with them
- Pair the task with things I enjoy (Coffee, Music, Chocolate)
- Celebrate new personal records.
Alex Hormozi discusses this in more detail here:
The point being is this.
Discipline is mostly just knowing:
A. What is my goal?
B. What BEHAVIORS do I need to do for this goal?
C. How can I make this behavior so fun I want to do it?
In A Nutshell
A happy life is a life based on principles, not pleasure.
Short term choices lead to long term pain, and long term choices lead to short term pain.
The pain is guaranteed, period.
The question is who will pay the bill, the you of today or the you of tomorrow.
If you life sucks right now, that’s because you’re paying the bills of the you of the past.
If you want to end this pain.
Stop passing on bills to future you.
Apply this article, and thank me when you eventually grasp your future success.
This works, all I need you is to trust me for the 6 months it takes between the application of these principles and the results beginning to show up in your life.
This is the life project, and if you follow me.
You will win.
Not immediately, but at some point you’ll curb stomp old man “failure” and piss on his grave.
Read this to expedite your success:
And if you want to be a cool kid:
