Mental Discipline an introduction
February 4, 2009 by Alborz Fallah
Filed under Articles, Blog, Choice Theory, Delayed Gratification, Mental Discipline, Positivity, Power of the mind
This is a topic that most of us tend to read about once every few years and simply neglect, even though it is quite possibly the most important aspect of your life.
So many of us spend countless hours at the gym training to lose weight or put on muscle, yet we spend so little time working on our minds, which should also be treated like a muscle, albeit a complicated one.
I want to go over a quick overview of what mental discipline means and how it can help you get to where you want to be.
How often have you sat around wondering how on earth you are going to get through all the things that you have to do, then spent the next few days or weeks putting things off. It all comes down to a mixture of mental discipline and will power.
Will power is a whole other topic, but having healthy mental discipline can enormously increase your will power as well and vice versa.
So what do I mean by mental discipline? It can be explained rather simply, being able to control where your mind directs its energy.
Life is one big interaction of energies, positive or negative. Your mental mindset can determine if you have a good day or a bad day, or even go as far as if you have a good life or a bad life.
Can you think of that one person in your life that has always been negative? Always seeing the bad side of things. Always warning you about what can go wrong and never seeing the up side? That negativity is a sign of weak mental discipline. Instead of using mental discipline to achieve goals, a negative person chooses to simply see the negative side so that he doesn’t have to act.
If you live in a country where food and safety is not an issue, the rest of your higher needs for happiness or lifelong fulfilment are in direct correlation to your ability to focus your mind on doing what ever it is that you need to do.
One of the biggest problems that I used to face in life was procrastination. I would always put things off, a simple task that may take just 10 minutes to do, I’d avoid because I lacked mental discipline. As a result, I’d then spend hours of brain power worrying or forcing my self to remember what I hadn’t done and end up doing it at a later date anyway.
This is a common problem amongst nearly anyone that has ever suffered from weak mental discipline.
Do you see the problem?
I am going to break down mental discipline a little better.
- Mental Focus
- Mental Action
- Positive feedback loop
Mental Focus
Mental focus is the key to mental discipline, before you can use the power of your mind, you need to have focus.
What I mean by focus is a clear path, a clear vision of what is needed. If you’re wandering through life aimlessly, you have no focus. If you’re stuck in a job or relationship which you’re unhappy with, you lack mental focus.
Einstein had a famous quote about insanity which also applies to mental discipline. He said insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.
Think about that for a minute. Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again whilst expecting a different result.
If you’re stuck in a job which you don’t like and everyday you come to work and do the same thing and you’re still unhappy, yet you spend countless hours complaining or making yourself miserable as a result – that is insanity. It’s also a sign of weak mental discipline.
Find your mental focus. Sit down right now and write out a list of what you want in life. Everything, from the simple needs to the higher needs. Take 10 minutes to do this right now.
This could be a big list or a small list, it doesn’t matter, but focus on what you want to achieve in the short and long term. Also don’t sabotage yourself by not writing down the things that you really want, but feel as though you can’t get. That’s weak mental discipline and negative thinking.
Once you’ve got your list, you need to focus. Work out a path, a guide or map of how you will get to each goal. Start a new page for each of those goals and write down steps on how you will get there.
For example, if one of your simple needs is buying a new car, work out how you’re going to get the car you want (stealing isn’t an option – so cross it of the list).
This may mean you need to get more money, which means you need to get a better job, which might mean you need more education or training. You see what’s happening?
Your mind is breaking down the steps by which you will get to your goal. No goal is unachievable, one of my current long term goals is to go into space – yep, space. I know I will get there because I’ve worked out how I can manage it in due course.
Once you’ve written down your goals and broken them down into step by step guides, you will have much clearer focus as now you know what you need to do.
Don’t be put off if you have no clear path for one of your goals, or if you’re unsure of the steps, do some research, find the answers you need – this will still give you focus and more clarity.
Once your goals are done. Another exercise to learn is mental focus in the now.
No doubt you have some work to do, right now. You have a decision to make, are you going to do this work or not. If the work you have to do is something you don’t want to do then write down why you don’t want to do it, look at the reasons and see if it’s because you hate your job, or if it’s because you’re lazy. If it’s the latter, get started!
A few years ago I was working at an organisation whereby I did very little. Jobs would come through and I would almost ignore them. I had a project to do for the last six months of my employment and when the time came to hand it over to the new guy, all I had was one single A4 piece of paper with a few diagrams drawn on it. That was it, six month’s worth of work!
Not only was I incredibly lazy and had little to no mental discipline but I also hated my job. I had no passion for what I was doing, I had no care for its success.
This is why goals are important for mental focus. Your goals should be things you really want. For example, lets go back to the car, you want a new car, but you need more money, so you want a promotion at work, work out how you’re going to get it. Talk to your boss, ask him if there is a possibility of a promotion if you worked harder or got more sales. This way you know your path. Don’t waste energy on things that won’t eventuate.
If you ask your boss if there is a promotional opportunity and he/she gives you a clear no. Don’t stay around and become miserable. You can’t have mental focus if you’re focusing on the wrong things.
Your focus is a new car, you’re not going to get a promotion at your current work, so work out how you can change your situation.
You may start another part time work on the side, you may start your own business on the side or more commonly you might start looking for another job, I know you’re thinking it’s not as easy as that, but it is. Start looking, go to interviews, start upgrading your skill-set, think about other ways by which you can get to your goal, write down ideas, work though them. Move yourself to the next level.
Get focus and work out your goals. You can’t get what you want if you don’t have a clear path to your goal.
Mental Action
Once you’ve found your mental focus, once you know what it is that you want, be it on a daily basis or for your life. You need to convert that focus into action.
Your goal path says you need to upgrade your skills to get a better job, so what do you do? Say it’s too hard and then spend the next few years being miserable in your current job? No.
One of the most important lessons in life is learning delayed gratification, something I will talk about a lot in the future but is very relevant for mental action.
Most people go through life living for instant gratification, wanting things now without any understanding of long-term or delayed gratification. This is the biggest sign of weak mental discipline and where most of the world’s problems come from.
The easiest way that I recommend you start training your mind or beginning your journey of better mental discipline is by finding one goal which is beneficial to you mentally and physically. I’ll start with fitness as we all need it.
Having the discipline to go to the gym or for a run on a regular basis is incredibly beneficial. If it’s not already, make one of your mental focus goals better fitness. Now come up with every single excuse as to why you’ve avoided doing it in the past.
If you already take your fitness seriously, you’ve shown a great deal of mental discipline which you can nurture.
But if you don’t take your fitness seriously, read your “excuse list” to yourself. Let’s be honest, they are all pretty lame. No time, too tired, can’t afford a personal trainer, can’t afford the gym, don’t have anyone to go with, blah blah blah. All mental barriers you’re weak mind creates to not have to put in the work.
Think about all the things you waste money on and then justify why you can’t cut them out and replace it with the gym? Personal trainer is not necessary, if you can afford it, great, otherwise look online there are thousands of useful websites dedicated to this topic. If you have no time, make time, fitness is worth your time. Don’t have anyone to go with? Great, take it as an opportunity to make new friends.
Stop giving in to your mind’s weakness, train yourself to have mental discipline and focus on your goals, then use the power of your mind to take action to get to your goals. It’s great to sit there and suffer about how you’re overweight or have no muscles, but that’s not going to make any difference, you need to take action, you need to have mental discipline.
You get an instant gratification by not having to do any exercise, yet the long term or delayed gratification of being fit, more attractive and generally healthier in life is amazingly forgotten. As a result you remain miserable.
Now write down why you should go to the gym next to all the excuses as to why you shouldn’t. Read it every day to remind yourself why that goal is important.
Positive Feedback Loop
This a term that can be used in many ways. What I mean by positive feedback loop is understanding that having goals and using the power of your mind to reach them builds this idea in your head that you can become stronger.
If your goal is to get fit and you spend the next six months having great mental discipline to eat healthy and exercise, you will lose weight. This will prove to you that mental discipline and delayed gratification work. This builds positive feedback.
Once you understand the theory and put it to use with positive results, this will all come naturally, then you will start using the same goal/action approach to all things in life and have great success.
Here are ten things I want you to take away from this article:
- Your mind needs training to become more powerful.
- Most of life’s success comes from the mind’s ability to focus and act.
- Weak mental discipline is a disease which can ruin your life, but it’s curable with … well… discipline!
- Stop doing the same thing over and over again if it makes you miserable. Eating that big mac will feel good for 5 minutes but it will make you miserable in the long run.
- Apply logic to your life.
- Aim to get to your goals in a logical manner, identify mental and physical barriers and eliminate them.
- Stop procrastinating! Mental action is needed before physical action takes place.
- Allow yourself to slip up occasionally. If you do happen to have that big mac, don’t spend the next week crying about it, move on, learn from that mistake and aim to eliminate it.
- You control the power of your mind – where you focus its energy is completely dependent on you.
- Be positive – nothing works better in life than mental discipline mixed in with positivity.
Remember, the goal-action approach is not the only way to live life, goals like a new car, more money etc are not necessarily going to make you happy. Being able to find longterm fulfillment will. Good Mental Discipline is the first step.