Motivation and Discipline

Have you ever watched a movie or documentary, read a book, attended a talk or keynote, listened to a podcast, or met someone with an interesting story and thought: Wow, this has changed my life; it’s inspired me to do something?

I suspect most of us have been there…the excitement of pursuing something new and different. The thrill of embarking on a new adventure. The envisioning of our lives vastly improving because of this new endeavor – whatever it happens to be (like writing a book, exercising, opening a new business, eating nutritiously, teaching a class, etc.). We’re hungry and driven!

Two weeks later, it’s all come to a standstill. The dream begins to die. We make excuses. We find reasons to avoid working on this new project. This is harder than I thought. This wasn’t really for me anyway. My life isn’t so bad.

Motivation and Discipline. Two sides of the same coin. Here’s what I’ve learned about motivation and discipline over the years:

• Motivation is the spark that starts the engine.

•  Discipline is the fuel that keeps the engine running.

We need them both. Motivation is necessary to get us going. It’s stewing in creative juices and flights of fancy, imagining what could be possible. It gives us glimpses of our future when we pursue new ideas. It’s incredibly addictive and empowering.  

Discipline is the hard-nosed sibling of motivation. And just as necessary. When the dream starts to look a little tarnished. Or the work seems tedious and boring – or much harder than we thought. When results are taking longer to achieve than we hoped or imagined (like completing a book chapter or losing weight). This is when we need discipline. Discipline is our day-to-day companion.

Motivation is impossible to maintain for extended periods. Discipline wouldn’t know a dream or exciting idea if its life depended on it. Motivation without discipline is a life full of wonderful ideas that never see the light of day. Discipline without motivation is repeating a bunch of banal tasks with no end goal in sight.

As human beings, we thrive on motivation – imagining a life that is full of aspirations. But we survive on discipline. The ability to execute the necessary tasks to see our motivation come to life.  

Is it hard to be disciplined? Yes. Is it worth it? 100%. Anything we can imagine for ourselves, we can achieve. But it requires a sturdy foundation of discipline to build the bridges to our dreams.

Motivation AND discipline. That’s a powerful mantra.

Until next week.

Cheers,

Andy

(All written content is created the old-fashioned way.)