Post date: Dec 20, 2016 1:03:09 AM
Discipline the Discipline
A good person (Stephen Block) whom I met recently at La Maison in Palm Springs said to me this quote in our conversation quite unintentionally. It is so profound:
“Discipline the Discipline”
What does that mean?
Discipline is the art of taking a task and having the courage to perform it on a regular basis. Discipline is taking one’s focus to one task and one task alone.
Driving is a discipline.
Exercise is a discipline.
Practicing anything is a discipline. Practicing an instrument, practicing writing, anything that requires mastery requires practice.
Talking is talking, conversation is discipline. The listening, the questioning, the answering and mostly the listening enables the questioning and answering. Without listening there is NO conversation.
There are many things that require discipline.
What if you do something without discipline?
Then you have the opposite effect of never mastering anything.
What happens if you are constantly aware of and using discipline?
Then you have no down time. If you are in a state of constant discipline, then there is no rest state.
Everything requires rest.
Awake requires asleep.
Work requires play.
Mastery requires moments of stepping away from it to think, to contemplate, to clear the mind in order to increase focus when one is in the discipline state.
Turning things off requires discipline in order to turn them on.
Therefore, disciplining the discipline is a must.
Learning when to take a day off to recuperate is imperative and maybe counter-intuitive to some.
Taking a perpetual day off means not having the discipline to use discipline to accomplish your dreams, your desires, your goals.
Use your discipline daily to either master your craft or discipline the discipline to take a break.
Either way you use one or the other to improve yourself. That is good discipline!