How to Be More Disciplined in Life

Being disciplined in life ensures physical and mental health and well-being in a person’s life. Developing habits which are good for us rather than those which bring us pleasure requires a certain discipline. It not only improves our health, and enhances our success but helps us achieve our goals. It gives us the inner strength to overcome the obstacles of life and achieve peace and fulfillment. Discipline can be with regard to money, children, and lifestyle. Many successful people attribute their success to self-discipline and grit or determination which can be with regard to money, lifestyle, work and most importantly while parenting.

It is very difficult for mere mortals like us to adhere to a strict regimen of self-restraint every single day like the super successful people do which takes a lot of grit and perseverance. But we can start with simple steps that are easier to follow and maintain and build up slowly. As the saying goes" Better Late than Never". So let us start those simple steps before it is too late for the sake of our health and well-being.

So here are a few ways you can be more disciplined in life:

1. Make a to-do list: Write down the goals and update them whenever you achieve the goal. For example, you can make a chart and update the chart daily.
2. Consistency: Be consistent while following your routine of working towards achieving your goals. For example, running, jogging, exercise, quitting smoking, cutting down on alcohol, follow it regularly so that it becomes a habit.
3. Practice Gratitude: Gratitude activates the dopamine receptors of the brain and increases dopamine and boosts serotonin. Help people who are in need. Good deeds increase the good hormones that no drug or medicine can do.
4. Recognize the negative feelings: Label the negative emotions like sad, angry, and anxious. Suppressing emotions can backfire. So whenever you have negative emotions, replace them with positive and good emotions. Being optimistic can make you healthier.
5. Make those decisions: Taking decisions helps reduce anxiety and worry, as well as help you solve the problem. The decision may not be the best decision but making a good enough decision helps. Take small steps towards your goal. Don’t expect to achieve success overnight. Working in the right direction may take a lot of time but will eventually lead to success.
6. Role Models: We tend to imitate the people we admire, friends, teachers, and others. So try to spend more time with people who are disciplined, have perseverance, and will power so that you automatically follow them.
7. Relationships are important to our happiness: So cherish them. Hug people you love, it releases oxytocin the happy hormone an alternative would be a massage. The increase in oxytocin helps us in achieving our goals.
8. Make lifestyle changes: Changes like having a good diet, avoiding junk food, exercising regularly, good sleeping habits, saying no to addiction including screen addiction which will impact your health for the better in the long run.
9. Learn from Nature: Spend more time in natural surroundings. We can learn a lot from nature. The consistency and the balance with which everything goes on in nature can be educative for us.
10. Practice Yoga and Meditation: Regularly practicing Yoga and meditation calms the mind and keeps negative thoughts at bay and helps in holistic health. Simple living, high thinking is the answer to a happy and meaningful life.
11. Take up New Challenges: Learn a new language or music, dance, mountain climbing. Achieving success in new and interesting things increases the secretion of dopamine in the brain which is essential for many cognitive functions in the body. To know more about its importance please read my hub on Dopamine- https://hubpages.com/health/Importance-of-Dopamine-And-Methods-to-Improve-Dopamine-Naturally.

Leo Tolstoy, the greatest literary genius of all times, succumbed to a deep spiritual crisis and was on the verge of committing suicide, shortly after he turned fifty, in a spite of the fact that he had attained great fame with the greatest literary works behind him, a large estate, and good health for his age and a large family. In his quest to find answers to questions on the meaning of life, he first turned to science and then to philosophy but could not find any answers and was very disappointed. Tolstoy channelized the existential catastrophe of his inner life in A Confession (public Library)-an autobiographical memoir of extraordinary candor and emotional intensity in which he mentions that he discovered the solution not in science, not in philosophy or the life of hedonism, but in those living life in its simplest and purest form. He also states that his knowledge is confirmed by the wisdom of the sages has shown that everything on earth-organic and inorganic is most cleverly arranged but people fail to recognize and seem to think that their life is very wisely arranged.

It brings to mind two lines from the Taittiriya Upanishad, Section 11, and chapter 1 which is apt in this context. Upanishads are the end part of the Vedas, the ancient spiritual texts of India, the teachings of which are applicable even today though they were compiled thousands of years ago.

"kushalanna pramaditavyam.h . bhutyai na pramaditavyam.h
svadhyayapravachanabhyam na pramaditavyam.h .. 1.."

Meaning: Do not swerve from dharma. Do not neglect personal welfare. Do not neglect prosperity. Do not neglect the study and teaching of the Vedas. Here dharma means righteous living and not the practice of any religion.

Research has proved that the long term benefits of leading a disciplined life are immense. And it is a well-known fact that successful people lead very disciplined lives. Self-restraint not only improves the quality of our life, but it also helps us lead a more productive and meaningful life. And it is absolutely essential to inculcate this virtue in children from a young age so as to help them grow up to be responsible citizens of the world. In reality, the very word brings up a picture of a strict and tough regimen to follow and a fear that we may not be up to it. But it is not so in reality. Taking simple steps in developing good habits, spending more time with people who already have those qualities, replacing negative thoughts with positive thoughts all lead to developing will power and self-discipline which is the best course for normal people like us.