If there’s one timeless principle of success that’s as cliché as it is true, it’s the age-old concept of discipline.
Parents, grandparents, teachers, coaches, movie stars, wrestlers—basically, anyone who has lived enough under the sun—all have something to say about the benefits of discipline and its role in personal growth, productivity and success. Needless to say, all of them are right.
For some, discipline is the key to everything they want. For others, it’s what keeps them going forward amid challenges. However, everyone agrees that it’s difficult.
Discipline requires resisting impulses, stopping procrastinating, eliminating distractions and focusing on what really matters. None of this is easy unless you have a well-thought-out plan. This is where setting clear, actionable goals becomes important. Read on to learn how to set discipline goals and build self-discipline.
The Power Of Self-Discipline
Self-discipline offers many great benefits for work, personal life and beyond.
Improved Focus And Productivity
A study conducted with 377 college students found that individuals with a stronger sense of self-discipline are less likely to procrastinate in daily life and academics. In other words, discipline helps beat procrastination—an arch nemesis of productivity.
Learning how to be disciplined also keeps you in control of your thoughts and emotions, making you more focused on your tasks and, hence, more productive.
Better Time Management And Consistency
M. Scott Peck, an American psychiatrist and author, once wrote, “Until you value yourself, you won’t value your time. Until you value your time, you will not do anything with it.”
Indeed, when you start valuing your goals over your urges, you also start valuing your time more. You become aware of its finiteness, how you spend it and how you should spend it more efficiently. Gradually, you become better at managing your time, which helps you consistently achieve your goals for days, weeks, months and years.
Increased Self-Confidence And Resilience
Confidence is among the most rewarding benefits of self-discipline. Every task you check off motivates you to do the next task. Over time, as you see yourself ticking off goals via sheer discipline, your self-confidence fires up.
This confidence makes you show up even on days you feel like giving up, making you more resilient and reinforcing discipline—continuing the cycle.
What Is A Discipline Goal?
A discipline goal is a commitment that helps you build self-discipline via self-control, consistency and habits. Unlike regular goals, discipline goals focus not on your desired outcomes but on improving the processes that lead you to the outcomes.
Unfortunately, we are all so used to setting outcome-based goals that we forget to care about the processes. For example:
- Getting straight A’s in school
- Reading a trending bestselling book
- Learning to play the guitar
- Buying a house
The list never ends, but there is a catch: fixating solely on the outcomes doesn’t work.
While regular goals tell you where you want to go, discipline shows you how. So, contrary to outcome-based goals, discipline goals sound very different and could include:
- Studying for three hours every day after school
- Reading 10 pages of a book every day
- Attending guitar lessons and practicing every day
- Saving a fixed minimum amount of money every month
This way, discipline goals not only help you achieve your goals; they also help you build habits that set you up for betterment and long-term growth.
How to Set Discipline Goals That Stick
Practicing self-discipline, in itself, is not a goal but a habit—and a very tough one at that. But, setting discipline goals can keep you on track. Here are the steps to set effective discipline goals:
1. Identify Your Priorities
Self-discipline starts with prioritizing the things that truly matter. To do that, create to-do lists for the day’s most important tasks and check them off before the end. Or follow the Eisenhower matrix approach and categorize tasks into four categories in this order:
- Urgent and important
- Urgent but not important
- Not urgent but important
- Not urgent and not important
Organizing your tasks in this way will help you put your best efforts into the things that matter the most and manage your time more efficiently.
2. Set SMART Goals
The SMART framework is among the best goal-setting models for the workplace and life. It ensures that your goals are:
- Specific
- Measurable
- Attainable
- Relevant
- Time-bound
For example, if you want to read more, here’s what a SMART goal might sound like:
“I want to finish four books over the next two months by reserving 30 minutes after dinner to read and minimizing distractions by switching my phone off while reading.”
Remember that the better the quality of your goals, the greater your chances of achieving them.
3. Break Goals Into Smaller Habits
Ironically, often, the secret to achieving big goals is starting small. You can be more disciplined without getting too overwhelmed by dividing big, tough tasks into smaller, doable chunks. For example:
- To build a reading habit, pick up a short book and read five pages every day.
- To improve your self-care, build one habit (like getting seven hours of sleep) at a time.
- If you want to get promoted at work, start taking on leadership roles, completing relevant training and seeking mentorship.
4. Write Down Your Goals
Writing your goals down on paper helps bring them out of your head and into the real world. Take a piece of paper, jot your goals on it and stick it on a wall. These written goals will keep reminding you of your ambitions and keep you on track when distracted.
5. Track Your Progress
The only person you must compare yourself with on the path of self-discipline is your past self, and that’s why you should keep monitoring your progress regularly. Here are some ways to do that:
- Maintain to-do lists to manage daily tasks
- Keep a journal to reflect on your daily or weekly progress
- Mark your calendar every day you check 90% off your to-do list
- Use habit-tracking apps like Habitica, Streaks, StickK, and Habitify
Self-Discipline Exercises to Build Long-Term Habits
Think of self-discipline as an endless ladder. It takes you to new heights, but only if you keep climbing. However, going up against the gravity of procrastination, distractions and similar evils needs practice, and these self-discipline exercises can help:
1. Time Blocking
Time blocking is a time-management technique in which you divide your day into several fixed time slots. You block each time slot for a single task or group of tasks and do nothing else during that time.
For example, you can block 7-8 a.m. for exercise and meditation, 8-9 a.m. for shower and breakfast, the next 30 minutes for responding to emails, the two subsequent hours for focused work and so on. Since we only get 24 hours per day, time blocking is a great way to efficiently utilize those fixed hours.
2. The 2-Minute Rule
David Allen introduced “the 2-minute rule” in his book Getting Things Done. The rule states that if something takes less than two minutes to complete, you should do it as soon as you think of it. This approach helps you beat procrastination, as many times, we procrastinate small tasks until they add up and become too much to handle.
3. Mindfulness And Meditation
To stay disciplined, focus on the present rather than past mistakes or future uncertainties. Practicing mindfulness techniques such as meditation can relieve stress and help you stay in the present moment.
Here are some ways to practice mindfulness:
- Breathing meditations: Focus on your breath for as little as two minutes per day
- Mindful journaling: Jot down your thoughts, feelings and emotions every day
- Single-tasking: Do one task at a time with full focus (try time blocking)
The more present you are in an action, the higher the quality of your efforts.
4. Delayed Gratification
Delayed gratification is the practice of resisting immediate rewards to get greater, more valuable rewards later.
For example, suppose you want to lose weight, so you resist your cravings throughout the week and reserve Sundays for your favorite sweet snack. You delay the reward of having sweets for the greater reward of shedding some extra pounds and feeling healthier.
Delayed gratification helps you avoid temptations and say yes to what’s truly important.
5. Monk Mode
Monk mode is exactly what it sounds like—adopting a monk-like attitude to achieve your goals. It’s not a specific exercise but a period during which you fully commit yourself to something. Going into monk mode is ideal for achieving a single goal within a rough time frame (usually a few days to weeks).
For example, you may have to write a research paper, train for a marathon, lose 10 pounds or meet a tight deadline. Fixate on the goal, create a strict routine and rules, eliminate all distractions and get to work.
Take Charge Of Your Life With Self-Discipline
Building self-discipline is hard, especially if you struggle with procrastination, instant gratification and poor focus. But the good news is that habits like task prioritization and setting SMART goals, coupled with exercises like time blocking and delayed gratification, can help you be more disciplined—one step at a time.
There is no need to aim too big in the beginning. Identify just one area of your life that needs improvement, set a discipline goal and start from there. With time and consistency, your self-discipline will create a domino effect of success across other areas of your life.
Photo from Khosro/Shutterstock.com
