EP 105: Want More Self-Discipline? Here's the Formula!

 When I ran across the 4 Levels of Self-Discipline, I could see the wisdom of the framework. Then I realized there was a 5th Level and my mind was really blown! 

These levels bring a fresh perspective to the desire for greater self-discipline that we all have. Once understood, we can self-evaluate and have more clarity on where to begin! 

It's also pretty amazing how perfectly these levels dove-tail with the 7 Laws of Life Mission!

If you haven't already, go grab your FREE copy of the 7 Laws of Life Mission cheatsheet here: https://www.themissiondrivenmom.com/

You can also learn more by grabbing your own copy of the book that goes into great detail about these laws here: https://www.themissiondrivenmom.com/store

There are also several episodes on the 7 Laws of Life Mission that you can find on this podcast!

Transcript:

 Welcome to the Mission-Driven Mom podcast. This podcast is for moms just like you, who want to learn how to glorify God through finding and embracing true principles, discovering and developing your greatest gifts, and using them to serve your family and community. Welcome back to the podcast. I'm Audrey Reba, author of the Mission-Driven Life founder of the Mission-Driven Mom.

I am super excited to be joining you today. We are gonna have a great conversation about self-discipline and the formula for gaining it, and it's 11 components. There are five levels of self-discipline that we're gonna go over in just a minute, which I'm excited to tell you about because this has been.

Very helpful information to me in making connections between these levels and the Seven Laws of Life Mission found in my book, the Mission Driven Life, and just in my own life experience and that of others. Before we get into it, I want to make sure that you know that we currently have a Mother's Day Cell going on.

You can get a hundred dollars off until Mother's Day of level one of the MDM Academy. We've had several women come in recently and we're having some great conversations. We're gonna have some student orientations coming up and then I'm gonna be doing some live q and as, some group discussions, some workshops.

It's gonna be a lot of fun. You've got the member directory in there and the the robust. Community component as well as all of the incredible information in the Academy course itself. So I hope that you'll make that decision to take advantage of the sale and to join us. One last thing. We would love for you to leave a review on this podcast.

It helps others know the quality they can expect to find here and get a sense of the kinds of things that we talk about and why it's benefiting you. And it would also be great for you to pass it along to a friend or family member that you think might benefit. From the content that we discuss here. So last night I had a book club at my house and we had a handful of people over and we were discussing the book, the Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde.

I don't know if you know much about Oscar Wilde. Years and years and years ago, I used to do a program called Enlightened Minds, and we would focus on a book every month and I would go into all kinds of depth. And back then I did this, a focus on Oscar Wilde. And I think this book, or maybe the importance of being Ernest, I'm not sure.

Anyway, at that time, I did some extensive research on the life of Oscar Wilde, and I don't have time to go into it today, but it was really quite mind blowing because he latched onto the aesthetic movement. He. Really felt like the pursuit of pleasure was the way to live. But he fell in love with a woman, married her, had a couple little boys, and then over time his life really fell apart.

He ended up in prison for sodomy and then died three years after he was released, after making a confession in prison. Anyway, the point of this book discussion and what we're gonna talk about today is that when we were talking about it. A picture of Dorian Gray. One of the things that I brought up, which was incredible to me, is that he wrote the book of the Picture of Dorian Gray is kind of a cautionary tale.

It talks about a man who, Dorian Gray, who pursues a life of pleasure and his life precedes to fall apart and. Oscar Wilde wrote this book, serialized it in the newspaper like they do back, like they did back then. And then he proceeded to live it out. He proceeded to do all the things that Dorian Gray did and kind of come to the same demise that Dorian Gray did.

And I was telling the group, it's always been incredible to me that this was his path. Like he knew where this might lead. He knew the consequences. Of making these kinds of choices, and yet he still went all in, made all these choices and his life completely unraveled. And I was like, what? Why would he do this?

This is so crazy. And one of the men in the book discussion just said, you know, just because you know something doesn't mean you can do it. Just because you know better doesn't mean you can always. Do that thing that you aspire to do. And of course I know this, and of course I don't show up for myself in a lot of ways that I wish I did.

His is just such a dramatic example that I was really like, oh my goodness, how in the world did this happen to him? But I also understand that you and I experience this every day. We don't have the discipline that we wish we had. And how can you do it? How can you take a good idea and really integrate it?

Into your life and into your lifestyle, and there's a lot of good answers to this question. Today we're gonna talk about the five levels of self-discipline. So it's going to be kind of the big picture structure that you can look at and plug yourself into. I think I need to work on this section of my self dis discipline or this section of it, and we'll give you some.

Tools, some ideas about what you can do next, what might be some of the next right actions for you to take in being more self-disciplined. Because you and I are probably not gonna have the path of an Oscar Wild or a Dorian Gray, but we both def definitely want to. Have more control over ourselves and our behavior and our emotions, and to have greater success moving towards our worthwhile and meaningful goals.

So how can we do that? Well, I found this article, and I'm gonna link it in the description for you. It was actually on a. Karate website, which is really fascinating. But he said some really valuable things. He turned me onto four of the levels of self-discipline, and I think there's probably five. And then he touches on the 11 components, which we'll talk about in, in near the end.

So he starts out by saying that discipline is a vital component of success, whether in school, in competition, on the job, or when you're pursuing your goals. Discipline is the mechanism that breeds success. And he also says, which I think is so profound, that discipline lies between honesty and belief.

Discipline is to obey what's right. So how do we do that? So I traveled back as I often do to the 1828 dictionary to get to some terms and some root definitions of some things because it has better definitions than we often do today. So on discipline, here's how it defines it to instruct, educate, inform the mind to prepare by instructing incorrect.

Principles and habits, and if you've been around me, you are the mission driven mom very long. You know that those are really incredible words. We are very focused on understanding the correct principles which bring lasting success and happiness. In the words of Stephen Covey and the 1828 dictionary goes right to that.

It also says to accustom, to order and subordination to correct. So discipline means all of those things, which is really, really cool. And of course, discipline comes from the word disciple. And disciple is defined as a learner, scholar, follower, one who receives instruction and follows the doctrines of another.

So if. Discipline were simply to do what I want to do or what I can do, then that would mean it wouldn't be something hard. I would just be doing something that comes naturally and to just do something that comes naturally that's easy, that I like to do, that I want to do that doesn't actually require this concept of discipline.

I don't actually really need to change or be different. The very nature of discipline is change, it's growth. It's being different than we were before, and that is gonna be something that's hard. Discipline is something that we're not inclined to do. And it's hard because we can't or don't want to do something, but we feel we should, and this goes back to that concept of the definition that was submission.

It means that discipline is trying to change to do things in a better way. You're trying to uplevel, and that's why it's hard because it's different. It's not what you're naturally inclined to do. It means that. We need something besides our way. Something besides the way we've been doing things, something besides what's natural or easy for us.

We need that to reign in our lives. We need that to take over our behavior. Ultimately, it means that we are working to conform to something above us. And this reminded me of the abolition of man, which I absolutely love. And this is CS Lewis, and he talks about this concept of the way, this is another way of talking about the natural law or the natural moral law, or the law of human nature that we reference a lot in the mission-driven mom programs, books, academy, all that kind of stuff.

And this is how CS Lewis puts it in the abolition of man. The Chinese also speak of a great thing, the greatest thing. Called the Dao. It is the reality beyond all predicates the abyss that was before the creator himself. It is nature. It is the way the road, it is the way in which the universe goes on the way in which things everlastingly, emerge, stilly and tranquility into space and time.

It is also the way which every man should tread in imitation of that cosmic and super cosmic progression, conforming all activities to the great exemplar I. In ritual, say the annex, it is harmony with nature that is prized. The ancient Jews likewise praise the law as being true. So this is the way discipline is essentially.

Us recognizing and honoring a way different than the way that we're inclined to. We are trying to order ourselves in line with the divine order. We are restructuring our habits, our thoughts, our actions to be in line with a better way of living, A way which brings greater levels of health and peace. And harmony and unity.

And. Success and inner happiness because they conform to the way things really are. And this is why I talk so much about being willing, this concept of being willing, that I talk about in my book, the Mission Driven Life and in our academy, that we have the choice of being willing or willful. We have the choice of going the way that's easy for us, or taking shortcuts to try to get short term solutions.

But there will be long-term breakdown if we try to short circuit the correct way of doing things in the correct way of being. But if we submit, if we admit that it's there, if we admit that there's something that we've gotta conform ourselves to, that's hard, that's different. That's above us. We're, we're striving, we're reaching, we're climbing.

That's why it stretches our muscles. That's why it doesn't come naturally. So how can we do that? What are these magical five levels of self-discipline that are really gonna help us to step into that? Okay. The first one is something that, and this is kind of the way this author talks about it, but there's a lot of ways of thinking about it.

He says, rules without relationships lead to rebellion. So another way of thinking about that is. The first step to true self-discipline is about your relationship, and in this case it's about your relationship with yourself and it's also about your relationship with God or the universe or the way or the da, this thing that you didn't, you don't get to make it up.

It's just the way things are and. How much you respect that, how much you honor that, how much you're willing instead of willful makes all the difference in being able to engage in greater self-discipline. And you must have a better relationship with yourself if you want to be more self-disciplined for several reasons.

One very important one is that if we. Don't have a good relationship with ourselves, then why would we bother to discipline ourselves if we don't like and love and care about ourselves, we won't do the work. We put in work for things that we really, really care about and love is a choice. It's a decision to take an action that would be best for whoever or whatever.

We can love our animals, we can love our lawn, we can love our world. We can love our PTA by taking actions that we don't necessarily want to take, but that are in the best interests of that entity or that person or that living thing. It's the same with you. If you wanna uplevel, if you want more discipline, you've got to learn to like yourself more.

And that means learning to take actions that are loving by striving for self-mastery. Now, there's three principles that I talk about in my book, the Mission-Driven Life. You can go grab a copy of that book. You can listen to the seven laws podcasts that we've got in this podcast series. You can also join the academy.

This would be a great time 'cause it's on sale right now. And we will walk you through these three laws. These three principles of loving yourself, which are meeting your real needs, disciplining your heart and your mind, and discovering and developing your gifts. But I think it is very obvious if you think about it for just a moment, that your level of self-discipline is gonna be in proportion to the level at which you truly honor, respect and care about yourself.

That's when you're gonna be willing to extend yourself. For your own spiritual growth, which is our MDM favorite definition of love. So if you want greater self-discipline. If you really have goals that are meaningful to you or you want things to be different in your life and you're striving for that to be different, and you're wondering why you can't get there, I would look very seriously at your relationship with yourself first, and if you find some vacancies and deficiencies there, if you find that you don't like yourself as much as you should.

Or as much as you would like to, you don't know yourself as well as you would like to, and I promise there's always more that you can learn about yourself if you don't really know what your real needs are and you don't know how to meet those, work on that first. Now, the second level, which this article starts with as the first level, but I'm saying it's the second because you need the relationship.

That second level of self-discipline is obedience. This is where you have an instructor. A mentor, a role model or God, and they set down some rules for you, and you just kind of blindly follow, you know that they have the fruits in their lives that you want, you know that they're a trusted source, and so you just do what they say.

You don't really consult whether or not it feels like a good idea to you, or you really want to, you just really try to get busy just doing it because they told you to and you put some parameters around yourself that help you to get it done. You know, this is where you're just doing what you're told.

And if you're an adult, it's doing what you're told. You know, you're, you're, you're told what to do at work, for example, and so you just do it because they're the ones that are paying your check and they're the ones that you're there to please. And so you just do whatever you're told to do. Now, that doesn't mean you don't think for yourself.

It depends on your maturity level, but this obedience level is where we begin. It. The second level is what they're calling self-discipline, and this means simply that you're no longer need to be told all of the time. Okay? This is a level at which you're learning and modeling principles because you're starting to understand.

That there's something above the level of just the rules. The rules of whatever you're trying to obey. Let's say for example, you're following Dave Ramsey's financial rules and he just says, put a thousand dollars in savings and then pay off your credit card debt. And so you just kind of blindly obeying the rules 'cause you like Dave Ramsey and you really trust him and believe in him.

So that's how you're obedient. You're just doing what you're told when you get to the next level, level three. This is what they're calling self-discipline. The third level of discipline. This is when you don't need to be told what to do all the time anymore because instead of just blindly obeying, you are now learning and modeling principles.

This is why in that 1828 dictionary, we receive instruction on principles and instead of always looking at what the rules are. And why we need to just do whatever we're told, whether it's following blindly, Dave Ramsey or our fitness instructor, instructor, or even a pastor. We now understand that those rules or applications of what lies beneath in deeper principles and foundational ideas, and that we can learn to navigate those ourselves and we can learn to harmonize our lives.

A little bit better. We're taking actions and we're modeling these principles. We're trying to understand them and live them for ourselves. The next level beyond self-discipline is what they call self-control, and this goes at an even deeper level now. E. In addition to understanding principles and taking actions on those principles, we're seeing that it's also a cul sculpting our emotions and the way that we're feeling about ourselves and in the world.

When you get to the level of self-control in this model, you're no longer. Are actively having to work on your relationship with yourself all the time because you're not sure how you feel about yourself. You feel settled. You're not just blindly obeying what everybody's telling you to do, and you're not just referencing the principles and trying to apply them.

Now you're feeling a greater sense of mastery. You really do feel in control of yourself. You don't worry anymore that you're gonna just fly off the handle and go out of control, or that you're gonna make some kind of meaningful goal and never know how to get there. You have better control over your emotions, but just over yourself in general.

And you feel like you really like yourself, you love yourself, you're at peace with yourself, and you have more control, not not every single moment of every day, but there's like this settled confidence that it's gonna be okay, that you're gonna be able to manage obstacles that come in your way. And then the highest level is what they call self-awareness.

The 1828 definition of this is watchful, vigilant, and aware of how your motivations and actions impact others. They call this the highest form of discipline, and it's an understanding of our importance in the world and in the universe, in the grand scope of things. This is not just me trying to reach my own goals and me trying to kind of get a handle on myself or me trying, trying to like myself or.

These kind of lower levels of discipline. This is me understanding now that even my motivations are affecting the people around me, and I'm willing now to. Forego things that might be pleasurable or even important to me for the greater good. The way that he says it is we realize our every word and action has an impact on others, and that we sometimes have to take on tasks that are unpleasant because those tasks help achieve a greater good.

So this whole framework is really helpful in terms of knowing where to begin. If you need a better relationship with yourself, work on that. If you just need to follow a mentor and just kind of do what they tell you to do for a little while because you trust them and they know that they have your best interests in mind, and they've worked with a lot of people and they know what they're doing, then just start doing what they ask you to do.

But then you need to get to the point where you're also. Learning the principles for yourselves, for yourself, and finding ways to apply those principles for yourself. This is, you know, we kind of walked through this process in the academy and it was really crazy to me how it really mirrors those laws of loving God, loving yourself, loving truth, and loving humanity.

Because at first we're just working on a relationship with God and on ourselves, and we're kind of. We have principles and like in the academy, we have principles list in every section, and those principles are set down for us and we're just applying them and kind of blindly obeying the process and working on our relationship with ourselves.

While also starting to see the true impact of the principles that underlie those, those good results that we want. And then in level two, we get heavily into love of truth. And this is where we learn to write actionable principles for ourselves and find better applications of them, which really reflects this self-discipline component.

And then in level three, we're loving humanity and this is that highest level of. Having greater self-control. We're becoming servant leaders. We're learning to love humanity and gaining this awareness, this self-control and self-awareness that our actions affect everyone around us and that the greatest purposes and the deepest meanings that we could have in life are to develop and utilize our gifts and the blessing of the people around us.

And. All of that is also just self-discipline. You're growing in discipline all the way along, and you are a true disciple. You are a disciple of the way you're disciple of the natural law and, and the God whose law it is. You're a disciple of the principles that can change you, and you're becoming a better and better disciple if you think about.

Jesus's 12 apostles, you can watch their growth in this process. At first, they were just doing their thing and then they had to just do whatever Jesus told 'em to do. And they really, and and, and they struggled with understanding why he was saying the stuff he was saying and why they were supposed to do the things that they were supposed to do.

And then they started to see the doctrines and the principles that underlie it and they gained kind of a testimony or a conviction about that and gained discipline and. Then they tried to do the things that Jesus did, and sometimes it was totally fell flat and didn't have any impact. And even when Jesus was headed to the cross, Peter didn't have that self-control and the discipline and the conviction.

To defend Jesus. He denied him. Right? And then after the resurrection, that self-control and that self-awareness going out into the world and taking this message to the world and sacrificing themselves for the greater good. So you see this really cool path of the disciple and the true servant leader through this process of these five levels of self-discipline.

Quick example that I thought of in my own life, of my own journey through these. Levels of self-discipline is in my journey to have a better relationship with money. I grew up pretty poor. Uh, we, one of the running jokes at our house was we never knew how much of the milk that was in the pitcher on the table, how much of it was powdered, and how much of it was real milk.

And my mom would try to trick us, you know, by mixing different combinations because we had to subsidize our meals with, you know, these powdered milk and lots of beans and. We had a little more money in my teenage years and, and we're, and we're comfortable, but I had a poor relationship with it. I didn't think I was really worth spending much money on.

There's stories that I've told in books and podcasts and in the academy about myself and my own struggle to be able to spend money on myself and to see myself as worthy of that and to understand why that was important. You know, but I was going along, being obedient to really basic financial principles to, to paying a tithe and to not getting into too much debt, but we were getting into debt and we weren't saving.

And so then eventually I gained greater self-discipline when I started learning the principles around. Finance it. And uh, one story in particular was I went to a retreat and this woman was a multimillionaire and she was teaching us these deeper level principles of finance. And we had a mentor meeting with her after this workshop, and she wanted us to save 10%, but we didn't have enough income to save 10%.

That's why I was in, I mean, I don't, I, I'd heard about it. People had told me that I should do that. And I sometimes obeyed and sometimes didn't, 'cause I didn't have a deep enough understanding of it at this point. I thought we didn't have enough money to do it anyway. I told God that when I got on this mentor meeting with her, that I would just do whatever she told me to do and in this space of being obedient and trying to gain more discipline, and she told us, I don't care if you have enough money to save 10%, it's a principle you'll do it.

You need to do it. And so we committed to it. We saved 10% and then literally, magically a check came in the mail. Someone in our extended family decided to give out a disbursement check of inheritance. They'd never done this before. They never did it again, but that particular month, they, we got money in the mail and that was, I really believed God showing me that I needed to be disciplined and living according to this principle and I.

I got better and better and better at it, and no one needed to tell me to do it anymore. I did it because I knew it was right and I did it because I knew that we could not have financial success unless we did it. I had a woman tell me once as I was going through this process that she was asking me about financial principles and I said, well, philanthropy is one.

You need to give money away. And she's like, okay, I'll go talk to my husband about that. And she came back to me and she was like, well, we've decided that we'll try it out. We'll live the principle of philanthropy as you're calling it for three months. And if we don't see the results, then we're not gonna do it anymore.

And that's just actually not how principles work at all. And you're not just gonna have magically the life that you want three months later. They are the foundation for a lasting success. It's like putting a foundation in your home or getting the root system of a tree established. You're just not gonna see the results in three months, but you will have, if you will pay that price for five years, you'll never be hungry again because that apple tree will produce apples for the rest of your life.

So anyway, I told her that's not how it works, and she was at that level where she needed to go backwards. She needed to find a mentor she trusted, and somebody that she could obey. She needed to work on her relationship with money because it's always about relationships and money is a thing that we do have a relationship with.

Anyway, long story short, I eventually gained more self-control as I lived according to those principles and grew in self-discipline. I don't ever worry about, are we gonna get into a ton of debt? Are we gonna make a stupid decision? Can I buy this shirt that's really cute at this store that I like, those kinds of things.

My relationship with money has completely healed. I feel abundant and confident and know that, you know, no matter how little or how much money we have will be conscientious. And our income has fluctuated. This year it went down, so we made plans. Blaine went to work, he earned more money, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And. So this is, this is something that is a path. It's, it's a journey, but you can't, over time, incrementally have more self-discipline in whatever area you want. And now there's a self-awareness. We go on, um, service trips. Yeah, we give money away more than we ever have. And I'm not saying that like to stroke my ego or whatever, I just understand that I've been given a lot and I had better give back because it's a stewardship and I'm gonna be accountable for it.

And my self-awareness about my financial situation has made me learn to be even more generous and to be looking out for others in a way I never did before. Looking out for them financially. So. These are some beautiful elements of how these five levels of self-discipline can create a framework in your life for understanding where you need to begin, whether you want discipline, it doesn't matter what area of your life in your marriage, in your parenting, in your finances, like I did in your health, and we've had to gain self-discipline in all of those areas of life.

And that mission-driven life, those seven laws of life mission are also the pathway that you can follow that will help you gain greater and greater levels of self-discipline, self-control, and self-awareness. Really quickly as we finish up here, I thought I'd read you these 11 components of discipline.

'cause I think it's really well said and it's something else to think about as you're growing in your own discipline. Number one, commitment. Commitment is when we make a decision and follow through, understanding the consequences. Without commitment, we cannot have discipline, and without discipline we cannot have commitment.

So their inner, their inner connected two punctuality. Punctuality is being on time and also being conscientious about the commitments that you make. Discipline people are always on time and have the ability to use time to their advantage. Three goals. To have a goal is to want something and be willing to work hard for it.

Discipline people are motivated by their goals. Four focus. Focus is when we direct all of our senses and energy to something specific. People with discipline are able to maintain their focus on what is important. Five, persistence. Persistence is to continue to attempt to succeed in our goals no matter what.

Discipline people have the persistence to try again and again, a million times as if necessary until their goal is met. Six. Determination. Determination is having the belief that we will somehow accomplish what we want. Discipline people show determination when working toward their goals. Seven.

Responsibility. Responsibility is to hold ourselves accountable for our actions and results. People with discipline always take responsibility for what they do and are able to find the best way to respond to their circumstances. Eight. Courage. Courage is having the strength to face our fears. Discipline.

People have the courage to face any situation and never give up. Nine, fitness. Fitness is taking care of our bodies and staying in shape. Discipline people take care of their bodies. Understanding that being fit will help in various situations. 10 vision. Having vision is. Having the ability to see in our minds what we are working to achieve.

Discipline, people are able to focus on their vision. And 11 passion. Passion is an incredibly strong feeling about something. People with discipline have great passion for reaching their goals, and I would add a 12th, and that is faith. People with discipline have faith. Instead of leaning into their fear or listening to their fears, they take actions that create results.

And they focus on where they're headed rather than the fears that can stand in their way. So that is a little bit on self-discipline today. I hope that you heard something that's helpful, that you have a better idea of where you can begin on on, on your journey to higher levels of self-discipline, to get from where you are to the goals that you're striving to reach, and from who you are to the person that you really want to become.

That is. The most beautiful journey you could be on. As Stephen Covey says, self-development is sacred ground. It's holy ground, and we ought to honor it and respect it. So I'm really grateful that you're here and really proud of you for being willing to learn something new and to look at yourself and to strive to overcome those challenges that beset you currently and to be more than you are.

That is. So incredible that you even desire that and that desire can work in you to become a motivation and the actions that will get you there. So thank you so much for joining me today, and I will see you next time.