Discipline Your Way to Success: The Definitive Guide to Success Through Self-Discipline

Chase Andrews

• Publisher: CAC Publishing LLC
• Print ISBN: 9780998714066
• eBook ISBN: 9781948489706
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Personal Success

Many inspired people miss the opportunities of being gifted the way they are because they don't have the will or the discipline to move the inspiration from their soul to their hands.

If you are the kind of person that is full of inspiration, loads of ideas, and have plenty knocking around in your head, but none of that has materialized, then there is a good chance what you need is more discipline. In most circles among adults, suggesting discipline is problematic because it feels like that word is reserved for kids. Yes, there is one kind of discipline that is reserved for kids. But the kind of discipline that you need to attain the kind of success you are thinking of is very different than the picture that emerges at the invocation of the word.

The discipline you need is the kind that will allow you to take control over your thoughts and actions. We may have all the other attributes that are required to be successful, but if we lack the discipline then all bets are off. That's usually where the problem is when you've gone through tons of books, tons of seminars, and you still can't translate inspiration into action. This book will show you the reason discipline is elusive to many people and why the lack of success becomes the norm.

You can't just turn on discipline in many cases, you need to understand yourself and understand the reason your greatness is stuck within you struggling to come out.

Don't wait any longer! Scroll up and click the 'Buy Now' button and start instilling more discipline in your life to help achieve your dreams!

Chapter 1 What it Means to Be Human

Success is a journey that goes from your current self to a better version of you, able to do things that you once thought impossible. Taking your bike down to the corner store is not a success, but taking your bike down a double black diamond trail for the first time would constitute a success. The difference is your ability in handling the terrain where any version of yourself would be able to handle the ride to the corner, but a stronger, more athletic version of you is needed to make it down the trail.

Being human is a complicated endeavor. There are so many forces, some in opposition, acting on us constantly. We have environmental forces that pervade us, psychological forces that sway us, social forces that influence us, and even economic forces that drive us. We are never just the result of one of these forces, we are typically an amalgam of all, and each changes one day to the next, just like the slope of a double black diamond.

Forces

All those forces aside, we have two more forces that mean the most to us. They mean the most because they are within us. These two internal forces are usually improperly named, and throughout the ages, many writers and theologians have called it one or the other. Some have even gone as far as to call one an angel and the other a demon. Cartoons mimic this by putting a cherub on one shoulder while putting a devil on the other - each whispering in your ear to do their bidding.

The only thing correct about that visual is that we, as humans, are slave to these forces. Our mistakes in life and our shortcomings in character are typically rooted in this dichotomy of self. There is a rational explanation for the two sides, one that does not rely on religious or mythical interpretations. These are the parts of you that you have to come to know and understand if you are to have a shot at being successful.

One of these two parts dictates actions that authors like Dante Alighieri describe in his Divine Comedy as the seven stages of hell. Christians call it the seven deadly sins. We can call it whatever we like, but it is the basic instinct of our primal self in full display. The seven deadly sins are gluttony, lust, envy, wrath, sloth, pride, and greed. We are told that when we do not control the devil within us from committing any one of these sins, we are doomed to hell.

The part of us that makes us do these things is really the primal and ancient part of us that got us through turbulent times of pre-civilization. Without the skills of greed, we would not have been able to go out and forage for food, so that we have stores when winter comes. Without envy, we would not have been able to mimic what others have done and thereby better ourselves. Without wrath, we would not have been able to spark defensive mechanisms and protect ourselves and our families. Without sloth, we would not have been able to rest and recuperate. Without lust, we would not have been able to expand the species and prolong it. Of course, I am oversimplifying - but not by a stretch. For each of those ’sins’ there was a viable reason for its existence and how, at one time, it worked in our favor. 

When you fast forward a couple of millennia, you find that none of those actions seem appropriate; and if you take part in any of those acts, the long-term repercussions are more detrimental than beneficial. So, in the long term, there are negative consequences to unmitigated acts sparked by our primal instincts.

As civilizations rose from the deserts and humans began to understand the benefits of communities and shared resources, new norms of behavior replaced the old. New social contracts took hold, forcing individuals to do things differently. These acts were defined by the different forces I mentioned earlier - social, economic, and so on. Consequences for non-compliance of living in civilizations and in communities were harsh and ranged from the loss of limbs to loss of life to outright banishment - all severe by any standard. In time, the repercussions forced individuals in line, and eventually, life changed at a fundamental level.

As we developed under the social forces of this new format of shared living, our brains improved and evolved with the better nutrition standards, lesser survival stresses from the previous hunter-gatherer models of living, then the farming and bartering models, to the current monetary supply and demand commodity economies we have now, where there are multiple degrees of separation from product genesis to product consumption. Greed, a natural instinct to want more, which once served its purpose, no longer manifests in the same way. Once a desired trait, greed, in today’s context, has become socially unacceptable. 

In the same way that we can visualize greed and its fall from grace, we can visualize each of the remaining six of the seven deadly sins. Placing whatever religious connotations aside, and looking at merely the practicality of the matter, you will begin to understand that the seven vices were once seven angels. But because humanity has evolved, humanity has marched forward and civilizations have become what they are. What was once necessary has now become more than just unnecessary; it has become counterproductive and thus evil.

Simile of the Raft

There is a Buddhist sutra (Buddha’s teaching) that is very interesting and relevant to this discussion. It is known as the Simile of the Raft. It tells a tale of a man walking in the forest, on the side of a river that’s filled with dangers. He comes upon the river and sees that the other side is safe and he desires to cross this river. The problem is that he is unable to swim or walk across and needs a raft. There isn’t one in sight. But there are enough branches and leaves and prop roots. The man uses all he can find and builds a raft using much effort and time. When it is finally ready, this effort of his back and work of his hands delivers him safely across the river to the safer side. When he gets to the other side, he knows that his journey takes him inland and not along the river. But he has a problem. What does he now do with this raft that he spent tremendous effort and toil building? Should he find a way of dragging it along, lift it over his head, or should he just let it be?

Think about that for a while and let it sink in.

Even though it may seem like we left something behind, we really haven’t. Once we have done something, it remains a part of us. That raft may have floated downstream, someone else may have been able to use it, or it may even have gradually disintegrated. But the knowledge he gained while building it, the confidence he gets from knowing he can do it, and even the ability to do it better the next time will never leave him - he will always carry that with him. Just as Heraclitus once said, “No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it is not the same river, and he is not the same man”.

But we have to leave things behind once they have served its purpose, and you have to unburden your shoulders and unburden your mind from its weight and its memory so that you can go on to the next state of being. Just as the Apollo rockets and the space shuttle jettison their stage one and two rockets as they ascend toward space; you have the discipline to free yourself of anchors as you move from one state to the next.

The man in the simile of the raft was changed by his experience - changed for the better, and will always remain that way, and in that way, he is the same as the river - which with each drop of water that flows in it makes it different.

In that exact same way, we may not act and behave at the impulse of the forces that got us here. We may have cast aside its influence in how we act. But it is within us. Our desires and temptations are exactly these forces that carried us over time and space. Today, we need the more contemporary part of our brain. We ne...

Table of contents

• Contents
• Prologue
• Discipline’s Place in the Grand Scheme of Success
• Preface
• Four Truths of Success
• Introduction
• Chapter 1 What it Means to Be Human
• Forces
• Simile of the Raft
• Imaginary Forces
• Right and Wrong
• Takeaway
• Chapter 2 Dominant Personality
• Actions and Reactions
• Chapter 3 Purpose
• Dual Purpose Life
• Greatness is Your Purpose
• Is Greatness Not for Everyone?
• Chapter 4 An Introduction to Discipline
• Filial Discipline
• Societal Discipline
• Personal Discipline
• Carrot and Stick
• The Arc of Discipline
• The Importance of Discipline
• The Insidious Nature of Indiscipline
• Why Does the Body Not Want to Act?
• Chapter 5 Overcoming Resistance to Action
• Chapter 6 Face to Face With Discipline
• Thoughts
• Actions
• Discipline Flows from Focus
• Chapter 7 How to Invoke Discipline
• Focus
• Energy Economics
• Behavioral Change
• Chapter 8 Theory vs. Practice
• Exercises
• Fasting
• Muscle Building
• Conclusion
• Epilogue
• About the Author