9 Ways to Increase Your Self-Discipline (Part 2)
Reinforcing your internal boundaries can be difficult especially if you're trying to replace life long habits. Here are the last 4 tips to help you better adjust!
Quick recap: We’ve covered 5 ways to increase your self-discipline in yesterday’s article.
Pair the new habit with one that you’re already doing.
Establish visual cues to remind you of the new habit.
Set timer reminders that won’t be easily ignored.
Designate certain areas to complete certain activities.
Find a way to put away distractions.
Now let’s move on to the last four tips!
Tip #6: Experiment using all 5 senses in finding the best ways to help you focus.
Just as there’s different ways to distract you, there’s different ways to help you focus. Explore different techniques and see what works for you.
Like I said earlier, when I’m working, I can’t listen to people talking. It always distracts me as I’ll pay more attention to that conversation than what I’m doing.
So this means I can’t listen to just any music. I have to specifically only listen to music that doesn’t have lyrics. To support this, I’ve built a playlist of low fi music, jazz music, and other instrumentals that I enjoy that helps me to stay in flow. In fact I’m listening to Issac Wheadon’s album, “the return”. He has many Christian songs that are mostly instrumentals with very limited soft lyrics playing along with it. I also am a big fan of Freddie Joachim. His instrumentals are always a vibe!
Other ways that can help you focus is noise cancelling headphones. There’s so many out there to choose from. If I had to choose my favorite, I would say Apple AirPods believe it or not. Their noise cancelling setting just can’t be beat in my opinion. I have to be careful of using it too much as I literally can’t hear anything outside of it. I can’t tell you how many times people have tried to get my attention, and I ended up jumping in my skin when I realized how close they are to me.
Other things that can help is what soothes you. Think of all 5 of your senses instead of just your hearing.
What do you like to observe to help you focus? Some people love being outside or near a large window. Nature helps them focus. Or maybe just being around other people that are focused on something like at a library or a coffee shop that usually has minimal background noise.
What do you like to feel to help you focus? Is the chair you’re sitting in giving you the support you need? Is it hard for you to focus when you’re cold? When you’re hot? Maybe you might need to keep a fan nearby or always have that jacket on hand. How can you find that right balance of comfort to help you focus? And I say that right balance because you don’t want to fall asleep because you’re TOO comfortable but you do want to be comfortable enough to where your discomfort isn’t a distraction in itself to you.
What do you like to smell to help you focus? Yes, believe it or not, certain scents can help you be more at ease and therefore help you focus better. Explore different scents in the forms of candles or incense that can bring a calming effect for you to focus.
I love using my lavender shower bombs at night before bed. Not only does it smell heavenly in my shower, but the scent eases itself into my bedroom lingering around to rock me into my sleep. I also love bright citrus scents when I’m trying to be alert and focus so many of my candles have some form of citrus scent to it. So what are some scents that can help encourage you to do whatever task or habit that you’re trying to do? Go to Bath and Body Works and let your nose lead you!
Last sense is the sense of taste. Now the obvious thing to think of is something caffeinated like tea, coffee, or some kind of energy drink. But I want you to think of food for this! What is a meal that’s not too heavy and not too light that you can eat before you’re about to get into focus mode to get that task done? If you eat too heavy of a meal, the itis is guaranteed to sneak up on you and knock you out to sleep. But if you don’t eat anything, your stomach grumbling is bound to distract you. Plus if you wait until you’re starving, studies show that you’re more likely to eat something that’s not healthy vs something that is healthy for you.
That means you should be proactive. Find a light meal that can satisfy any hunger cravings and give you the energy to focus. I think a go to meal is anything with vegetables and a protein with limited carbs. So think salmon with mixed veggies or a salad with chicken. If you want to add rice or a piece of bread, that’s fine but don’t indulge too much as that will cause your meal to be heavier. Eat enough for you to feel satisfied but not so much that you’re stuffed. That stuffed feeling is what we want to avoid.
Also remember that your body needs water. You may feel irritable and unfocused simply because you’re dehydrated. That headache you have? You don’t need Advil for that, you need a tall glass of H2O! Make sure you’re keeping yourself hydrated so that you can focus well.
I know some of this information may seem elementary, but you’ll be surprised how many people forget the basics when they prepare to try to focus on a task or habit. Take a moment to reflect. How are you taking care all of your 5 senses to help you stay disciplined?
Tip #7: Keep track of you progress.
There’s a number of apps out there that can track your progress for whatever task or habit that you’re trying to do. The point of them is not to bog you down with more things to do but rather help you see how far you come to motivate you to keep going. Data can be a powerful motivator if you use it as you’re less likely to skip a habit when you think about how much work you’ve already put in to keep it going.
So find an app that suits you! There’s so many out there so it really comes down to how much detailed data you want, which feels the most user friendly to you, and if you’re willing to pay for the app. A few apps that I have enjoyed before are Finch, Habit Tracker, and Streaks. Take some time to explore your App Store to see what would be a good fit for you and make sure you turn on the notifications so that you can get periodic reminders as well.
But do you really need an app? Of course not! You can make it simple with an excel file or just a journal to track how you’re doing and proceeding. Set an alarm at the times you want to do the habit and boom you practically have the same thing as the apps. The key is to not make this complicated. Just have a way to monitor your progress so that you can use that data to nudge you forward.
Tip #8: Identify milestones that you want to celebrate for consistently sticking to your new boundaries.
One of the biggest mistakes you could make is to wait allllll the way until you’re at the finish line to celebrate your progress. Instead set milestones for you to celebrate yourself even if it’s something small like an extra hour to binge a tv show or a tasty treat to snack on. It’s ok to celebrate yourself because you want to learn how to appreciate the journey to keep it a habit instead of viewing this as a marathon to get over with.
For me, I recently hit a milestone of a goal that I had and to celebrate, I took myself to my favorite steakhouse for a delicious steak. Now I’ve had plenty of steaks before but this one right here was definitely special as even the taste of it tasted like success. It made it all the more delicious knowing how hard I pushed myself to stay the course.
Now I don’t know if this is big back of me or not (It’s okay if you judge me, I don’t mind.), but there are days that I don’t feel like working on my goal, but I remember how delicious that steak was! I also remember how proud I was of myself and that it made me realize that the only person that’s getting in my own way is me. I go into a whole self-talk monologue of how important this goal is to me so I shouldn’t give up. Besides don’t I want that steak again? Ok then! Get to it!
Tip #9: Designate an accountability partner that you can check in on a regular basis.
Yes of course I had to include this because sometimes we really underestimate the power of community. And actually there's levels to this. Let me share how.
Level 1 - Have a friend that will ask you directly if you’ve worked on that habit. Report to them of whether or not you’re on task so that they can nudge you forward.
Level 2 - Have a friend that not only will ask you about your habit but is also working on the same habit for themselves. That way there’s shared accountability and you have someone to talk to and motivate you who can empathize with you about the challenges of the journey.
Level 3 - Have a group of friends at various levels of that habit. One who is working on that habit that’s a bit behind you as it’ll make you feel good to help others to where you don’t want to let them down, one who is right at your level that’s trying to be consistent like you so that you can have a shared empathetic experience, and one who is way ahead where the habit is so well established that you can ask for advice and see what success could tangibly look like. This gives you various levels of inspiration and support to make that habit what you need to be. Birds of a feather do flock together so put more people around you that are trying to do as you do.
Think about the goal that you have in mind and how you’re trying to be more disciplined in it. How can you build a community for yourself to help hold you accountable? Seeing people work hard towards the goal you’re also trying to reach can fuel your fire to not be left behind. And with social media, there’s now more than enough opportunity for you to connect with other like-minded individuals so that you stay the course. Take advantage of that and watch your motivation soar!
You have to be curious about yourself enough to where you are willing to experiment on what works for you and what doesn’t. Too many people give up or cave in because they discover that a certain approach doesn’t work for them that did for someone else.
So what? Try something else.
Make a tweak to it and see what happens.
What works specifically for you to get the results you need?
Be curious and experiment on what you need and you’re guaranteed to eventually crack the code of what helps you focus and get things done.
Yes, it takes time.
Yes, it takes patience, BUT this is one of the greatest investments of energy and time that you can make which is in the efficiency of yourself. Do the work now so that you can be the best version of you later.
I hope that all 9 have been helpful for you. If you know of any others, please do share in the comments for us all to learn from. Remember that this is a journey not a race. Find a way to fall in love with the process rather than only focus on the outcome. You CAN do this. The only person that can truly stop you is YOU. So make a plan, get started and take it one day at a time!
