Motivation is Useless, Build Discipline instead.

You know those days when you set your alarm for even earlier than usual, in order to be more productive and get more done during the day? That’s what I’ve been doing a lot recently. Today was interesting though.

I woke up to the sound of my alarm, I was feeling quite tired and sleepy. I did my morning 20minute meditation, where I probably fell asleep a couple of times. After the 20minutes my brain was seriously trying to convince me to go back to sleep.

My mind was constantly trying to come up with excuses on how I will be able to do all the tasks on my to-do list later. It was trying hard to convince me to go back to sleep.

I sat down for a few minutes. Took a few deep breaths and I remembered of past experiences when I listened to my mind. I recalled what happened on the days, where I went back to sleep. I recalled how my day went.

Right then and there I decided to get up. One foot in front of another and I was up. Ready to take on the day.

What convinced me was the fact that I remembered all the other days, when I did go back to sleep. I remembered that on those days I felt very lazy and unproductive. Most importantly I knew that if I went back to bed, a whole hour will go by in 2-3seconds.

I thought about the amount of work I could get done in that hour, that’s what truly convinced me to get up.

Often times we talk about motivation. We come up with excuses for not following our dreams. Excuses like, I don’t have the motivation to lose weight, start my business…

But it’s not the motivation that’s required. In fact, motivation doesn’t do anything for you. Scientific research shows that motivation only lasts a maximum of 4 days. Think about it. How much weight can you lose in 4 days? Can you build a business in 4 days?

Motivation is a fad and I personally don’t believe in it anymore. I used to be a big believer in it and I still don’t have anything against it. But motivation isn’t what will make you successful in the long term.

In fact, the only time I think motivation is useful is when you’re starting out. If you’re in doubt about taking action, motivation can be a very good tool to make action taking a bit easier. But that’s about it.

What matters for long-term success is discipline. Not the kind of discipline that will cause you pain or suffering. But the kind of discipline that allows you to make priorities.

Often times we’re presented with decisions. Most of the time it’s a decision between something that will provide short-term and something that will provide long-term benefit.

Just like this morning. I was presented with 2 options. One was a short-term benefit decision – going back to sleep. The other one was a long-term benefit decision – getting up and starting with my day.

That’s all that discipline is. Discipline is the ability to focus on the long-term benefits. That goes directly against the way of how our brain is structured. Our brain constantly wants pleasure as soon as possible. Discipline, however, is harder, it takes willpower and focus. That’s why not many people have it. That’s also the reason why people that do have it are usually successful in the area where they’re disciplined.

In short, you have to keep on doing it, until the uncomfortable becomes comfortable. You have to keep on doing it until discipline becomes part of who you are.

Thank you for reading.

Until next time,

Benjamin 🙂