Pick Your Pain: the Pain of Discipline or the Pain of Regret

 

“We must all suffer from one of two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. The difference is discipline weighs ounces while regret weighs tons.” – Jim Rohn

Everyone knows some type of pain is needed for success. But how much?

I wrote a post about how sacrifice relates to self-discipline.

Sacrifice is the “what”, this post is the “why”.

You can only sacrifice what you have for what you want by using self-discipline.

This article will dissect the pain of self-discipline and how it’s different from the pain of regret.

Let’s dive in.

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The Existential Dilemma of Life and the Pain/Pleasure Paradox

As a human being with conscious awareness, you will experience varying degrees of pain and pleasure in your life.

Knowing this, humanity has set up civilization (especially modern civilization) to eliminate pain as much as possible and enhance pleasure to a significant, dare say, infinite degree.

However, you’re never going to experience all the pleasure and neither will you eliminate all the pain in life.

So the consolation becomes: how do you only experience necessary pain and dial down the unnecessary pain?

Understanding the difference between these two are vital to utilizing self-discipline effectively and living a happy life.

Necessary vs. Unnecessary Pain

An example of necessary pain is doing the hard work of cardio training in order to condition your heart, preventing health problems in the future.

An example of unnecessary pain is staying up late playing video games knowing you have work or school in the morning.

Necessary – learning a valuable skill in order to command a higher salary at a job.

Unnecessary – taking drugs and having to deal with drug addiction that comes months or years afterwards.

As you can probably tell, this is the difference between short-term gratification and long-term discipline. Or better yet the pain of regret vs. the pain of discipline.

You put the work in today so you won’t have to do it tomorrow.

Understanding Self-Discipline: What It Is and Why We Care

There’s tons of definitions of “self-discipline” floating around but there’s only one true definition.

Self-discipline is the act of corralling and marshaling your emotions, behavior, and mental resources to achieve a goal or intention that would not be achieved in the absence of this intention.

In other words, doing something that if you didn’t get your lazy ass out of bed or off the couch, would not and could not be done.

Using this definition, it’s pretty obvious that all of the good things we know, enjoy, and want in life are a product of self-discipline:

  • Thriving businesses
  • Excellent health
  • Money in the bank
  • A strong and chiseled physique
  • A great romantic relationship
  • Inner peace

All of these are conscious efforts. These things don’t just “occur” spontaneously, they have to be consciously striven towards.

Self-discipline inevitably leads to self-mastery, where greater success comes to you at a faster rate.

This is all great and all…but again, you have to sacrifice. You must sacrifice the immediate gratification of what you want for what you need to do. It is non negotiable.

“You go after things. You try, even if you fail, you get back up and you continue to try and fail and continue to try and fail, and ensuring…you never fail to try.” – Greg Plitt

The Two Worst Enemies of Self-Discipline

It’s been frequently stated that 80% of the obstacles you will face in life will be internally generated , while 20% will be external.

In this case, the two biggest obstacles to self-discipline are internal:

  • The “expediency factor”
  • Anxiety over feedback/results

Both of these combine to create the single biggest destroyer of human potential.

What is the Expediency Factor?

The expediency factor is simply the human tendency to want results and feedback as quickly as possible with as little effort as possible, stacking together as many of them together as possible. Also known as “instant gratification”.

For example: taking drugs. Immediate pleasure. Watching erotica. Immediate pleasure. Drinking alcohol. Immediate pleasure. Eating pizza. Immediate pleasure. Cheating on a test and getting an A. Immediate pleasure.

All of these things give you immediate hits and require little energy.

Expediency factor isn’t necessarily bad, it’s why we have some of the biggest developments in our modern world. But for success, it is a killer because it trains you to want big things with little effort involved. Over time, this weakens your self-efficacy and emotional foundation.

Lack of Feedback

You don’t get good feedback for a good habit the first day you do it.

The first day you start running or going to the gym sucks.

The first day you start learning how to code websites sucks.

The first time you ask out a woman and get rejected will probably suck.

All of these things are immediately painful. Likewise, as you continue to build up the habit, wins don’t start stacking until sometime after.

You won’t play guitar like Slash or Jimi Hendrix after practicing every day for a month or even a year.

You won’t be jacked like an IFBB pro bodybuilder after you go to the gym consistently for several months.

You won’t become a millionaire just from saving 1,000 dollars.

The things people want in life like a nice body, being skilled at a musical instrument, or financial independence only occur after long periods of time with little or sometimes even no visible results.

Being able to persist in spite of immediate feedback is one of the ways you execute self-discipline and why many people just don’t do it.

How to Choose the Pain of Discipline vs. the Pain of Regret

There’s only a couple of ways in which you can defeat the enemies of self-discipline but here are two of the most effective ones.

1. Research

In the case of knowing what to allocate your energy towards, knowledge is power. In this short life on earth, we need to know that we’re not wasting our time and that our eventual striving will produce a result.

You want to “buy in” to this investment of energy, time, and possibly even money. You want to create faith without a shadow of a doubt that:

Yes, this is worth it.

In that case, research the end result of what you plan on doing.

If you plan on taking up an instrument, take a look at people who are proficient at the instrument and learn what it took for them to gain proficiency. See what mastery or near-mastery looks like. Do you want to play gigs? Do you want something to impress your friends? Do you just want the feeling of competence and confidence?

If you want to start a business, study successful individuals and companies in your industry and replicate their path to success. Are you looking for the experience? The profit? The freedom? All three? Note it down and see the end results of what happens when you start an entrepreneurial endeavor.

You may not be able to get their exact results due to factors like “luck” or inborn talent, but if you put enough effort in, you may be able to get in the same ballpark and then use that as a base to build further individual success from (AKA launchpad capital).

This dismantles the enemy of lack of feedback because it shows what could happen if you take certain actions. It also provides inspiration in tough times and a “light at the end of the tunnel”.

To learn more about this concept, check out this podcast episode:

2. Commit to the Long Game

If you want to see real change in anything you do whether it be quitting smoking, starting a new exercise routine, or even just committing to going to sleep on time, you need to be invested in what your life will be after long chunks of time doing certain things.

Habits and neurological wiring are established by repetition, which means doing things repeatedly over long batches of time before it seems “normal”.

It also depends on when you start. Starting sooner and starting younger (if you can) is better because your brain is more plastic. It is much easier to “get things” when your brain is still developing and setting up for adulthood. It’s not impossible to change when you’re fully in your adult ways, it’s just that it won’t seem as “natural” to create that habit because you have years of life experience in which to compare it against. It’s much easier for a 25 year old who has been smoking since 18 to quit than a 55 year old with 30+ years of life experience.

As an example, I have what many men want: a muscular body and low body fat percentage. This is the end result of training many hours over the course of years. I established the habit of going to the gym at least 4 days a week at the relatively young age of 20.

It was easy for me to form that habit because I was relatively young along with the feedback that my body was transforming (more strength, more muscle). Now, several years later – at 25, it is more difficult for me not to go to the gym than to go. It feels odd when I don’t work out for several days in a row.

Likewise, there are many people who start exercising at 36 or 45 and find it incredibly difficult to start or even continue. Not only are they older, but they have decades of time when they didn’t exercise and that momentum is pushing against them.

Committing to the long game and habit formation dismantles the expediency factor because you realize that anything good you want to create will not happen in 90 days or even half a year. You then commit to creating good habits because that is what will make your life much easier in the long run. You choose discipline rather than regret. You choose the pain of creation rather than the pain of inertia.

This is the mindset you need to wield the sword of self-discipline.

Conclusion and Final Thoughts

The only real antidote to not suffer regret in your later years is self-discipline and effort.

You need to pick what goals you want, research what is required to get there, and decide that you will do what is required for that goal to be accomplished. You are sacrificing yourself for the goal.

In a world filled with instant gratification, we are programmed and socialized to go for the quick fix. Most people are not trained from a young age to discipline themselves for long-term success and striving. As a result, we as adults have to build it into ourselves.

We must decide to do battle and arm ourselves against the expediency factor and lack of immediate feedback on a daily basis. We must decide that goal achievement and goal striving is worth any cost.

Because the factor of the matter is…if you don’t work to achieve your goals, you will be put to work to achieve the goals of others.

If you don’t build your dream, someone will hire you to help build theirs. - Tony Gaskins Click To Tweet

So…what’s it going to be?

If you want a great end-to-end system to help you develop your own productivity blueprint, check out the course Cornerstone. It’s full of foundational strategies and tactics designed to help you take your life to the next level.

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