Unlocking Success through Self-Discipline: A Guide to Reaching Your Full Potential

Discipline is a word I don’t use very much, do you? 

It means :the practice of training people to obey rules or a code of behavior, using punishment to correct disobedience." Whoa no wonder I don’t use it much that sounds so rigid!! "Do as you are told or else!” I am sure we have all heard this before, but did we fall in line? If you are like me you probably felt less like falling in line. Ok well it depends right? Do not touch the sea monk on the beach - Got it and respect it! Stop talking in church, well maybe as an adult but probably not so much as a kid. I think you see where I am going here. 

So today I went to aerial yoga - a basics class - and half way through I went into shavasana. Why? I have some serious hip pain. It could be the fact I took two months off my practice while dealing with my neck/shoulder issue and then have gone 4 times in one week! With aerial yoga it takes time to get use to the silk biting you 😆 Either way I went to do Monkey and my hips were not having it. So I jumped in my silk and cocooned myself in while doing a Reiki session on myself for healing in my hips. 

It wasn’t that easy though! I kept thinking will the teacher be upset or come over to help? Will the other students see and wonder why I am not doing the other poses? What will they all think? BUT WHY?? THIS IS MY PRACTICE!! 

Then two things came to me. 

1. My why for stopping was pain and trying to heal myself. What could be so wrong with that?

2. In my Wednesday night class the teacher (who I love btw, she sings during half of the shavasana) often talks about honoring ourselves and giving love to ourselves. She had this message Wednesday night and specifically said do whatever your body is being called to do while you are here. 

So I released all those thoughts and started doing Reiki. And guess what? I felt really good with the extended shavasana. 

Of course 💫 no coincidence 💫 that a friend reached out to me shortly after my class with this quote, 

“This Month is going to require discipline if we are to stick to the task of uncovering our truth as opposed to what we were imprinted to believe” - The Power Path

Sounds like some shifting is happening with me and maybe with you as well! What do we value and where do our priorities lie? We have been taught by culture what to value, how to act, what to do and not do, so how about just honoring ourselves? Being honest with ourselves and acknowledging what is true for us. It means treating ourselves with compassion, understanding, gentleness, acceptance and LOVE. It’s not easy but I believe it’s definitely worth digging a bit deeper! We cannot immediately undo or heal damaging beliefs or wounds, we can ease into honoring ourselves ❤️

Here are some ways to practice this daily:

1. Forgive ourselves. None of us are perfect!

2. Pausing. Get still. It could be as simple as putting both feet on the ground of your office chair, relaxing and opening your heart space, let the sensations in your body take your attention vs your thoughts and simply breathe in and breathe out. Do this as long as you need and notice how you feel. 

3. Respect your body. What I was talking about above with my experience I was listening to what my body was saying and not pushing forward. 

4. Be honest with yourself. I almost talked myself out of doing what I needed because I was honest with myself. Here’s a quote to think about “The most fundamental harm we can do to ourselves, is to remain ignorant by not having the courage and the respect to look at ourselves honestly and gently.” - Pema Chodron 

5. Do something that makes you feel good. Play pickleball, read a book, watch a silly TV show and if you need help, see a supportive practitioner or therapist!

Try some or all of these practices and see where you are at the end of December!