Discipline Day

Before I elaborate on a practice I call Discipline Day, I would like to take a moment to look at this interesting word. Discipline can be a noun or a verb and can have both positive and negative associations. Some of the positives may include self-control, training, and a branch of knowledge. The negatives are usually associated with some form of punishment, sacrifice or strictness. Over the years, while helping people connect with and heal their hearts, the concept of discipline is often involved. For some, it stirs up past traumas for being disciplined or punished in ways that objectively seem cruel or excessive. We may carry these traumas into adulthood and find ways to punish ourselves or those closest to us with the same justification told to us when we were children. I would like to focus on self-discipline or self-control as a positive, necessary and integral part of being human.

Self-discipline can help us achieve balance in many areas of our lives including diet, exercise, relationships and work. Through self-discipline we can use the power of the mind to love and protect ourselves in a more healthy way. We can also transform negative habits and behaviors to positive ones.  Developing our muscles of self-control can help us to pause before reacting negatively and choose to act from higher and more authentic place. I will expand more on this in my next book of the Enlightened Living 101 series, The Way of Body, Mind and Spirit. In the first book, How to be a Great Parent to Your Inner Child, we explored an east-west perspective on your heart being both your Ruler and your most prominent Inner Child. I have seen many variations of how parents discipline their children in the name of love. I cannot judge as to which methods are fair or most effective. Each society, culture, religion and individual family has certain ideas around discipline.

There are many ways on how self-discipline can help your heart. You will need to reflect on what works best for you. As a child, I associated the word discipline with self-control and martial arts training of the body, mind and spirit. Whatever punishment I received, whether at home or in school, was punishment and was not associated with the word discipline in my mind back then. Many of our early traumas can lead our hearts to cope with our pain and suffering in ways that do not serve us well as adults. For example, we may have certain habits, addictions, self talk and behavior patterns used to punish ourselves or in someway hold us back. Oftentimes we are giving into our heart or inner child to numb ourselves, find comfort or reinforce negative programming of who others said we were or should be.

I would like to offer you some simple ways to develop and individualize healthy self-discipline which can help develop trust and help your heart feel loved and safe for your higher good. When I began working with mental health patients with serious addictions to drugs and alcohol, there was often a new patient in the group who would challenge my ability to help them because I was not a former addict. On the one hand, not being an addict gave me a chance not to have the same blind spots that a former addict may share with their patient. On the other hand, with a little honest reflection, I acknowledged my serious addiction to sugar and began figuring out what I needed to do to break this habit. I developed more empathy for my patients trying to quit a substance and what it took to remain sober. Unlike most drugs, sugar is in most foods and had a lot of positive associations for me growing up. My approach involved a series of baby steps weaning myself off all refined sugar and all its aliases.

Fast forward to today. As part of my continued awareness of my sugar addiction, I have become very conscious of what I am choosing to eat and why. There are times when I will allow my inner child to fully enjoy sweets (often something with stevia or naturally sweet), knowing very well what I may need to do to balance my eating later. One of the things I do to strengthen my mind and will power and ultimately serve my heart is Discipline Day. For instance, I will choose one day and tell myself no matter what, I will not eat any refined sugar. Of course this will usually be the day that my colleagues may unknowingly leave my favorite childhood cookies in the common kitchen area to share. Every hour throughout the day I would look at the cookies when I would wash my hands. As I was finishing up for the day, I would see one or two of my favorites still there. One of my inner children may say “go ahead”, “no one’s around”, “you were good all day”. I would then smile to myself and say, “Sorry today’s Discipline Day, maybe tomorrow”. Usually all the cookies were gone by morning. Some of you may be thinking, what’s the big deal, what’s one cookie? Depending on how strong your discipline muscles are, that’s like saying it’s just one drink to someone with a serious alcohol issue.

Discipline day does not only have to be around food or addiction. Reflect on the part of you that could benefit from some self-control. Maybe you decide you want to do some exercise today. One friend challenged herself not to curse for the day. Maybe do something fun or kind for yourself or provide a service for others that nourishes your heart (like I wrote about in the good deed blog). Perhaps you want to learn a language, play an instrument, dance or paint. Maybe it means taking a break from TV or from social media. Connect with your heart and choose an area for you to apply Discipline Day as a way of nurturing, protecting and loving yourself in a healthy manner. Start with a no-brainer, achievable, baby step as a way to begin your Discipline Day practice. Building on successes is key to quickly strengthening inner trust and willpower. The holidays are often times where self-control and self-discipline go out the window. This is sometimes followed by self-loathing and regret. Perhaps you can reframe Discipline Day as giving yourself a gift or as a fun game you can play. Remember to start out with something meaningful and easy. Enjoy and all the best to you and yours this holiday season.