Episode 21: The Importance of Self-Discipline

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Foreign welcome to another episode of K12 Education Untamed. My name is Dr. Kim Fields, former corporate manager turned educational researcher and advocate, and I'm the host of this podcast. I got into this space after dealing with some frustrating interactions with school educators and administrators, as well as the micro discriminations that I faced while raising my two kids who were in the public school system. I really wanted to understand how teachers were trained and what the research provided about the challenges of the public education system. If you're looking to find out more about current topics in education that could affect you or your children, then you're in the right place. In today's episode, I will be discussing the importance of self Discipline. I have always been an observant person because you can learn a lot from observing others. For example, I know that my husband is very undisciplined. I have learned this from observing him for over 20 years. He sets out to perform a certain number of tasks each day without completing most of them because he's easily distracted. He's also an emotionally reactive person. He tends to be inclined to respond to everything emotionally, mostly in a negative way. All of his tasks seem to have the same priority urgent. In reality, everything can't be urgent. He can set intentions to change his diet or go for a walk or exercise, but these things rarely come to fruition. Maybe he's ruled by the characteristics of his zodiac sign, or maybe he never learned the skill of self defense discipline growing up? I'm not sure. But what I do know is, and this is what got me to thinking on the topic of self discipline, that without self discipline very little is accomplished. Self discipline is one of those important traits that a person can have. It's the ability to control your thoughts, feelings and actions in order to reach your goals. Self disciplined people are able to stay focused and motivated even when things get tough. They're able to stick to their commitments and put in the hard work required to achieve their goals. They're also able to resist temptations and resist giving up when things get difficult. Self discipline requires dedication and self control, but it's essential for achieving success in any area of life. If you want to be successful, you need to learn how to be self disciplined. So what are the characteristics that would identify someone as being a self Disciplined person Here are the characteristics that come to mind for me 1. Dedicated efforts 2amorning routine or schedule 3. Mental mindset and 4 setting priorities let's start with the first one. Dedicated effort self discipline involves consistently putting your efforts into accomplishing the tasks that you set out to complete on any given day. It means staying focused and and not being distracted by things that are not important. This work involves a dedicated effort and doing the work when no one is watching. It involves understanding the big picture and keeping your goals ever present before you. It means powering through without excuse because we can all come up with excuses like I'm too tired, I don't feel like it, I'm too old, I'm not smart enough, I don't have the support from friends and family and other excuses along those lines. Self discipline means being laser focused on those things that set out to be accomplished because they're meaningful and important to you. It involves doing your best work and being proud of the results. It involves understanding the big picture and utilizing processes, procedures and routines that allow you the space to complete what needs to get done. Morning Routine One of the things that is essential in setting up for success in the day is a morning schedule. What you accomplish in the first two hours of every day sets the direction for your day. Do what's important for you to get your mindset established. This could be waking up with prayers and gratitude, followed by some type of exercise to stretch or move your body. It could also involve reading inspirational or motivational chapters or verses from a book. It involves eating or drinking healthy foods or green drinks. It also includes reviewing your to do list that you created the night before so that you know when you have established those priorities for the day. For me, my morning routine consists of prayers and affirmations as well as morning stretches. I also like to listen to 5 to 10 minutes of an audiobook or a meditation. These are things that are not beneficial for a morning routine. Checking emails, scrolling on social media, watching the news, eating an unhealthy breakfast, and not incorporating some type of physical movement. When you wake up checking emails and scrolling on social media, you let everyone else's agenda become yours. You are basically responding to their to do list. For you, how you start out your day sets up your mindset for the day. It's what provides you with the motivation, inspiration, and direction to guide you throughout the day. Mental Mindset Self discipline is the product of a mental mindset, a framework of thoughts and emotions that are your internal compass. Thoughts guide your every action. You can choose to produce beneficial thoughts or negative thoughts. We all know where negative thinking leads. It leads to stinking thinking. It leads to self doubt, a lack of confidence, no sense of purpose or direction. You tend to be reactionary and often have a of victim mentality. Controlling your emotions means controlling your reactions. Mental outlook is so important when you purpose to accomplish your goals. It's that I can do this mentality and then generating the emotions that support that. If there's something that needs to be learned, seek out the information through courses and books and seminars. Learning is such a vital piece to improving yourself and learning the skills that are necessary to build upon the knowledge that you already have. Learning also helps to shape your mental mindset, especially when you purpose to learn new things, new techniques and new information. Setting Priorities Understanding the difference between what is emergent, what is, what is urgent, what is important, and what is informational is a critical skill to master. Very few things that occur on a daily basis are emergent. Emergencies tend to be rare occurrences. They happen every once in a while. Everything is not always urgent. Some things are, but again most of what we deal with on a daily basis is non urgent. Taking care of business by handling those things that are urgent is necessary and the responsible thing to do. There are several things that are important to do on a daily basis, including feeding your children, getting them to school, taking care of their needs, nurturing your relationships, eating well, sleeping well, and completing the work that you are responsible for in your work or career. Most of the information that we receive on a daily basis is informational. There is no action to take, it's just collecting tidbits of knowledge. I used to use a four quadrant chart in project management that was very helpful in establishing priorities for each day in order to gauge my response to those priorities. Those quadrants were the ones that I mentioned before. Prioritizing activities that were emergent, urgent, important, or informational. This makes a big difference in where you focus your efforts. For the day. The top priority was given to emergencies. The next priority was given to any activities that were urgent. Activities that were important could usually be delegated to others with any follow up on those items. At the end of the day, the items that were informational warranted no response. Following this priorities hierarchy is where implementing your self discipline in accomplishing your daily tasks is most actively utilized. This priorities assessment is applicable to your personal as well as your professional life. It makes a big difference in what you accomplish on a daily basis. If you're constantly reacting to every piece of information that you receive, you'll never accomplish those high priority items that are urgent or important. Self discipline is one of the most important characteristics that identify someone as being successful. It's the ability to stay focused on what you're trying to achieve and not be distracted by things that derail your efforts. Self discipline is also about making sure that you stick to your goals when the going gets tough and you feel like giving up. Self disciplined people are usually successful in whatever they set their mind to because they have the duties, determination and perseverance to see things through. If you want to be successful in anything, developing self discipline is essential. Can you get someone to be self disciplined as an adult once their habituated patterns have been established? Probably not. You're not responsible for how they manage their day, their activities, or their tasks. This is something that is best taught at an early age. Setting routines such as completing homework, having dedicated space for homework, completing chores, practicing sports or music lessons. These are all things that help to instill a routine, a known process that will help to instill self discipline in a child as they govern or self respect regulate themselves on the completion of work as required. These four areas that I've mentioned could be developed into a self discipline policy that you create for yourself or your child. It can be a creative exercise in which your family sits down and establishes what the rules or processes are that are necessary to develop a self discipline policy statement. It can include incorporating guidelines for planning a morning routine, establishing the right mental mindset while being aware of thoughts and subsequent actions, creating a learning environment and setting priorities. I usually end these personal type podcasts with either a mantra, a quote, or a joke because I love surrounding myself with positive thoughts and words and I also like a good clean joke. Today I'll end the podcast with an inspirational quote from Dr. Martin Luther King. You don't have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step. If this is the type of subject matter in discussion that resonates with you, please subscribe to my podcast on whatever service you're listening to this also, I'd love to hear from you. So please leave me a comment or a review as well as a rating and share this episode with anyone you think would find it valuable. Be sure to tell your friends, family and community about my podcast. Thanks for listening today. I hope you'll come back for more occasional 12 educational discussions with even more exciting topics to untangle. By the way, if you have a burning question about an issue or a specific topic that you'd like me to cover and explore, shoot me a quick email@kimberationfruit education.com to let me know what your question is. Until next time, aim to learn something new every day.

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