TERRI: Self-Discipline is leaning into resistance. You
know, it's taking action in spite of how you feel.
Motivation is your overall desire to do
something. So here's how you move from
motivation to a lifestyle of self-discipline.
TERRI: Hey, I'm Terri Savelle Foy your cheerleader
of dreams. Hey, I want to talk to you today about
five proven methods to help you stay disciplined. You know, I
have posted something on Instagram asking if we could
just sit down and talk. What is the one question you would want
me to answer? And we received hundreds of questions and I
actually wrote down the most common ones. And then I counted
how many times the most popular ones were asked. So today I want
to address one of the top five questions, which is this... How
do you stay disciplined with your habits? Well, it's not
coincidental that the most common trait I've seen in the
most successful people in the world is self-discipline. Now,
let me distinguish between self-discipline and motivation.
Self-Discipline is leaning into resistance. You know, it's
taking action in spite of how you feel. Motivation is your
overall desire to do something. So here's how you move from
motivation to a lifestyle of self discipline. You Ready?
Okay. Number one is decide on your new identity. Now let me
explain this. You know, for a moment, forget about the goal
you're trying to achieve. Instead, focus on the identity
you want to have. You know, in James Clears book on atomic
habits, he explained it like this. He said, imagine two
people are resisting a cigarette. One person says, no
thank you, I'm trying to quit. Sounds reasonable. But this
person still sees them self as a smoker who's trying something,
but their identity is a smoker trying to be something else.
They're hoping that this behavior will change while
carrying the same beliefs. Now the second one declines by
saying, no thanks, I'm not a smoker. Now, sounds like a minor
change, but it's major. See, they've already decided on this
new identity, even though they're still in the process of
changing. So saying, I'm not a smoker, is a significant change
in your identity. So what they're declaring is smoking is
a part of my former life, not my current identity. So once you've
established a change in your identity and yes, you get to
decide, then you're going to begin walking in alignment with
that new identity. You know, you may have heard me talk about how
for 11 years after college graduation, I was pretty much
lazy, in a Rut, didn't work out consistently only for summer or
spring. I was terrible with my money, didn't save any spent,
everything we earned. I would wake up at the last minute to go
to work. I had no ambition. But in 2002 I decided on a whole new
identity. You've heard these day. I looked at my life, you
know, I was separated from my husband, in debt, unhealthy. My
house was a mess, I was a mess. And I had a little five year old
girl looking to me for inspiration. And I remember when
I started making changes and people started noticing my
discipline, my style of working out every day, getting up at
five o'clock reading, listening to messages, and they started
commenting. Terri is so disciplined and I would hear
that and I loved it. And you know what? It made me want to
maintain that identity. So start thinking of yourself as who you
want to be. An athlete, a writer, a singer, a designer.
You know, someone who's fit and healthy. And remember your
behavior will never deviate from your personal identity. So the
way you view yourself is how you will act. If you view yourself
as a procrastinator, you will procrastinate. If you view
yourself as lazy, you will maintain a lazy lifestyle. So
ask yourself, you know, what labels have you put on yourself?
Like if you had a little post it note, what would you put on
yourself? Who Do you need to become to achieve your goals? So
start thinking of changing your behavior by changing your
identity. Disciplined, athletic, motivated, consistent,
organized, proactive, early riser. So think about that.
Number two is affirm it every day. This is pretty intense, but
you get the picture. How do you change the way you view
yourself? It's with the words of your mouth. You know, God's Word
says, "Thou shall decree a thing and it will be established unto
you." So, no wonder you may have stayed lazy, procrastinating,
un-disciplined. Because you've been decree in it. So do the
opposite. Start declaring, I am disciplined, I am proactive, I
am energetic, I am successful. So change your internal and your
external dialogue about yourself. You know, I made a
list in 2007 and I begin speaking it over myself, which
was the exact opposite of who I truly was. But you know what
happened my life and my behavior started lining up with my words.
So change what you're saying and you'll change what you're
seeing. Number three is look at reminders you might say, of
what? Of why you're being disciplined in the first place.
You know, I heard a story about a guy who, he went to the doctor
for a checkup because so many people, his family had died of a
certain heart condition around his age. Well, the doctor said
flat out, he said, your wife is pregnant, right? He said, do you
want to live to see this child go to school? Do you want some
other man walking your daughter down the aisle? Here's an
example. You know on her wedding day, he gave him like this harsh
reality. He said, if not, then you better change your eating
habits. He said, change your fitness routine. Well, that's
all it took. He said, now you know, he has photos on his phone
of his wife, his children, you know, just picturing this is who
I'm doing it for. He said, this is why I get up at five o'clock
in the morning and go to the gym. This is why I ate a salad
over the cheeseburger most meals. So put your goals, put
your reasons, your why on your phone. You know, they say, we
check our phones at least 80 times a day on average 80 times.
So put your motivation on your screensaver. He could be a child
going to college. Put your child with a graduation cap on your
phone. You know, that can be your reminder to stop eating out
and start putting that money in a savings account so you get the
picture. Number four is set yourself up to succeed. In other
words, planning your habits on your calendar, not just the day,
but the time to map out your entire week on your calendar.
Now, I always do this on Sunday night. I don't do say workout
Monday through Friday. I say workout five o'clock to six
o'clock and get everything ready the night before. If you want to
start working out, get your clothes out the night before you
want to save money and stop spending everything. Set up
automatic withdrawal into your savings account as soon as you
get paid, just do it and you will be amazed one year from now
when you see how much you've saved, you want to stop eating
late at night or eating too much junk food empty the pantry of
all the junk food. Only have what is healthy and you'll start
to break the habit. If you're spending too much money each
week, eating out at lunches, put a certain amount of cash in an
envelope for the week and when the cash is gone, you stay home
or you take your lunch. Okay, number five. My last point is
track your progress. You know this is a habits calendar that
we have here, but use a calendar that you can start tracking
because you need to see how this disciplined you become mark
through each day that you keep your commitment with yourself
and that's just it. The more you keep your promise to yourself of
reading 20 minutes a day, saving $25 a week, working out five
days a week, your confidence is going to grow tremendously and
your self discipline is going to soar. Theodore Roosevelt said it
like this. He said, "With self-discipline most anything
is possible." Let me give you a little side now before we close
this out. Learn to love the discomfort. Every time you feel
discomfort, celebrate, get excited because it means you're
growing. You have you know groaning in your stomach because
you're hungry and maybe you've gone on a fast. That's a good
sign. Things are changing. It means you're succeeding, you're
getting closer to the goal. Just like go into the gym and working
out makes you feel better. Every time you embrace discomfort, you
are practicing self discipline and you always feel good when
you leave the gym, right? You've embraced the discomfort. It
makes you better. So just remember the struggle is good
for you. And let me just, let me tell you this story because I
thought it was pretty interesting. It was the story I
heard about a beekeeper who he said that, you know when the
little bee is in the first stage, it's put into this little
cell and enough honey is actually stored there for its
use until it reaches maturity. Now, I never knew this, but he
said the honey is sealed with a capsule of wax and when the tiny
bee has fed itself on the honey and it runs out, that means its
time has come for the bee to emerge out into the open. But it
is quite the struggle straining to get through the wax. Now this
is what it said. If the only way for the beat to exit is through
this agony of the struggle, the Bee actually rubs off this
little membrane that hid its wings. And on the other side
it's able to fly. In fact, the beekeeper said one time a moth
got into the hive and it fed on all the wax and the bees just
got out without any strain or trouble. But here's the thing,
they couldn't fly and the other bees stung them to death. And
now the words, your struggles are never wasted. The Times you
push yourself to do what's best, what's you know, do what's going
to help you down the road. It's always for your benefit. So I
want to challenge you, embrace the struggle embrace the self
discipline. This the fun. And Hey, I hope you enjoyed this
podcast today. If you'd like to dig a little deeper into this
topic, you can actually download my podcast notes cause I may
have gone a little fast today, but I want you to get my notes
so you can really study what I said. Just click the link below,
go to terri.com/self-discipline and I want to give you my notes
and don't forget, follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter,
and if this video spoke to you, please share it with
someone else. You can get on this growth track
together. Thank you for watching and remember,
I'm cheering you on to live your dreams.