Every April, 20,000 people come together to participate in The Boston Marathon.
Let’s take it a step further…
Across eight separate events in the US, 16,000 people complete a consecutive 2.4-mile swim, a 112-mile bike ride, and a marathon, known as an Ironman.
Question — What the hell is wrong with all of these people?!
Answer — Nothing. These people have all learned that proving to themselves what they are capable of is an exercise in building unbreakable confidence.
Life in today’s day and age has gotten pretty comfortable:
We can take showers with water hot enough to burn our skin.
We can turn the lights on and off simply by telling Alexa to handle it.
We can hop into the back seat of a stranger’s car and be wherever we need to be in a matter of minutes.
Don’t get me wrong — these modern day conveniences are AWESOME. I’m not going to argue that we should all crawl back into caves and start foraging for our meals.
Instead, let’s think about why discipline is a total game-changer.
Every January, your gym becomes the most dreaded part of your day because of the New-Year’s-Resolution-ers. By the third week of the month, however, the new crowd fizzles out and it’s back to business.
You complain about how you have no time to read, while your iPhone tells you you’re averaging 2 hours and 38 minutes on TikTok per day.
Of course you want to change your habits, but this desire fades when the habits feel a little inconvenient.
Instead of relying on motivation, you need to make a commitment to yourself.
We make commitments to our parents, friends, and colleagues all the time.
But why do we find it so difficult to make commitments to ourselves, and actually execute on them?
Start with the end goal in sight. Put aside the temporary suffering in exchange for the reward.
Make incremental changes in your day to day life — better known as habits.
After a few months of being an avid reader, it’ll start to feel so normal that you’ll feel like something’s missing if you miss a day of reading.
If there’s one thing you take away from this episode, it’s that doing hard shit makes you understand what you’re capable of.
I’m not saying you need to run an ultramarathon or sign up for Navy SEAL training.
But take this as a not-so-gentle reminder: every now and then you need to push yourself. Show yourself what you’re capable of.
The best things in life are waiting for you on the other side of your comfort zone. It’s up to you to build the willpower to go get them.
Thanks for listening. See you on the next episode of The Principle Podcast.
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