Zheng Shenghui Study and Reflection Day 2387
Core content
There are many reasons why it is difficult to achieve self-discipline, such as overconfidence in oneself and the external environment, looking for objective excuses, wrong motives, fear of self-change, and so on. An important way to achieve self-discipline is called the "Daily Q&A". It reinforces our commitment, fuels us when we need it, and demonstrates the difference between active self-discipline and passive self-control.
Preface
Why is it so difficult for us to be self-disciplined, and how exactly should we do it?
Before we get into this book, let's take a look at how difficult it is to achieve self-discipline. Let me ask you a few questions first: Have you ever sworn to turn off your phone before 11 p.m. and go to bed, but you still scroll through Weibo Moments until late at night every night? Have you ever told yourself that you can't eat sweets anymore when you're overweight, only to end up indulging in the smell of strawberry cake? Have you ever planned to go out for a night run a hundred times, but still choose to snuggle up on the couch and watch TV and play with your phone every night?
I believe that each of us has experienced the above situations to a greater or lesser extent. We all find it very, very difficult to change a habit that has been going on for years through one or two whims. Most people choose to accept reality and continue to live according to the original track after trying and failing to change themselves, but few people stop to reflect on why it is difficult for us to become the ideal version of ourselves. The answer to this question given by the book "Self-Discipline" will surely satisfy you.
Marshall Goodsmith, author of the book "Self-Discipline", is a pioneer and authority in the field of global senior leadership training, and has been recognized by the American Management Association as "one of the 50 most influential top thinkers in management over the past 80 years".
Marshall has been invited to coach more than 150 CEOs of large global corporations and their management teams on leadership. According to Marshall, one of the many competencies a leader needs to possess is self-discipline. As a leader, the first person he wants to lead and control is himself. How to achieve self-management includes not only how to change your bad habits in life, but also how to further improve work efficiency and quality at work.
Why do we lack the ability to control ourselves in life and work, and how can we leave the gloomy past, create good behavior habits, and become the kind of person we want to be?
Today, I'm going to break down the core of the book into two parts for you. In the first part, we will first analyze why it is difficult for us to achieve self-discipline, and on this basis, we will talk about how to achieve self-discipline in the second part.
Part I
Let's start by looking at why it's so hard for us to be self-disciplined.
There was such a joke on the Internet before, many people were in the dark late at night, while staying up all night with black circles, and anxiously on their mobile phones, Baidu "What harm will staying up late do to the body" and "Will staying up late cause sudden death". This joke sounds funny, but it actually reflects a more serious contradiction, that is, many people know that staying up late is not good, but they still can't control their behavior and can't go to bed early. In fact, this problem, in essence, is the difficulty of self-discipline.
Why not stay up late playing with your phone, which sounds easy, but can be so laborious to do? Professor Marshall believes that people have difficulty in self-discipline for several reasons.
The first important reason for the difficulty of self-discipline is overconfidence, overconfidence in our execution, physical and mental strength, and external environment.
The difference between a self-disciplined person and a non-self-disciplined person is not in what they think, but in whether they can really put it into action. For example, many people can't quit staying up late, not because they don't know the harm of staying up late, but because they find it difficult to take the first step to change and put the idea of going to bed on time into action. So, knowing how to do it doesn't mean you're going to do it. If we are satisfied with knowing how to change our own path, but do not try to implement it, we will definitely be in vain in the end.
In addition to our overconfidence in our own execution, our overconfidence in our mental and physical strength is also an important reason for the failure of self-discipline.
I believe that many people will have this experience: when they wake up in the morning, they are full of energy, so they make a series of full plans for the day, and are full of hope that they will be able to complete the above tasks one by one. But before noon, you will find that doing things exactly according to the plan is almost an impossible task, because your interest and physical strength, from the moment you start to carry out the plan, are being consumed little by little with the passage of time. And when we feel tired and listless, our self-discipline will be greatly reduced, and we can be said to be powerless to complete the plan.
Therefore, Professor Marshall said, a plan that requires 100 percent absolute effort to achieve will lead to a loss of physical strength and energy, which is very detrimental to our self-discipline. Whether it's overconfidence in execution or mental strength, it all comes down to overconfidence in yourself. Overconfidence in the external environment will also affect the realization of the self-discipline plan.
You can recall that in the process of making your own plans, you may have considered combining work and rest, alternating between arts and sciences, but have you considered setting aside a certain amount of blank time in case you need it?
In fact, throughout the day, we will be interrupted by various episodes at hand, such as a WeChat message reminder or a courier call. The misconception of "thinking that we won't be distracted" often leads to unrealistically high expectations, and once this high expectation is interrupted by unexpected events, it will cause us to lose control of ourselves, and thus make the daily plan completely collapsed. Therefore, just as a cup of white water overflows if it is too full; Proper and reasonable daily planning, leaving some room for possible contingencies, and moving forward from retreat, often the results may be more satisfying.
The second reason why self-discipline is difficult is that we can always find all kinds of objective excuses for ourselves. This is also a very important reason why people have difficulty in self-discipline. Among the various objective excuses, "today is special" is definitely the one with the highest probability of appearing.
When we want to make excuses for our inappropriate behavior, every day can be considered a "special day." In life, when we find it difficult to stick to the matter of reading on time every night, we will weave all kinds of reasons for ourselves, for example, today is a holiday, I need to relax, and it is not too late to stick to the plan tomorrow. This way of dealing with it may seem like only one day is lost, but once you set a precedent for the first special day, then you are not far from the second or third special day. Blaming every interruption of your plans on the distraction of an external event will only reduce your self-discipline and create a tragic cycle of "tomorrow after tomorrow". If you really want to change your bad habits and become a better version of yourself, then, when distractions arise, you should firmly choose to ignore them - the path you choose, even if there are many forks in the road, you must not squint and go on without hesitation.
Walking the path of one's choice without hesitation means sticking to good habits – good habits are easy to do, but they are important to stick to. Many people who can't achieve thorough self-discipline and can't stick to a certain good habit consistently are because they have lost to "take it when you see it". Therefore, "accept what you see" is the third important factor affecting self-discipline.
For example, if a person wants to lose weight by exercising, but when his weight changes from excess to normal, he feels that he has reached his goal. But in fact, it is more difficult to maintain a healthy body and not let the lost meat rebound than to lose weight. Maybe weight loss is something that can be done within a certain time limit, but maintaining a healthy body is definitely not, maintaining a healthy body is a long-lasting, dynamic, and endless process, and like the formation of other excellent behavior habits, we need to persist and work hard day after day. Therefore, the hardest thing to achieve true self-discipline is not to "achieve" a certain good state, but to "maintain" it.
In order to maintain a good state of self-discipline, proper self-discipline motivation is crucial. Specifically, material rewards, such as promotions and raises, are not an appropriate motivation for self-discipline. There are two reasons for this: First, self-discipline does not necessarily bring you significant benefits and returns in a short period of time. If your utilitarian purpose is too strong, it means that you are more likely to be frustrated, and it is more difficult to persevere in your self-disciplined behavior. Second, self-discipline can bring you far more than material rewards.
Marshall's mentoring executives at prestigious companies has found that many leaders want to change because they believe from the bottom of their hearts that it is the right and beneficial decision because self-discipline can help them play a role in society and their families so that they can live better. And isn't this the best reward for self-discipline?
The last reason that affects the success of self-discipline is the anxiety of the public about self-change.
I used to have a friend who was very shy and introverted. In the workplace, because she is not sociable, she has suffered a lot of dumb losses; And in the love field, because she was passive and conservative, she also missed a lot of lovers. I once asked her, why don't you try to change yourself and be more cheerful and outgoing? She replied that she actually knew that changing her personality could bring her a lot of benefits, but she still didn't dare to make a change, because she was afraid that if she tried to become talkative and cheerful, it would be equivalent to completely denying the timid and introverted self of the past twenty years, and the cheerful she was only disguised, not her true self.
In fact, many people will have such concerns to a greater or lesser extent before they change themselves. Marshall argues that it is precisely this concern that induces our stubborn tendencies—because of the fear of losing our old selves, we refuse to adjust ourselves to new circumstances, and we refuse to restrain ourselves and change ourselves to achieve self-improvement. In fact, self-change is not only for a specific behavior, self-change can also be for you to define your own way - there are many ways to define a person, behavioral habits, personality and temper can certainly determine a person; However, you can also choose to define yourself with your own worldview, outlook on life, values, your artistic taste, cultural accomplishments, and unique experiences and memories. In this way, try to change the way you define yourself, and then change your habitual personality, so that you will not lose yourself because you are afraid of changing your habitual personality.
All of the above factors are the culprits behind the miscarriage of self-regulatory plans, and you need to keep them in mind at all times and take them as a warning.
So far, we've explained a few misconceptions that we've helped you understand why it's hard to be self-disciplined in the first part. In the following section, we will talk about how to achieve self-discipline.
Part II
The author, Marshall, believes that the fundamental difference between self-discipline and non-self-discipline lies in two completely opposite attitudes - active and passive. In order to achieve the specific goal of self-change and improvement, we need to proactively carry out targeted planning. Without planning, it's hard for us to get better. In practice, Marshall found that planning can not only increase our chances of success, but also help us save the precious time lost due to lack of goals and blind efforts, and improve the efficiency of our success.
The meaning of planning for us is similar to the proverb "sharpen the knife and cut the wood" and "if the worker wants to do his job well, he must first sharpen his tools". The process of planning is to sharpen the knife before chopping wood, which seems to add extra workload, but in fact, it helps us to complete tasks quickly and well, and achieve self-discipline and self-improvement. In daily life, when we get up on time at half past seven in the morning, when we tidy up the messy desk before spreading out the notebook, when we make a shopping list before going to the supermarket to shop, we are all making plans, we are "sharpening our tools", and we are all about achieving the next tasks smoothly and smoothly.
As for how to use planning to achieve self-discipline, Marshall provides us with the most convenient thinking tool in the book, which is the "daily question and answer method". Let's take a look at a specific weight loss plan case to explain why the daily Q&A method can help us achieve self-discipline.
Suppose you are seriously overweight, if you choose to stick to your weight loss plan through daily questions and answers, and develop good lifestyle habits. The first step is to set specific goals that you need to achieve each day – here we set two goals, one is to stick to a diet with fruit and vegetables, and the other is to exercise.
After setting specific goals for each day, the second step is to ask ourselves – am I doing my best to accomplish them? And in response, we need to rate our performance every day. For example, today, if I only drink fruit and vegetable juice and eat nothing else, I will set the first goal for myself: stick to the vegetable juice diet and score 10 points; And if we just take a short walk in the neighborhood because we're lazy, I'll give a three-point for my goal two: exercising.
Keep in mind that specific goals are not set in stone, for example, if we have been exercising every day for three months and have made exercise a natural habit, we can cross the goal of exercising from the goal list and replace it with a higher goal, such as running a marathon once a month, etc. For example, if I have been on a vegetable and juice diet for a period of time and have seen results, then for the sake of balanced nutrition and physical health, I should replace the vegetable and juice diet with a healthy and balanced diet.
This is the specific operation method of the daily Q&A, I believe you must be curious to know, is this method too simple, can it really help us achieve self-discipline? What's the rationale behind this – and why are daily Q&As so effective in helping us successfully change our habits and achieve self-discipline? There are three principles behind the daily question and answer method that help us achieve the goal of self-discipline.
The first reason behind the daily Q&A method is that it reinforces our commitment.
Life requires some rituals. What we think in our hearts, what we say, and what we type on our mobile phones are too easy to do, and the weight is too light - only by turning out the book, picking up the pen, and writing down one stroke at a time, can it be enough to have a sense of ritual and attract our attention. For many of us, writing down our goals means that we are able to face up to our shortcomings and want to make changes for the better. In fact, the process of writing also forces us to deeply reflect and examine ourselves; The process of writing is the process of thinking, and thinking is the first step in all changes.
The second principle behind the daily Q&A method is that we excite when we need to.
Everything we do is not for nothing, there must be some kind of motivation behind it, although sometimes, we are not aware of what that motivation is. Self-discipline is also a behavior, and it also needs to be motivated. Marshall divided all the motivations in the world into two broad categories: intrinsic and extrinsic. So what is intrinsic motivation?
Put simply, it means that we do something for our liking, such as reading a book that was not assigned by a teacher, or baking a loaf of bread for hours at home, all because of our intrinsic motivation. And what is extrinsic motivation? It's when we do something for an external reward, such as preparing for an important exam, or working hard for a promotion or a raise. The external motivation that gives us spiritual recognition or material stimulation is external. The daily Q&A is to help us do things that are neither driven by intrinsic nor extrinsic motives – in other words, you don't like those things and you don't reap the rewards in the short term for doing them.
In this regard, a weight loss program is a good example. You don't like to lose weight, because losing weight means exercising more and giving up all the delicious high-calorie foods that you used to eat, so there is no intrinsic motivation to lose weight. The extrinsic motivation for weight loss is also difficult to give immediately, after all, weight loss is a long-term process, and it will take a long time to get the praise of slimming down. That is, there is no extrinsic motivation to lose weight. Therefore, the daily Q&A method can help you face the things you don't want to do and don't have short-term results, and work hard to accomplish them so that you can achieve long-term, even life-long results.
The third principle behind the daily Q&A is that it can help you show the difference between self-discipline and self-control.
Here we first distinguish between the two concepts of self-discipline and self-control. Self-control, which refers to avoiding irrational behavior; Self-discipline, on the other hand, refers to the behavior of achieving ideals. For example, when we have eaten dinner and resist the temptation to eat dessert, this is self-control. And when we insist on going to the gym to exercise after work, it is self-discipline. Most of us are good at one part of self-discipline or self-control, not the other. Our preference for self-discipline or self-control is clearly reflected in the daily answers we make for ourselves.
For example, if we talk about quitting smoking for the same problem or goal, people who prefer self-discipline will be worded differently than people who prefer self-control. People who prefer self-discipline might say, "Am I doing my best to limit myself to smoking?" And someone who prefers self-control might say, "Am I doing my best to resist tobacco?" "Do you notice the subtle difference? People who prefer self-discipline will always be aggressive, while people who prefer self-control will always act with a passive resistance attitude. So, if you're someone who prefers self-control over self-discipline, try to choose proactive wording when making plans, for example, by replacing "do I do my best to avoid how and how" with the expression "do my best to do how and how". In this way, you can unconsciously strengthen your own self-discipline.
summary
In the first part, we talked about several reasons why it is difficult for us to be self-disciplined, such as overconfidence in ourselves and the external environment, or finding objective excuses for not being able to be consistent. There are also things like wrong motivations and anxiety about self-change – these are all stumbling blocks on the road to self-discipline.
In the second part, we talked about how to achieve self-discipline. After emphasizing the importance and significance of self-planning for self-discipline, we shared with you the daily Q&A method brought by Professor Marshall. The method is very simple: the first step is to set specific goals that you need to achieve on a daily basis; The second step is to rate my performance each day by saying, "Am I doing my best to achieve these goals?" It's important to emphasize that setting specific goals is not set in stone, and you need to adjust it appropriately according to your own accomplishment.
The reason why the daily question and answer method is effective for self-discipline is because of the following three reasons: the daily question and answer method will strengthen our commitment first; the second will be the engine when we need it; Third, it can also highlight the difference between self-discipline and self-control.
Written by: Liangzhou Studio; Brain map: Liu Yan; Source: Get APP Listening Book Column
Disclaimer: Except for the original content, the text, pictures, audio and video of the push manuscript are all from the Internet and major mainstream media. The copyright belongs to the original author, if you think the content is infringing, please leave a message below the article to contact us to delete or pay the manuscript fee.
Mom is anxious, come to the Mother's Wisdom Cultural Center!
Address: Hangzhou Southern Song Dynasty Royal Street "Inseparable Mother Wisdom Cultural Center"
Contact: Mr. Ye Zi