Each week I’ll be posting the things that have inspired me. Whether it be podcasts, books, research, or people, these are the things I think are worth sharing with everyone to hopefully inspire you as well.
Most of the things we think we need to focus on are things we shouldn’t be focusing on at all. It’s all just noise. We think we can do everything: become a cook, be a parent, learn a language, become a health guru, a blogger, a part-time musician, a video game developer, and on and on.
Focus and Discipline are two of the hardest aspects of achieving anything. One problem seems to be that people focus on too many things. People want to do everything and then when that proves to be too much they end up doing nothing at all.
I’m definitely guilty of this. My brain jumps to many things in rapid succession and it is hard to keep it under control. I’m very curious and I want to learn about and be good at so many different things. There are so many programming languages I want to learn that I dabble a lot and don’t really focus on one. I would like to begin public speaking. I have ideas for three games that I want to create. I’d love to get my guitar skill back to what it used to be. I always thought I’d get back into practicing Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and Muay Thai. Hell, at one time I even wanted to become a pro Starcraft player.
People also mistake the role of motivation in discipline. People say things like, “I’m just not motivated to go to the gym.” Substitute gym with anything you want. Things like learn a new language or eat well or go back to school all fit as well. But the fact of the matter is that motivation is fleeting. It is discipline that people need. The people who are successful at whatever they do don’t feel like doing it some days either. But those people show up and put in the reps.
Over the coming days and weeks, I’m going to be writing mostly about these two very important topics: focus and discipline. I’ll be examining books by Dr. Angela Duckworth (Grit), Charles Duhigg (The Power Of Habit, Smarter Faster Better), Stephen Pressfield (The War of Art), to name a few. I’ll be looking at what philosophers like Marcus Aurelius and Seneca had to say on the matter. I’ll also look at a couple of studies on the matter and how we can use the results to help us maintain discipline throughout the day.
This is an extremely interesting topic to me and I can’t wait to learn and share.
Well, I’m back. I’ve been thinking about doing this again for quite some time. Things are settling down as Thing Two approaches the two year mark. It is time to refocus on health and positive change. The format will be close to what it was before, but fewer deep research articles as I don’t have as much time.
Hello again, old friend. Quite some time has passed since we last saw each other. You haven’t changed much, but I have. Not really for the better either. You see, our on-again-off-again relationship over the last ten years have been really hard on me.
Just a guy trying to create positive change in his life. Husband, father, developer, reader, gamer, musician.