Habits Not Discipline: The Antidote of Life

Discipline, probably the most abused term in the self-help / productivity / growth space. From sub-reddit forums to youtube communities, people repeat the word like some broken record; the antidote to life’s frustrations and dissatisfaction. It is reverberated to the point people start to gaslight themselves, thinking how they themselves are the source of their problems. ‘Your life is like this because you are lazy and lack discipline.’ Time and again, you see a repeating pattern of self-help gurus and life coaches, basically belittling people for lack of discipline and treating them like fresh military recruits. “You are lazy.”, “You do not truly care about your life or yourself.”, “You do not have ambitions.” and so on.

Is this true? Is your life like this because you lack discipline? Do you face repeated failures because you lack discipline? I beg to differ. I think that is a misguided approach. I believe most people don’t grow, not because of low discipline but because they lack good habits (or they have too many bad habits). While it is partly true that most people do lack discipline, it is also an oversimplification and over-exaggeration. You do not get low grades because you can not sit in a stressful 2 day uninterrupted study session, just before your exam. You get low grades because you do not read for 10 minutes everyday. People do not fail at losing weight because they can not control their impulse to eat ice-cream (to be fair, some really can’t), they fail because they do not have a daily 10 minutes exercise session or don’t have a habit of eating healthy. 5- 10 minutes of a daily good habit hardly requires any discipline (I hope that is true for you).

Let us begin by understanding both. Habits are the actions we repeat—often without thinking. They are a big part of our personality. Unlike your typical action or task, habits just feel natural to us since we subconsciously perform them; they feel inherently human and do not feel forced. Discipline, on the other hand, is our inner strength. Our willpower or self-control to do the hard and difficult tasks. Discipline is especially useful when motivation is low. It allows us to avoid short-term gratification and forces us to do what needs to be done. As I mentioned above, discipline is overestimated but it is habits that truly change us and our lives because those small day to day actions produce life changing results.

Before I stress on why habits are the key to your life’s problems, let's talk about the flaws of discipline and why it is often ineffective and impractical.

• Discipline is not natural 

I bet all of us have heard this phrase, “If you have to force it, it is not natural.” This is especially true for discipline, since we basically force ourselves to do things that we do not want to do or feel uncomfortable. There have been numerous studies suggesting how discipline is not a naturally gained ability but a socially learned skill. Studies such as Social Learning Theory or Social Control Theory, suggest that self-control and discipline are learned and developed socially as individuals grow, learning from their peers, parental guidance, social reinforcement, etc. Now, I do not want to imply that we need to avoid every tough thing in life, but if doing a task feels hard and challenging every time we repeat it, something definitely is not in tune or natural. Doing a 5 minute jog is much more natural and fun than running on the treadmill for an hour, even just once a week.  

• Discipline drains your resources 

Discipline demands constant energy and willpower. Of course all of us have experienced the sudden spike in our willingness to do something difficult just after a cup of coffee. Gailliot et al. (2007) showed how self-control depended on glucose levels which are a limited energy source. Numerous other studies have linked self-control to glucose level in specific brain areas. In order to do the hard things, we need to be constantly fueled with both energy and emotional support. Doing 100 push ups twice or even once a week requires more than just ‘I need to do this’. You need an emotional trigger i.e. willpower to make you push the extra mile and what’s hard is that you need it every time since you are forcing yourself to do more. Personally, I do not have the energy to run for an hour, even once or twice a week, however I can skip rope for 2-3 minutes every other day without exhausting myself; I even manage to get better results.

• Discipline lacks sustainability 

As I mentioned before, discipline levels vary based on genetics, learned behaviour, mental strength and other key factors. Some have greater mental and physical stamina than others. And that is not even the issue. We can not constantly live in a state of stress and pressure, where we have to force ourselves to do difficult things. We are not machines. This makes keeping discipline last for a long duration, extremely difficult and impractical. This is the exact reason why people often feel excited and committed about their new year’s resolutions, only to end up forgetting or procrastinating or losing motivation. Baumeister et al. (1998) characterizes self-control as a limited resource which has a strain on mental and physical stamina. Ampel, Muraven & McNay (2018) showed a clear connection between energy use and self-control by highlighting how self-control processes depend on physical brain energy.

Discipline helps us tackle hard things because it consumes a lot of resources at a very short duration and we are not in abundance of willpower nor infinite energy. Not to mention, this often leads to burn out which then causes the need for more motivation to do the same task next time.  Muraven, Tice & Baumeister (1999) suggest that self-control effort reduces performance. Continuous use of discipline leads to poorer performance on a physical stamina test as well as causes mental and physical fatigue. The Burnout studies also show how continuous self-control demands drain internal resources, leading to attention failures, cognitive fatigue, and drops in performance. Hence, discipline is also not sustainable for the long run.

Now let’s talk about why habits are the ideal substitution; the engine of progress and growth. Habits are the solution to your life’s problems, not discipline.

• Habits are innately human 

Human beings are habitual creatures. From our bodily functions like appetite or sleep cycles to our personalities and behaviours, we rely on habits because they work so well. Ann Graybiel & Theresa Desrochers et al. suggest that habit development emerges spontaneously from brain activity. Numerous other studies have suggested how habit building is common across animals i.e. habits are pervasive in animal behavior and supported by specific brain networks.

• Habits are part of our default subconscious wiring 

Verplanken & Orbell 2012 give direct evidence that habits can run outside of conscious deliberation. They are a shortcut to mental decision making. This means no distraction, procrastination or demotivation. It is just as normal as eating or talking, part of the daily routine that you do not give any thought to. You just do it instead of thinking about doing it. You just make your morning coffee. You just take the same route to work or school. Actions that you are unaware of. What if you had the habit of ‘Jogging before breakfast’ or ‘Reading before bed’ or ‘Talking to random people on the bus or train’? These are all habits that have positive outcomes (Yes, even talking to strangers).

• Habits are energy and resource efficient 

Habits are extremely sustainable in terms of resource consumed and output generated. You do not waste time or energy thinking about doing them or how to do them. Meaning they require less cognitive processing or willpower. Haith & Krakauer (2018) suggests that habits reduce the amount of conscious processing and cognitive load required to perform them. You don’t feel burned out after making your cup of coffee, do you? Now, replace that habit with a 5 minute session of rope skipping or jogging or any other healthy activity. In addition, they are extremely effective. Since habits are repeated behaviours and patterns, error is minimal. We all know the feeling of how things start to mess up the moment we think about them. There is also little to no need for deliberate control mentally, making them smooth and continuous even under stress.

• Habits are persistent

Habits are hard to change. We all have heard the saying, “old habits die hard.” Thomas GO, Poortinga W, Sautkina E. (2016) show how habit disruption can cause behavioural instability. Disrupting a habit causes cognitive uneasiness as you will become more aware to find an alternative to replace that habit. If you miss it, you will immediately feel the mental uneasiness. Just like how you don't feel good if you miss your daily morning coffee, you can also feel uneasiness if you miss your daily bath or exercise or journal.

Discipline is in no way insignificant and it is a crucial ability that we all should have and develop. However, to rely upon it entirely for progress and solving life’s problems is neither practical nor healthy. Building long-lasting habits that stimulate change in your personality, behaviour and even to your environment is the key to shaping your life in the manner that is ideal and acceptable to you. If your default behaviour is to walk up early, avoid high caffeine drinks, and do a 5 minute session of exercise, that will produce more outcome than a 1 hour stressful session at the gym, where you constantly have to fuel yourself with motivation and validation. If you have a habit of keeping things neatly organized, you won’t muster up a week’s worth of discipline and spend your weekends cleaning your room.

Both habits and discipline are useful but in different contexts. Some habits require you to be disciplined in order to be a part of your behaviour pattern. Fortunately, that is not the case for most habits, which are simply uncomfortable at first. My personal experience has always been my habits helping me achieve what I want. Being disciplined and harsh on myself and creating stressful times has never worked well, and in fact it has made me give up on things. Good habits have always helped me avoid desperate times and have kept things running like a well-oiled gear in my life. blueprint is also based on this core concept of habit building and is carefully designed. Feel free to give it a try.