The Science of Self-Discpline

Improving consistently over time

provides consistent positive feedback to keep you motivated to continue. It also gives you the time to focus on your thought patterns and behaviors in order to develop new neural pathways in your brain so that you steadily change your habit.

Techniques that help them maintain clear mental states even stressful environments. Box breathing

recognize that you are feeling overwhelmed, regain your control by focusing on your breath— breathing in for four seconds, holding for four seconds, and then out for four seconds, and repeating until you can feel your heart rate slow down and normalize. A stressed-out mind is an inefficient and uncreative mind, and so it is crucial for you to be able to remain calm if you want to perform to your full potential. The technique itself is easy, but the real key is to be able to recognize when your arousal might spiral out of control and sabotage your self-discipline. Whenever you feel your heart beginning to race or your palms beginning to sweat, try focusing on your breath to reign in your undesirable reactions. If you can use box breathing at the first hint of physical arousal or stress, you will fare well because you will be able to control it. It's easier to stop it rather than manage it.

Habit formation and self-discipline come down to

small action persisting over 66 days that you must power through without regard to your emotional state.

Goals with sub-components

success in one of the sub-goals can reduce efforts on the others. For example, to improve your health you may be determined to eat more healthily and hit the gym more often. Yet success at healthy eating can reduce your motivation to work out. You may rationalize to yourself that you had a salad for lunch, so you can skip tonight's workout. Your overall goal is to improve your health and your healthy eating is giving your brain the symbol it wants.

telling others of your goals gives you

"premature sense of completeness." The way this works is based on the "identity symbols" in your brain that give you your self-image. These symbols in your brain can be created both by talk and action. As a result, talking about your goals creates similar symbols to the actions required to achieve them. Your brain now has its symbol and "neglects the pursuit of further symbols."

Think of how your actions can benefit others

Consider how becoming a Graduate Accounting Student at the University of Oklahoma will make Carman proud. Consider how becoming an investment banker will make your dad proud. Consider how increasing your income by increasing your skills will benefit your parents and allow you to take care of them.

Motivation vs habits & routines

Creating and developing good habits of self-discipline is exponentially more important than motivation in terms of reaching goals and getting what you want. The reason is motivation is temporary, no matter how much of it you have. It is a reaction, an emotion and these things dry up. Habits, on the other hand, are consistent and they are necessary to make self-discipline sustainable.

Two types of suffering

"We must all suffer one of two things: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret."

Urge surfing steps

1.. Take a few moments to notice where in your body you are experiencing the urges. Just as hearing music might give you an urge to tap your feet or bob your head, most urges can actually be felt in the body if we have awareness. 2. Once you connect the urge to the place in your body that it's felt most strongly, focus your attention on that area. Observe the sensations you have there. 3. Spend 1-2 minutes noticing your breath. 4. Imagine that the sensations you feel as a result of your urge are a wave. Watch that wave rising and falling as your urge peaks and subsides. 5. As the urge inevitably passes, take note of its transient nature. The next time an urge arises, you'll be that much more confident in your ability to ride it out to its conclusion.

On average how many days does it take for an action to become automatic?

66 days. Shortest 18 days and slowest 254 days.

Think in terms of effort

A lot of things that happen to us and around us are out of control. One thing we can all control is effort. Put in the time to become an expert in whatever you're doing. It will give you an advantage because most people don't do this.

What is the six sources of influence model?

A model that helps you change your behavior and succeed in the process of habit formation. The model explains all of the factors that influence us whenever we try to alter our behavior and increase our discipline. These are all the obstacles you face in forming habits and even just acting in a disciplined manner.

Discipline is going to be difficult

And it might feel extremely wrong, but that's temporary. If you push through the pain and discomfort that you'll inevitable face when you try to change your behavior, you can break bad habits and build better ones in their place.

Why time intervals of 10 minutes, hours, and days?

Because that helps you realize how short-term the pleasure or comfort of a discipline is relative to its long-term consequences. At 10 minutes, you might be feeling good, with perhaps just the initial bit of shame creeping in. After 10 hours, you'll feel mostly shame a regret. Ten days later, you might be consumed by regret having realized some of the negative consequences that your decision or action has had on your pursuit of your long-term goals.

In moments when you feeling tired

Being accountable to yourself typically isn't enough. So think about how being lazy can NEGATIVELY impact others. How you not wanting to study and what you have to do in order to make a 750 on the GMAT is going to impact your moms life.

Lesson on habits

Building habits takes takes and it requires self-discipline to get through that process. But once you make it through that phase your habit will dive you to achieve where you used to require exercising self-discipline.

Thinking about discipline doesn't make you disciplined,

Discipline only happens through consistent action.

Question 4: Am I being self-aware?

Distractions and impulses are the enemy of discipline.

Will power & self-discipline levels

Due to its biological basis, willpower and self-discipline are not static quantities you can maintain in the face of constant temptation. They are more similar to a gas tank. Using your willpower will deplete it, just the same as lifting weights would fatigue your muscles. Individuals who are experiencing willpower depletion have also been shown to have decreased cognitive activity in the brain as well as lower blood-glucose levels relative to people who haven't had to exercise willpower.

Best thing to do in order to successfully reprogram your behavior is to

Embrace the wrong. Your new routine going to take a while to start feeling right or natural, so just accept that and keep chugging along. Eventually, the behavior you want will be wired into your basal ganglia and you go back to auto-pilot as an improved version of yourself.

Focus & Executive Functions

Focus is one of the main pillars of self-discipline; a person who lacks the ability to focus is almost certainly one who will also lack discipline. Focus itself is dependent on something that neuroscientists call executive functions. The three executive functions that we are most concerned with when it comes to being disciplined are working memory, impulse control, and cognitive flexibility and adaptability. You can see why they are aptly named the executive functions. Your brain has to be able to set and pursue goals, prioritize activities, filter distractions, and control unhelpful inhibitions.

thinking of your future self experiencing the consequences of your present self's actions more often.

For example, imagine that you are tempted to procrastinate on work. Rather than giving in to that temptation, you could think about your future self not doing the work and missing out on opportunities to socialize and have fun or just relax without stress because your present self wants to be lazy. Put yourself in the shoes of your future self with as much detail as possible. Think about how much you'll suffer and how what the real cost-benefit of your lack of discipline is. It's easy to say you'll do something later when you don't actually think about it, but once you do you give yourself the opportunity to be disciplined. At that point, the right decision will usually be obvious and even feel easier.

Discomfort Along The Path

For whatever goal you want to achieve, there is discomfort along that path. Self-discipline drives you through this discomfort and allows you to achieve and attain. It's an essential component of mastery, and nothing great was ever accomplished without it.

What is having self-discipline?

Having self-discipline and willpower is the ability to do difficult or unpleasant things because those things are better for your well-being in the long run. That could mean waking up early to exercise when you would rather press the snooze button, or maybe resisting the temptation of a sugary snack that you know will result in an energy crash an hour later. Whatever you need to do in order to accomplish your goals and to be fulfilled, discipline will be a crucial skill in that process.

purposeful escalation of good habits.

If you're doing something productive you might keep doing it for five minutes longer after you first feel the urge to quit. Then the following time you go for an extra six or seven minutes, and so on. Every time you feel distracted, just exercise discipline for a few minutes longer, and you'll steadily build better self-discipline with each escalation.

Think Optimistically, being disciplined and being in a overall badass

Imagine that you just experienced a difficult breakup that left you brokenhearted and lonely. This girl cheated on you and embarrassed you. A pessimistic loser could feel sorry for himself and want others to feel sorry for him also. They might believe that all girls are the same and blame girls and protect themselves. A discipline optimistic would analyze the situation. Realize the mistakes that he made and take control of his life. That person would go through the difficult progress that requires lots of discipline to create a rich and successful life that would increase his confidence and attract many awesome girls to him. This is being optimistic because he's showing positive thinking by knowing he's in control of his life and that with discipline he can achieve what he wants.

Do not justify bad behavior ever

Imagine that you're a recovering alcoholic who goes out to a restaurant to celebrate a friend's birthday. Rationalizations to have a drink would be easy—it's a birthday, why not celebrate? After several months of sobriety, one drink couldn't hurt. These are the victories you are calling on to justify undisciplined behavior. You see where this is going—after the first drink, you no longer have those months separating you from your last drink, so having a second drink is that much easier to justify. One lapse is all it takes.

Urge Surfing

Is an exercise for training your self-discipline and mental toughness. Whatever the urge was, think about it and pay attention to the physical and emotional sensations experienced with it. Indulge in it. Notice how these sensations evolve over time. As you're doing this, softly focus on your breath to help you ride out the urges, imagining that they are waves and you are surfing across them. Our natural tendency is to identify with our urges, and urge surfing helps us to separate our identity from whatever past habits and tendencies we want to correct. Instead of thinking, I want a cigarette, you might think, I have an urge to have a cigarette. It's not a part of you that you must fight, but rather a sensation that you experience, observe, and then let pass or settle. Fighting urges is rarely effective, but curiously observing urges without identifying with them gives you much greater odds to overcome them. In learning to be disciplined, you become comfortable with the discomfort of seeing an urge and not indulging it.

We all experience difficult times

It's an optimistic attitude that helps some people remind disciplined and productive and in those times while others lose sight of their dreams and goals.

Why focus matters

It's nearly impossible to achieve focus and self-discipline separately. Being disciplined in your pursuit of long-term goals is only possible if you can consistently focus on the decisions and actions that lead to accomplishing those goals.

Most importantly

Just get started and don't stop putting in the effort until discipline is as natural as breathing.

Know your specific outcome

Knowing the exact outcome you want is an essential part of having self-discipline. You must be able to name it, describe it, and feel it. Otherwise, you're just forcing yourself into discomfort with the vague idea that you should be doing it. It's like marching in an army and not being sure whom you're going to fight or even why you're there.

Delayed Gratification

Limiting your immediate pleasure in exchange for an even greater future pleasure. You suffer now for a specific outcome later, and it requires mental fortitude, pushing your boundaries, and doing more than you thought you could. Whenever you seek to delay gratification, you use self-discipline.

Question 2: Am I doing the right thing or simply what's easy?

Often doing the right thing means doing the hard thing. Unfortunately, they are frequently the same thing. Most people don't choose things that are difficult when there is an alternative which is why discipline is often the missing component for many people who don't fulfill their goals. People tend to drift toward the path of least resistance. If you don't what that to be you, you'll need to be able to accurately answer whether you are doing what's right or not. Doing the right thing may feel like the harder route in the moment, but when you do it consistently it winds up being the most efficient route to accomplishing your goals

Avoid Rationalizing

Our minds are constantly coming up with excuses to abandon discipline. The biggest obstacle is to recognize when it's happening and to hold yourself accountable. Regardless of how much you feel that you've earned a break or a reward for your past actions, accepting that tendency to rationalize or make excuses will have a negative impact on your discipline, plain and simple. Each moment or decision stands on its own and you don't get to "carry over" credit from past behavior. ("I was so good yesterday I can take a break today"), stop immediately and don't undercut your own progress. Each event should be taken in a vacuum, and you don't get an accumulation of points you can buy bad behavior with.

Six sources of influence model 1. Individual

Personal motivation- Are you motivated to quit smoking to improve your health and lifestyle? What's in it for you and how does your life improve? Personal ability- Are you personally capable of overcoming the physical and mental addictiveness of smoking? Do you have enough will power or social support?

Procrastination versus Discipline

Procrastination is the enemy of self-discipline because it often means waiting for perfect conditions to justify inaction. For instance, it's easy to postpone going to the gym because your calves are tired or it's raining outside. Just because the road isn't 100% clear for you to go to the gym doesn't mean you should forego it completely. There is almost no perfect timing you should be waiting for. Waiting to have more money, resources, or experience very rarely increases your odds of accomplishing the goal in the future. You only have the chance to succeed once you've started, and you can always figure out the details along the way.

Goal Proximity

The closer we get to a goal the more effort we make to reach it. Marathon runners run the 26 faster than most of the previous miles. In reality they should be tire but when you see the finish lining getting closer you put in the extra effort to cross the finish line and achieve your goal

Six sources of influence model 2. Society

Social motivation- Do you have friends and family who will encourage you to quit?

Avoid self-sabotage when forming habits

Start small and manageable with habits rather than shooting for the starts right away and guaranteeing failure. starting small reduces the perceived difficulty of the task and will make it easier to stick with it when your motivation is lacking. It tells your brain that this action is acceptable and even enjoyable. You can steadily increase the duration or difficulty of your new habit as you feel yourself progressing.

Six sources of influence model Environment

Structural Motivation- Does your everyday living environment punish you for smoking such with fines for smoking indoors?

Act on Behalf of Your Future Self

Struggling with discipline can be seen as struggling to put your future well-being ahead of your current happiness or pleasure. One explanation for why so many people experience those struggles is the inability to relate or connect to our future selves. When not wanting to do something that will be beneficial to yourself Think about how doing this one time will be beneficial to you in the future And always remember that the more you do it the easier it will become

Losing motivation doesn't mean

That you lose your desire to accomplish something. After several weeks have passed and your motivation is fading, you'll still want to get a 750 on the GMAT.

The 40% Rule

The 40% Rule is straightforward. It says that when an individual's mind begins telling them that they are physically or emotionally maxed out, in reality they have only pushed themselves to 40% of their full capacity. In other words, they could endure 60% more if only they believed that they are capable of it. When you think you have reached your limits, you're not even close, and whether you can keep going or not depends on if you believe it. It's an acceptance of pain. We are usually ready to give up around the time that we begin to feel pain or are barely pressing our boundaries. But that point is actually just the beginning of what we are all capable of, and the key to unlocking more potential is to push through the initial pain and the self-doubt that surfaces along with it. By maintaining a belief in yourself, you show yourself that you can do more, and that evidence builds your confidence and mental toughness. You might, for example, begin struggling after doing 10 push-ups. You'd start hearing the voice in your head that says you feel too tired, too sore, or too weak to go on. But if you take a pause and gather yourself to do one more, you find that you've already disproven the voice saying that you can't. Then you pause and do another. And then another.

Unlike fleeting emoational states

The habit of discipline is a rational thought process that becomes a permanent way of living once it's developed.

Practicing awareness about discipline

The more you practice awareness about discipline and get in the habit of exercising your willpower, the stronger those functions will become. That's the path to sustainably increasing discipline in your daily life.

The 10-10-10 Rule

The next time you feel that you're about to give in to an urge or temptation, stop and ask yourself how you will feel 10 minutes, 10 hours, and 10 days from now. The 10-10-10 Rule may not seem all that powerful, but it's effective because it forces you to think about your future self and to see how your actions are going to affect yourself in the future—for better or worse. A lot of times, we know that we are losing discipline or doing something harmful in the moment, but that's not enough to stop us from doing it because we don't have any connection to our future self that will have to deal with the consequences. The 10-10-10 Rule quickly creates that connection, and that can make the difference between a success or failure of discipline.

Increasing and decreasing your self control

The phrase "exercise your self-control" is an accurate way of thinking about your ability to be disciplined in the face of temptation, as that ability can be built up if you consistently exercise it by making healthier choices, and it can also be stripped down by constantly giving in to unhealthy pleasures.

The Endowed Progress Effect

Think in terms of what you already have. People will work harder to achieve something if they are aware of all the ways that they are not starting from zero and closer to completion. If you provide some sort of artificial progress toward a goal, that would then increase the probability of a person putting in the rest of the work to complete the goal.

Using The Endowed Progress Effect to achieve your goals

Think of ways that you have already made progress toward a goal or are starting with a leg up, you can make it more likely that you'll maintain discipline in pursuit of that goal. If you've already invested in achieving a goal in some way, you can contemplate how it would feel to waste whatever effort and time you've already invested.

Acceptance of pain

We are usually ready to give up around the time that we begin to feel pain or are barely pressing our boundaries. But that point is actually just the beginning of what we are all capable of, and the key to unlocking more potential is to push through the initial pain and the self-doubt that surfaces along with it. By maintaining a belief in yourself, you show yourself that you can do more, and that evidence builds your confidence and mental toughness. You might, for example, begin struggling after doing 10 push-ups. You'd start hearing the voice in your head that says you feel too tired, too sore, or too weak to go on. But if you take a pause and gather yourself to do one more, you find that you've already disproven the voice saying that you can't. Then you pause and do another. And then another. And then another. Suddenly you're at 20. You can take it slowly, but you've just doubled what you thought was possible.

How our developed brains work against our goals

We overthink decisions with somewhat obvious answers and we are able to rationalize bad behavior that robs us of our more desirable outcomes. We're not always sure ourselves what's a real excuse and what's just a justification or excuse.

10 minute rule

When you feel an urge, force yourself to wait for 10 minutes before giving in to whatever the urge is. If you're still craving it after 10 minutes, then have it. Or wait 10 more minutes because you've already done it and survived just fine. Simply by choosing to wait you remove the "immediate" from immediate gratification—building discipline and improving decision-making. Similarly, if you want to quit something beneficial, wait just 10 more minutes.

Hunger

When you get the first pangs of hunger in your stomach, you might think that it won't go away until you have something to eat. Hunger is also one of the urges that most commonly causes irritability, as being productive when you're hungry is extremely difficult. But as anybody who has experimented with fasting knows, hunger is as temporary as any other urge. You might notice that you feel hungry when you are bored or when you've been sitting for a while at work. You might feel the pangs in your stomach, but if you pay attention closely you don't feel that your stomach is empty or that you are in dire need of calories to energize yourself. A few minutes of just accepting the hunger and not taking it as a strict sign that you need to eat can actually make that hunger quickly fade away. Hunger pangs

Don't wait for it to feel right

When you to break a bad habit or form a positive one, you're naturally going to feel awkward or uncomfortable at first because you have to actively make decisions about your behavior. Your brain has already been programmed to function in a certain way, so it will resist the change and, as a result, make the new behavior feel wrong and even frightening.

An addict who wants to overcome their addiction

Will only be successful if they diligently attend support groups meetings, go to therapy sessions, and take the prescribed medication. Motivation is wanting to beat the addiction. Discipline is doing all of those things to make it a reality.

There's no amount of

knowledge, habit formation, thinking, or visualization that will make self-discipline comfortable. Being disciplined is going to feel like a chore.

Question 3: These are the vegetables, so what am I getting for dessert?

You're being disciplined and taking on discomfort now so that you can experience some personal benefit in the future. The disciplined behavior is the vegetables, and the payoff is the dessert. It's easy to falter if you forget what your payoff is So ask yourself, what am I really doing all of this for>

The last of Aristotle's seven causes of action is our

appetite for pleasure. After our basic needs are met, we can be irrationally driven by our desires in a way that motivates us to act against our own interests. You might go to the store to buy some essentials and find yourself with a cart full of things you don't need and didn't plan to spend money on, simply because you weren't disciplined enough to overcome your appetite for the pleasure of materialism.

Whenever you find yourself making excuses or lacking discipline,

consider those two phenomena and ask if your excuses are legitimate. Quite often, the underlying causes of lapses in discipline are the beliefs we create in our minds that we can't do something. Expecting yourself to be capable, successful, and disciplined will make it all the more likely that you actually

All actions are driven by

emotionally or rationally. We seek pleasant things and act in order to reduce our pain and suffering.

It's only temporary

everything you think and feel is temporary, including desires. you forget that fact, cravings and urges can feel overwhelming. But if you are patient and confident in your ability to ride out a temporary urge until it passes, you will find that it's far more effective than trying to distract yourself or battle the urges head-on.

When not wanting to do something beneficial and or difficult remember

exactly who you are, who you will be, and who you want to be.

When you want to give into an urge or make a decision that isn't beneficial remeber

exactly who you are, who you will be, and who you want to be. And also how giving in to these urges has lead you to where you are currently. If you're not satisfied with where you're how will continuing to make these decisions keep everything the same. No progress just constant regret

Delaying gratification is a crucial life skill

in order to be successful. It might be one of the foundational skills that underlie high achievement. We have to be willing to purposefully delay positive events and rewards until after we've completed some objectives or achieved some goals.

False Hope Syndrome.

is the belief that altering our behavioral patterns will be easy We routinely underestimate how difficult it is to break out of bad habits, and picture ourselves sailing through adversity as if it were an ideal world with no temptations. When we give ourselves too much false hope, we tend to fail more often than not, and often become more solidified in the behavior we wish to alter. People tend to shoot for drastic and unsustainable changes, leading to inevitable failure. Being overly ambitious is often a result of underestimating the difficulty of achieving a goal or making a change.

placebo effec

it quickly becomes clear how powerful our minds are. Countless studies have supported the conclusion that the placebo effect is a result of chemical changes in the form of endorphin production. Just believing that you can give 60% more effort makes it possible.

Question 1: Do I want to be a disciplined person or not?

it should be a simple yes or no. If you stop or quit, you must answer a no. There are no exceptions, ifs, ands, or buts. Either you are disciplined or you aren't; there isn't any space in between. If you are disciplined, you'll do the thing you don't feel like doing because that's what is necessary to pursue your goals. You must classify yourself one way or another at each juncture. Imagine you have work to do, but you feel tired so you want to put it off and relax instead. The more time you spend analyzing that decision, the more opportunity you are giving yourself to rationalize being lazy. If left unchecked, your mind would quickly convince you that there's nothing wrong with procrastinating until you are less tired or the work is more urgent. But if you make the decision black or white, you know that one action is disciplined and the other isn't. You nip this thought process in the bud and spring yourself into action because you won't want to see yourself as an undisciplined person.

10X Rule

it states that you should set targets that are 10 times more than what you think you want, and then take 10 times greater action than you think it is necessary to accomplish those targets. The 10X Rule is over-the-top on purpose. The idea is to force you to change how you think about your own possibilities and how you plan to take action. You must realize that your thoughts and actions have brought you to your current place in life, and if you want to go further and achieve more you first have to start thinking and acting well beyond what you originally considered the norm.

self-discipline in a nutshell

it's really a matter of how much pain you can stomach, and most of us will only bend and never break. Our minds can be our best friends when we have a strong belief in our capabilities, but they can also be a poisonous enemy if we allow negativity to seize control. It's up to you to empower yourself using the 40% Rule rather than throwing in the towel mentally at the first sign of resistance.

75% Rule

take action when you're only about 75% certain you'll be correct or successful. So when you're somewhere around that 75% threshold level, it's time to commit to your decisions and actions. suppose you want to run a marathon but you aren't very fit. The probability that you can safely run a full marathon is infinitesimal. But the probability that you can safely run two miles is substantially greater, perhaps around that 75% threshold. So that's where you'd start in your training. You might not feel ready for two miles, but you think you can probably do it, and the first step is always the most important. After a little while, you might have a 75% probability of being able to run a half-marathon. Keep that up and you'll eventually have that same probability for the full marathon. Through this breakdown of a large goal into smaller ones, you make it realistic for yourself to start right away and to maintain discipline each step of the way without getting discouraged by failure. It takes a realistic approach and a willingness to act without certainty to build discipline.

disadvantage of telling people your goals

telling people of your goals makes them less likely to be achieved! When you tell people your goal, you will typically receive praise and congratulations. Way to go! This tricks you into thinking you have actually achieved something already, like the act of telling people has fulfilled your duties. This has the adverse effect of reducing your willpower and self-discipline. People who tell others of their goal lose their drive and are less likely to achieve it. It may be that having your goal acknowledged makes it a part of your identity and provides that rush of feel-good reward hormones. telling others of your goals gives you a "premature sense of completeness."

Being disciplined comes down to choosing

temporary discomfort that helps you in the long-term. Just as lifting weights causes temporary discomfort that allows muscles to grow back stronger, choosing disciplined actions and decision-making also makes your "uncomfortable muscle" stronger. Making a regular habit of embracing uncomfortable situations can have a positive impact on all aspects of your life.

The key quantity we need more

the amount of discomfort we can handle and tolerate. using mental toughness to power past instincts to choose what's easy, comfortable, and immediately gratifying.

Best way to maintain discipline is to

the most effective way of maintaining discipline is by simply avoiding the situations that present the highest chances for failure. You might have the willpower to resist risking all of your hard-earned cash at the casino while you sit at the table, but then again, you might not. On the other hand, you'll certainly succeed in resisting that risk if you just don't go to the casino in the first place.

Mastery

to get better at things. For an idea of how strongly mastery can impact our discipline, consider the legendary work ethic of Kobe Bryant. Whenever people would ask Kobe why he worked out at 4:00 a.m. or why he showed up to the gym to practice before anybody else arrived, he responded that he did it because he wanted to be the greatest basketball player he could possibly be.

Self-discipline is

uncomfortable by nature. You would never willingly subject yourself to the struggle of being disciplined unless you had a strong purpose for doing so.

Think Optimistically

will be conducive to self-discipline because having a positive mindset prepares you to manage failure and discouragement.

Practice Discomfort

willpower is like a muscle that fatigues the more you use it within a given time. This is actually good news, because willpower fatiguing like a muscle means that it can be strengthened like one, too. The "exercise" that most effectively increases your baseline level of willpower is leaving your comfort zone. That involves pushing yourself to regularly do things that you aren't completely comfortable doing so that you become familiar with the feeling of discomfort itself. Leaving your comfort zone is important because it teaches you that the things you fear aren't as bad as they might seem. Each time you learn that lesson in some small way, your tolerance for discomfort and your willpower both increase.

Parkinson's Law

work expands to fill the time available for its completion If you give yourself a relaxed deadline, you avoid being disciplined; if you give yourself a tight deadline, you can draw on your self-discipline Set aggressive deadlines so that you are actually challenging yourself on a consistent basis, and you'll avoid this pitfall.