Don’t Rely on Discipline,
(Especially if You Aren’t Disciplined)
by blogrdoc
It was fun while it lasted, but I’ve decided to stop twittering. It was really cool, but I found it too distracting. I could try to police myself, but that’s obviously not a guarantee. I just can’t handle it right now. Maybe someday.
There was some great advice I picked up from Tim Ferris about ‘Don’t Rely On Discipline’ [1]. I have my own version of it which you’ve already read: ‘Don’t Rely on Discipine: Especially if You Aren’t Disciplined.‘
There are proponents of using ‘positive reinforcement’ only which seems to be pretty popular on some blogs I’ve read. I don’t know about you, but for me, those methods are not sustainable. Personally, I need a kick in the ass every now and then of some good, old fashioned reality.
So what, then, do you rely on, if you can’t rely on yourself and you obviously can’t rely on others? Well, this is blogrdoc, so you can probably guess the answer: you rely on nature. You cannot break the laws of nature, you can only break yourself against them. [2]
What authority do I have telling you this? Remember, I’m a process engineer. I look at processes and it’s my job to impose my will on them*. Unfortunately (or fortunately, as the case may be), human nature is not as predictable as in-animate objects, but I do think some things carry over. In the next blog or so, I’ll elaborate. Hopefully this is enough to get the main idea across (and get you interested for the next post!)
Note: there will be graphs!
* I love this phrase, in case, if you haven’t noticed.
Acknowledgements
[1] Tim Ferriss
[2] Steven Covey
Popularity: 7% [?]
5 Responses to “Don’t Rely on Discipline,
(Especially if You Aren’t Disciplined)”
By Alik on Mar 15, 2008 | Reply
I stopped using PDA
http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2008/01/02/what-if-you-protected-personal-time-as-family-time/
I disabled ANY email notifications
http://practicethis.com/2007/12/17/remove-distracting-email-notifications-all-of-them/
Less distractions, less friction, more productivity
By blogrdoc on Mar 15, 2008 | Reply
One trick that I do is that I have my monitor face the opening to my cube. That way, anyone who passes by can see what I’m doing. This is fairly strong insentive to avoid goofing off. It worked for me for a while, but I’m going to have to take more drastic measures.
We’ve got a breakroom at work and I’m going to try a new policy of only surfing the web at those computers, never the computer at my desk. It’s going to obviously be tough, but the web is a huge distraction for me at work, esp since I started this blog.
When I said “especially if your aren’t disciplined”, I was primarily talking about myself.
By Alik on Mar 15, 2008 | Reply
You ARE disciplined. Discipline is not only resisting distractions, it is also consciously removing it, and this what you seems to do.
I like it.
By Sam Crockett on Mar 16, 2008 | Reply
While I can usually control myself when it comes to twitter, mindless internet surfing is where I have trouble.
At breakfast in the morning I often open up my rss reader. Next thing I know I look at the clock and two hours have passed.
What happens is I’ll read one interesting blog post and then see that they are linking to another blog in their post. So I’ll go check that blog out, and maybe read a few posts. Then I notice they have a popular section, so I think well if it’s under the popular section it must be good, right?
And it turns into a never ending process.
I’ve recently practiced more self control by forcing myself to get up from the computer when I’ve finished my breakfast. Hopefully this action turns into a trigger that will ensure that I don’t spend hours mindless surfing.
By blogrdoc on Mar 16, 2008 | Reply
LOL Sam. I was chuckling while reading your whole comment. Your entire account sounds very familiar. :)