By Latoya Hammond
2 Timothy 1:7
“For God did not give us a spirit of timidity or cowardice or fear, but [He has given us a spirit] of power and of love and of sound judgment and personal discipline [abilities that result in a calm, well-balanced mind and self-control].”
Have you ever set goals and struggled with being disciplined to achieve those goals, then girl, I GOTT U!!
Now that January is over and I have set my goals and put my action plan into place, I need to develop in an area that, if I am honest, I do not always find success. I am talking about discipline. Getting real with discipline has definitely been a struggle for me throughout my life. Once I started making the necessary moves to begin walking in my purpose, I realized that I am not as disciplined as I thought I was. I listened to Dr. Myles Monroe this week on the topic of Self Discipline. He stated that self-discipline was a set of self-imposed standards. At that very moment, I had to check myself and do some reflection and ask myself, "Do you have any self-imposed standards?" Let’s just say it got very quiet for me.
You see, two years I was excited about a year of elevation, goal setting, and getting my vision together. I finally knew my purpose and thought I prepared to walk in it. I was even on Facebook posting live videos. Man, I was hyped and ready to take social media by storm! However, I did not take into consideration that the "feeling" in which I was operating would not be there all the time. I forgot that life was going to happen and I was not always going to be motivated to write, record and post. The reality is, I was not going to always FEEL like it.
Motivation is based on how you feel at the moment. We have all heard people say, “I don’t feel motivated.” Truth be told, I have been one of those people on many occasions. But you hardly ever hear people say, “I don’t feel disciplined.” That is because discipline is doing in spite of how we feel. Discipline says our feelings do not get a vote! My past record shows that if I do not feel like it, chances are my feelings win and I do not accomplish my goal. I would make every excuse in the world to justify allowing my feeling to have a vote. I am learning is that it takes focus, hard work and consistency to develop discipline; especially, if you are going to walk in your purpose and achieve your goals. I realized that my relationship with discipline was pretty much non-existent when it came to my goals. I set myself up by trying to conquer too many goals at one time not understanding that my lack of discipline would make things even more difficult. I started implementing a new morning routine that consisted of waking up at 5:30 am to pray; read a devotion; speak aloud affirmations; and journaling. I started eating healthier; prepping meals, keeping a calendar… you know, all the things! I started off pretty good but, after a while, the consistency was not there. I had knowledge about what discipline was and was not but, what I lacked was wisdom and how to apply that knowledge to my life. I had amazing ideas for the things I wanted to do but I was not willing to do what it would take to accomplish it. I would go strong for a while and then I would fall off. Time would go by and I was no longer motivated. Life hit and the "feeling" was gone.
I had to now get real with myself and the idea of discipline and make a decision. But first that decision had to begin with a 'WHY". Why was I doing what I was doing? Why did God give me the dreams and goals that He did? I believe that if there is no clearly defined "why," then you will lose sight of the end result, the goal. Therefore, there will be a lack of discipline. After one month, I had to accept the fact that I was not as disciplined as I thought I was and this was a process that I was not going to conquer overnight. There must be discipline and consistency! I had to make a firm decision to do it even when I didn’t feel like it. Keeping the goal set before me!
I want to let you know that whatever goals you have set for yourself that you can and you will achieve them but, you must develop discipline. And I will keep is 100 with you, it ain’t easy but, it is possible! There will be times that you are in it and then something in life will happen to throw you off. For some of you, you may not even skip a beat but, for others, you may want to give up. For those of you who may want to give up, it is okay to feel that way. What you have to remember is that tomorrow is a new day!! In the words of our dear sis Aaliyah, you can dust yourself off and try again. You have to deal with the situation that threw you off and say to yourself that in spite of this, I am still going to accomplish my goals!! You may have to switch up the method but, don’t change the goal!
If you’re like me and you’ve allowed your feelings to get a vote, make up in your mind that it stops TODAY! It may not be easy but it will be possible. Find out your WHY and allow that to anchor you. Once we get there ladies, that is when we become unstoppable!!!