Some people are naturally disciplined than others. Some people become more disciplined through continuously learning process. So if you are like me, the least naturally disciplined person, don’t be discouraged – there’s hope for everyone:). I only started to know the importance of self discipline at a later stage in life but as they say, it’s never too late. For those of you who are struggling to keep on track, I want to share the 5 daily habits I’ve recently developed and intend to keep for life. I also believe these are the 5 daily habits that can help you achieve more in life.
Get up early
There are early risers and there are night owls.
I used to resent getting up early in the morning to go to school and office. All these years I thought I would be the happiest if I could just wake up naturally every morning without using the alarm. I used to tell myself that I’m not a morning person so it’s ok to get up late in the morning. But started from this year I decided to challenge myself and be a disciplined person. I’m trying to get up before 7:30am every morning. You’d be surprised how much extra you can squeeze in one day if you just get up 2 hours earlier in the morning! I’m able to exercise everyday, have a healthy breakfast everyday and read everyday!
Exercise
I’ve never had a regular exercise routine before this year. I do yoga, go the to gym, go dancing… only when I felt like it. If people asked me in the past: which days do you go to yoga during the week? I would have hated the question. Why do I have to fix certain days in the week to do yoga? I didn’t like fixed dates or rules. As a result, I didn’t excise when the weather wasn’t good enough, when I was tied, when I was moody, when I had other things to occupy more mind.
But this has all been changed. Nowadays, I start to stretch right after I got up and brushed my teeth. Pushups and plank pose are the ones I stick to everyday. I prepare my yoga clothes the night before so it’s easier to quickly put them on in the morning. 3 times a week at night, I go skipping rope. Again, I prepare my exercise clothes, drinking water and skipping rope earlier and put them next to the front door. I skip ropes in my garage no matter what the weather is like, I have no excuse not to go to the garage to jump rope.
Have a healthy breakfast
I skipped breakfast for many many years. But now I have smoothie for breakfast almost everyday. It’s that simple.
I bought this powerful blender for smoothie at the beginning of last year, thinking I would start to have healthy breakfast from January last year. Instead, I used it for 3 times and left it there for the rest of the year. My mind decided last year that smoothie is not that filling enough for breakfast after 3 days. As a result, I reverted back to my old habit of having no breakfast at all.
The secret of make good habits is keep doing it regardless what you mind tells you what to do. After having smoothie for breakfast for a consecutive of 5 days, my body got completely used to it. My mind has stopped objecting the idea of having smoothie for breakfast too!
Read books
One can never stop learning through reading books. People often say: who has the time to read now! Well, we can always make time. If one can check social media updates & emails every 5 minutes, surely we can find 3o minutes a day to read or listen to a book. My goal this year is to read at least one book a month. The way I’m doing it is that I divide the total pages of the book by the number of days in a month. For example, if a book has 300 pages in total and that month has 30 days, all I need to do is to read 10 pages a day. Keep doing this everyday in that month, I’ll slowly but surely finish the book in one month.
Read aloud
In order to achieve more in life, one must be able to clearly express his/her thoughts to others. English is my second language. For years I have the desire to improve my English & communication skills but never put any real effort into it.
The theme of my goals this year is Communication. In the past years, I tried to read aloud every now and then but never made it a daily habit. Hence I’ve never made any significant improvement. Now I’ve made a daily commitment to read out loud for at least 30 minutes a day, right after my daily stretches. It’s still early days and I don’t see any quick result yet but I know this daily habit is going to stay for life.
Who have thought setting goals and stick to them is this hard:). Maybe it’s easier for someone but it certainly hasn’t been easy for me. Luckily if there’s a will there’s a way. It all depends on how badly you want to achieve your goals. Remember:
Repeating an action makes a habit.
Your habits create your character.
Your character is your destiny.
May success be your destiny.
