“Self-awareness and why it matters most“
The most disciplined people you know, or those with the highest willpower, likely don’t have some sort of cyborg-like discipline nor willpower. What they likely do have is a great deal of self-awareness and they use that to set themselves up for forward progress.
When it comes to food, most of us have a finite amount of willpower. Even those with a super strong mindset and ability to resist temptation can only say “no” so many times til they hit their limit and cave in.
This is where self-awareness comes into play. They likely setup their home and work environments in a way that keeps them on track and makes it so they DON’T always have to call on their willpower nor discipline to stay on course.
A huge part of willpower and discipline is setting ourselves up to not always need either.
The great news is self-awareness CAN be built more and more if we’re willing to put the time and energy in, recognize patterns, and learn from our slips in order to adjust and improve.
How we actively choose to set ourselves up for success will do far more for us than having huge discipline or willpower.
- Laying out clothes the night before an early workout so all we have to do is get geared up and go.
- Not buying certain foods we know will tempt us and instead buying foods we enjoy and can stay on track with.
- Choosing to place our training in time of day where day to day life has smallest chance of forcing it back off the schedule.
- Not placing ourselves in situations where we’ll feel the need to do what others are doing if it means going off track with our goals.
Figure out what works and doesn’t work for you, and keep adjusting as needed. Don’t set yourself up to need superhuman-like discipline, most of us aren’t wired that way.
