MASTERING SELF-DISCIPLINE

Just as we begin our journey with self-knowledge we can only complete it with self-discipline. It doesn’t matter how many resources we have if we don’t know how to use them.

There are no easy answers in life---a magical crystal, the right book, a powerful teacher----that will solve our problems and make life beautiful. Answer to all problems lies with us “only we have that magical power to do that.” But to become skilled is not enough, its only when we can ‘walk the talk’, we gain that freedom from the dragons of mind and open the power and strength of the personality and spirit.

We will learn a number of different exercises and techniques that will help us take commands of our inner resources. Don’t try to become expert at any of them at this point, and don’t worry about which ones to focus on. We will see as what we have come to regard as normal breathing leads to heart diseases and discover how to return to our natural breathing motion.

Learning and doing these exercises is not meant to be work, but an engagement of intention, effort and joy. Learn to play, to experiment, to see what you discover as you systematically explore your capacities with the exercises. The great traditions of self-mastery are very systematic, taking care to build the foundation so strong that it can support any height that we can achieve soon we will begin to master all dimensions--------physical, mental, emotional and spiritual.


BODY SKILLS: RELAXATION, DIET, & EXERCISE

Human body is very sacred, it lets us know when we are in danger, what kind of food is healthy for us, & it even signals when we are making a wrong choice. We seldom think of the body as an instrument, a tool to develop and use. Instead we let our bodies suffer from stress and disease and they become obstacles, instead of tools. Not only do we suffer from pain and discomfort, but also we do not think clearly or creatively, our relationship suffer and we waste incredible amount of money on drugs to relieve symptoms but do nothing to change the cause.
There are three key elements that are found in every system, whether it is hatha yoga or martial arts and are essential to the achievement of self-mastery:
· Relaxation
· Diet
· Exercise

Self-Awareness – Taking Charge of Power

What Skinner and other behaviorist never realized is that the laws and principles that define habits only apply as long as the habit remains on the unconscious level. The moment that we become conscious of the habit, it no longer has the power to control the behavior. We can control any habit, and the behavior it evokes, if we are fully aware of its entire pattern.

Our awareness, however must be complete and constant. We all know how hard it is to change habit. Someone looks at us in a “funny way” and we react. We know that our reaction isn’t helpful, we even know why we do it, but we find ourselves doing what w don’t want to do. The problem is that we are only partial aware of the entire pattern of the habit, most of which still lies hidden in the unconscious mind. Partial awareness only gives partial control. As long as we must struggle to control our habit, it means that we still aren’t fully aware of the habit.

Intellectual understanding has little power to control unconscious habits. Let’s take an example:

If a compulsive eater gains some awareness of his compulsive behavior and realizes that he is eating mostly to relieve stress, he recognizes intellectually that his behavior is not healthy for him. What then follows is a constant battle between healthy for him. What then follows is a constant battle between his good intention and willpower on the one hand and his habits of snacking driven by suppressed sexual feeling on the other. He will continue to have conflicts until he takes the next step in dealing with repressed sexual feeling directly.

Paying attention makes us aware. Awareness leads to conscious choices. This immediately weakens the habit. The compulsive eater has several options. He can continue to eat and suffer the consequences – or he can decide to eat at certain times. Instead of eating between meals when he feels the urge, he practices a relaxation or breathing exercise. The more relaxed he is, the easier it is to deal with the compulsion to eat. The more skilled he is at relaxing, the more sensitive he is to the thoughts and feelings that drive the compulsion. This gives him even greater insight into the real reasons for the compulsive behavior. The more awareness, the greater the opportunity for choice, and the more control he has.

Becoming aware of your unconscious patterns is not just an exercise in counting symptoms. It means that you become more sensitive to the thoughts and feelings that accompany and even precede your actions. If we pay attention to your body as you exercise, becoming more aware of your heart’s behavior, which muscles are moving, the changes in your breathing, you become more sensitive to what actually is happening in your body. As you become more aware of your internal states, you understand the cause/effect relationships between thoughts and behavior. The more aware you are, the more able you are to choose a different behavior as well as choose different ways of thinking.

CHOICE, NOT STRUGGLE

The emphasis must be on choosing the habits we want to build, not struggle to eliminate the old habits. Most of us think of self-discipline as making ourselves do something we don’t want to do. If this is the case, very few of us will ever succeed. We can successfully learn to be self-disciplined if we remember three key points:

1) Inspiration is 90 percent of the success for self-discipline. Work on building habits that you really want to have.

2) Practice makes perfect. Once you decide on the habit or pattern of behavior or the thinking that you want, practice that behavior or thinking pattern every day. You won’t create change by wishing something would happen, or by imagery alone. You must act on your choices in order for the choices to become deeply grooved in the mind.

3) Determination and persistence will always lead to success. There is no failure, only premature stopping. A habit takes time to establish itself in the mind. Once you decide on a particular behavior that you want to build, allow at least three months to begin to groove the habit into your mind.


ABOVE ALL BALANCE

To be successful, self-discipline must be tempered with balance. We don’t grow much as human beings if we become over developed in one area and remain retarded in everything else. Genuine balance is not a static condition, but a dynamic process, constantly evolving as we grow and evolve. When we are balanced, we are spontaneous instead of programmed, relaxed instead of tense, responsive instead of reactive, and in tune with the world around us. Balance involves the integration of all dimensions of the personality. But physical balance must involve emotional balance. Even the best of food becomes toxic and our exercise just another pressure if we don’t know how to balance our emotions. Emotional balance requires that we build our relationships with others with the same care that we build the relationship with ourselves. Both emotional and social balances emerge from our increasing spiritual awareness.

The same tools and techniques that give us control of ourselves also help us to become balanced human beings. But along the way there would be times when we allow ourselves and others the freedom to think in different and unusual ways and to make mistakes. We need only to be patient with ourselves and with others. The practice of patience is just as much apart of self-mastery as anything else we may do. Like other skills patience takes sincere practice and effort.

Laziness: The Path to Nowhere

Like any organization, the personality resists change. This resistance comes mostly from our habits. Laziness is one of the most pervasive ways in which we experience this resistance.
It’s easy to rationalize laziness, we are action oriented society but with heavy dose of couch potatoism. The most common complaint is, “I don’t have the time to do the relaxation exercise (or anything else).” While we will find enough time to watch an average of two hours f television a day, the time to waste on idle chatter, the time to have a couple of cold ones. We find time to clean our bodies, our cars, our homes, but we don’t take time to clean our minds.
The great danger of laziness is that it turns us into victims with guaranteed life of misery. If we are unwilling to make the effort necessary there is no way we can take the power away from our dragons or solve the problems of stress.




Self-Training: Taking the Steps to freedom

It is upto each of us to make the choices necessary to be free. No one can be aware for another, and no one else can slay our dragons. When we blame others or ourselves for our behavior, we end up with even greater weakness and fear. Our habits are ultimately our own responsibility. If we choose to ignore them, no therapist, doctor, friend, spouse, teacher, or even God can help us. We choose to be unaware, we alone allow habits to remain in power, and we alone suffer the consequences.
The path to self-mastery and freedom lies in our conscious decision to use our own power to create and sustain balance, to develop and use our inner resources. Everything we need is sitting right there within us, hidden only by our ignorance. Take the next step. N one asks that you believe, only that you experiment, practice, and become strong. We can take back the power. We can become masters.



I hope by now we know the importance of self-awareness, let’s continue with Self-discipline along with the techniques to achieve both as to gain Self-mastery.

SKILL: TAKING CHARGE OF POWER

Self-discipline doesn’t mean self-punishment. Self-discipline is about accessing inner strength and developing the ability to do whatever we choose to do. The beauty of this is that we already have everything we need to become skillful human beings. All we need to do is understand a few simple things about the mind and body, and we can use power in creative and useful ways for ourselves and others.

Our Habits: Channeling the Power

A habit is like a groove that channels the energy of the mind in a certain direction. The more often the mind’s energy travels down that channel, the deeper the channel, and the stronger the habit becomes. We form these groves, or habits, through a process called conditioning, repeating behaviors associated with pleasure and avoiding behavior associated with pain.
We also build habits through association. The cause and effect may not be related to each other but occur close enough in time that we make a connection. Like my brother had stomach flu just after eating Prawns ten years ago. Even though he knows intellectually that the prawns was not the cause of his illness but the feeling is so strongly associated with prawns that he can’t force himself to eat it again.
When habits are practiced and refined, they are called skills. If we do something well or easily, it is because we have the habits that support the behavior. When something is difficult, it means we don’t have habits to support the behavior. We become skilled at driving, brushing our teeth, eating healthy or having good posture. We also become skilled at worrying, self-criticism, self-doubt and poor health habits because we practice them. Every time we worry, we are practicing worrying. No wonder we become so skilled at worrying.
The most powerful and subtle habits are those learned in the first five or six years of our lives. But we didn’t choose these habits they developed unconsciously as a result of our interaction with parents and society. Once these habits are established they become part of our personalities and guide our behavior for rest of our lives. If we grow up thinking we are not important or smart, it becomes difficult in later life to experience ourselves as important or smart. And we will probably spend a great deal of effort trying to prove that we really are important and smart. As long as we remain unaware of these built-in biases, we don’t have any effective way to counteract them.
Bad Habits Bring Bad Outcomes

We are all familiar with those habits that create emotional reaction for us. Let’s say that you walk into a crowded room and see two people together. One is a stranger, the other is someone you don’t like or trust. Your eyes meet this “enemy,” and you experience the moment of mutual recognition. Then the person smiles and drops his gaze. You see him whisper into the ear of the person sitting next to him. The next moment the stranger looks in your direction, smiles, and quickly looks away. Now, what does your mind do with this? Are they talking about you? No doubt! Are they saying what a wonderful person you are? Very doubtful! And what is your emotional reaction? Does the term “paranoia” fit?
Did you make a conscious decision to be upset? Highly unlikely. You walked into a situation and unconsciously interpreted actions along the lines of your past experience (Habits). The consequence was an emotional reaction, not a choice. Very few of us consciously choose to be disturbed!
It is the consequences of these physical habits created by our emotional reaction that we often call stress.

The Unconscious Power

The key to self-control is to take charge of our habits. Habits develop in many ways and for many different reasons. But all habits share one critical aspect – they only operate in, and because of, the unconscious mid. We may consciously build our habit, such as when we practice playing guitar or proper breathing and relaxation techniques. The whole point of practice is, in fact, to build a habit, to have a certain behavior that we don’t have to think about. Not a single habit function as a part of the conscious mind. According to the late B.F. Skinner, the “grandfather of behaviorism,” we are products of our environment, and are controlled by our environment.
Just think about the last time you became furious. A few moments before you exploded, I’ll will bet that you did not consciously and rationally think: “ hey this individual’s behavior call for an drastic expression of anger. I better scream and demonstrate some anger here.” Instead, you just felt an explosion of anger that came right out of the unconscious emotional reaction. This person pushed one of your triggers, and all your repressed emotional energy got channeled into your reaction. You didn’t really had a choice, you simply reacted. When we react to such emotional stimuli, we lose the power to act and our environment governs our behavior.
For example, let’s say you have acquired the deep-seated habit of feeling incompetent. This attitude learned in childhood, lies in the unconscious, where you are not fully aware of its power.
However, whenever anyone questions your judgement, you react with anger or aggression, and overwhelm your questioner with intense, logical argument. The intensity of your response indicates that one of your triggers (your old habit of believing yourself to be incompetent) was pushed, and you react to this with fight-or-flight reaction. When your inquisitor backs down, both the effectiveness of your reaction and the old habit of feeling incompetent are reinforced. More than likely you rationalize your reaction, never really aware of the reason behind your action.