Authentic August – Day 17 (31 days ’til 28)
In yesterday’s post I talked about how there are 31 full days before I turn 28, and how I want design those days with a good balance of discipline and surrender. Basically I want to start off 28 on the right foot. I want 28 to be the year I take myself and my dreams seriously. I want it to be the year I start walking the walk, since I’ve been talking the talk for a long while now. And even though I may not know exactly what the future has in store for me, I know that if I walk steadily towards more discipline and more surrender, I’ll be happy with myself.
Discipline means taking care of myself and putting in the work to achieve my goals. Surrender means being open to life’s opportunities and spending time connected to Love (“Love” is the name that holds the least amount of baggage for me when it comes to talking about “God”).
I was supposed to brainstorm a discipline/surrender game plan last night but I ended up reading a book and passing out instead lol. It’s alright though, I think I have a good idea of where to start:
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey
I came across this book in the summer of ’14, when my family and I took a trip to Oregon; my parents bought it for me from the famous Powell’s Books store. And The 7 Habits blew my mind!
(Side note: now that I’m thinking about it, 2014-2015 was a major turning point in my life. My mind was rife with new ideas because of the content I was consuming; The 7 Habits being one of them. I was experiencing freedom at a level I had never previously felt. I just felt so alive. So I guess I want to infuse year 28 with the energy and essence of year 22 haha!)
The 7 Habits introduced so many new concepts to me in such a clear and understandable way. Despite this, I’ve never been a serious student of the material and therefore I haven’t fully integrated the habits into my life. I’ve even went back several times over the past six years to reread the book and make attempts to really live out the book’s wisdom. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve definitely improved my life just from reading and rereading The 7 Habits, but this time around I want to reach new levels of mastery with it’s material. Because as the book says, and as I’ve mentioned before in the blog,
“To learn and not to do is really not to learn. To know and not to do is really not to know.”
When I started writing this post, I actually didn’t know I would be led back to The 7 Habits, but when I wrote that “Discipline means taking care of myself and putting in the work to achieve my goals” my mind immediately jumped to one of the main ideas from the book:
Circle of Influence vs. Circle of Concern
Our Circle of Influence is the list of things that we actually have control over, while our Circle of Concern is everything we don’t have control over. How often and how intensely we exercise would fall within our Circle of Influence, as well as what we eat and how many hours of sleep we get. These are things we can control, things that we have influence over. The weather and what people think about us are things that may concern us, but ultimately we do not have control over, so therefore they fall within of Circle of Concern.
Historically, I’ve spent a lot of my time worrying about things that lie within my Circle of Concern. That’s just what happens when you’re a people-pleasing, codependent person! So when I think Discipline, I think Circle of Influence; when I wrote “taking care of myself,” I thought “things I can control.” And for my 28th year, I’d like to tip the scales more towards Influence and away from Concern. And even though 22 was filled with loads of growth and freedom, looking back I recognize that I still spent the majority of my time worried about things within my Circle of Concern.
Obviously this stuff is common sense, but common sense isn’t always common practice! So I’m diving back into the sea of The 7 Habits, and we shall see what comes of it!
Because I’m a slow reader and because I also have the Personal Workbook, I’m going to give myself a full 60 days to go through it all. If I end up moving at a faster pace, then that’s cool too! But I think this is a reasonable/attainable goal. It amounts to roughly 6 pages of reading a day, but I don’t how much time I’ll need with each of the exercises from the workbook, so spreading it out over two months will help with processing and absorbing the material in a way that sticks.
If you want to build more discipline too, maybe we can go through this material together! Just hit me up and we can start a book club of sorts!
With LOVE,
Q.
p.s. I used to feel discouraged whenever I had to “start over” with something, like I am with this book. But something that’s helped me overcome this is an encouraging phrase I once saw on Instagram:
“You aren’t starting from scratch. You’re starting from experience.”