Better Discipline Won't Cut It

Working more efficiently isn't enough.

The best-kept secret of the most successful is this…

Forced action is *always* less effective than empowered action.

Discipline is finite. 
Purpose is not.

Hard work from strain drains energy. 
Hard work inspired by fulfilment is energising.

While discipline and hard work *are* important, they belong lower on your hierarchy of high-performance needs than you realise.

And because I know how tempting it is to think this is a fluffy ideal that belongs in a Disney movie, here's the science...

Dopamine is one of the most powerful molecules you have.

It is responsible for your motivation, focus, satisfaction and your readiness to push through things to get what you want.

When pleasure is *not* experienced as a result of behaviours (such as overwork and self-sacrifice), the dopamine system isn't being used intelligently, which leads to:

→ Craving pleasure from things like food, drugs, and social media
→ Underwhelm resulting in poor performance
→ Burnout due to a lack of reward for efforts

Chasing achievement to prove self-worth, status or meaningless "success" is an endless cycle with little reward, but the pursuit of growth for the joy of it cultivates infinite reinforcement.

The first leads to your biology wanting to *avoid* behaviours in future, while the latter, re-wires your circuitry to *encourage* the repetition of actions that led to it.

As long as your drive for performance is misaligned with what's truly meaningful *for you* you will never escape the struggle. You will never be free of the need for force to achieve or the craving for unresourceful short highs of pleasure.

Therefore,

Purpose + Fulfilment + Self-worth = empowered actions, which leads to consistency, sustainability and improved efforts.

You *can* force short-term results or enjoy life-long success. The choice is yours.

Let's remember, those claiming success through the hustle and telling you "work harder", "be more disciplined" and "improve your systems" either:

💥 Have their sense of purpose, fulfilment and self-worth sorted - which is *why* the grind works for them

💥 Don't have their purpose, fulfilment and self-worth sorted, which means they don't have much else *other-than* than the grind working for them

It's not that you "don't have it in you"...

it's that you still need to find the truth of what is in you.

But IT IS IN YOU.

When your dominant drive is from purpose,
When your dominant experience is of fulfilment,
When your dominant story is that you are worthy no matter what…

THEN, your high performance is a natural by-product.
THEN, your peak well-being is experienced, 
THEN, your success is inevitable.