Why Discipline Is Freedom
Discipline and Freedom, two words that seem to be galaxies apart. The title of this article itself seems to be an oxymoron. After all, you might wonder, what do discipline and freedom have to do with each other?
The purpose of this article is exactly that, aiming to bring discipline and freedom together, and in the process giving you some food for thought.
Discipline and freedom, like Yin and Yang, form a dynamic system.
To understand the relevance of such a claim, we must first understand the intricacies of both discipline and freedom. According to the Collins dictionary, discipline, in literal terms is:
Discipline is the practice of making people obey rules or standards of behaviour, and punishing them when they do not.
This means that discipline forms a set of rules, a criterion of standard behaviour that must not be defied. But how does this relate to freedom? To that end, we must first understand freedom. Again, according to the Collins Dictionary:
Freedom is the state of being allowed to do what you want to do.
At first glance, the definitions of both these words couldn’t be any further apart, where one is the representation of rules, the other prides itself on the lack of it. However, to understand “Why Discipline Is Freedom” literal definitions must be ignored. We must understand the implications behind both words, not their definitions. Perhaps it is best said by James Farmer.
“We do what we have to so we can do what we want to.”
-James Farmer
This quote by James may seem cliche and simple, we have to do things we don’t enjoy so we can obtain what we want. Yes, that is precisely what James is trying to say, and yes, that is logical, but it is envisioned as far too simple, to say the least. What James is trying to say is that our freedom is a result of our actions, how we act defines the degree of our freedom. Simply, the freedom of movement requires the restriction of travel.
Freedom is easy to understand, but discipline is far more complex. Many of us portray discipline as a handbook that must be respected, a book when disobeyed is considered a felony. Trapping discipline into such a small bracket is borderline criminal.
Discipline is not an act of obeying rules.
Discipline is an act of consistency.
Let’s take a simple example to understand such an interpretation. Ever wondered why the billionaires of the world can truly experience freedom?
It isn’t because of financial freedom, albeit, I admit, that helps. Search any of their daily routines and you’d be surprised how disciplined they are, how consistently consistent they are. It is because of such obsessive consistency they portray the image of freedom. They successfully do what they have to do to put themselves in the best position possible to pursue what they want to. They fulfil their daily hierarchy of needs. What is the hierarchy of needs?
Allow me to cite Maslow’s excellent theory of the Hierarchy of needs.
The video above shows that individuals have basic needs that must first be satisfied to move up the ladder of more important needs. It is best explained by Maslow himself, who famously once said:
“It is quite true that man lives by bread alone — when there is no bread. But what happens to man’s desires when there is plenty of bread and when his belly is chronically filled?
You might wonder how this is related to the discipline of billionaires. In the aforementioned example, they established a daily hierarchy of needs. Although Maslow’s theory pertains to an individual's whole life, it can be interpreted and condensed to a single day. By fulfilling the set of needs an individual requires on a daily basis, he or she can then move to more important needs. That is, if the non-negotiables of the day are taken care of, the day opens up to pursue the negotiables and this is what billionaires do better than anyone. They make sure they maximise the time and energy given to these negotiables. Thus, discipline comes into the conversation, to be free from the clutters of life we must be in control of them. Only then do we have the fire to disengage from our basic needs and move unto greater needs.
Therefore, we can conclude that in order to achieve true freedom we must first achieve true discipline.
