3-7-24 Dedication vs. Discipline and why it matters for your success
What is the purpose of this podcast? To help people decide which they need for personal success and how to make it work for them.
Live intro with hook - Hello my lovelies. Today we’re talking about a topic that I just recently started to dive into, Discipline versus Dedication,and I’m finding it to be so informative and interesting for people’s individual success, whatever that looks like for them. Some may say that they are the same thing, but for those who have tried to discipline themselves to do certain things, like lose weight, stop smoking, keep a clean home and they’ve failed over and over, they know that discipline is not the answer for them, and I think this is exciting for several reasons. First, it’s a new way of being in the world for those who feel like they’re undisciplined or discipline does not work for them in some way. Second, it gives people who love discipline a view into a different way to motivate people who don't respond to discipline like they do. It’s an exciting subject because to me, when you understand this concept, everyone wins because everyone succeeds, and that is a beautiful thing.
As we do sometimes, we’re heading to Merriam Webster to get our definitions of Discipline and Dedication. For our purposes today, we are using the following definition for Discipline - orderly or prescribed conduct or pattern of behavior, training that corrects, molds, or perfects the mental faculties or moral character. Synonyms for discipline are - composure, mastery, control, willpower, self-command. Does this sound like any task oriented personalities we know and love?
Dedication on the other hand is defined as setting aside time and energy for a particular purpose, self-sacrificing and loyalty. Synonyms for dedication are commitment, devotion, allegiance, and fidelity. For those who are more people oriented, I am sure those terms resonate.
While the terms are similar, do you get the subtle differences? If not, let’s go on this journey of discovery together so you can all be more successful in whatever way works for you.
For those who are new to the podcast, when I talk about personalities, I use the DISC personality model of behavior and refer to people as D or Driven, I or Inspired, S or Supportive, and C or Cautious and we’re going to talk about that in terms of Discipline and Dedication. One important thing we often talk about is being in balance and out of balance in terms of personality because that definitely affects how people act and react, so let’s get to it.
For the D personality, you loooove discipline, especially when it helps you to overcome a challenge. You love the climb, the overcoming, and the blood, sweat and tears approach. If something comes easy, is it even worth it?
We’ve talked before about how much the Driven personality loves a good challenge, especially if they have choices and control about how to meet the challenge head on. The Driven personality is all about making everything better through self-mastery and willpower. The key for the D personality, though, is to remember to celebrate their successes because it’s so easy for the Driven person to gloss right over the victory and move onto the next challenge because, for them, the success is in the discipline.
While that works for the D personality, it can alienate the other personality types who may need the celebration, a rest between challenges or time to decompress from the massive amount of work they’ve just put in. I’m not saying that the Driven personality should stop their momentum, but in a group situation like a business or family, it helps to alternate a group challenge with a personal challenge to give the other personalities time to recover, so everyone can face the next challenge renewed and ready.
For example, a friend of mine and her husband both decided to get in shape and her husband is a very high D personality. He decided to see how many days in a row he could work out, and I think his streak ended at over 1,000 days only because he had to have surgery, but he continued to work out before that even when he had kidney stones.
If you’re a high D, you’re probably thinking, Heck yeah! That guy is amazing, and if you are some of the other personality types, you’re thinking, Heck no! What is wrong with that guy? That’s the difference between those that prefer discipline and those that prefer dedication.
With the I personality, dedication is a better vibe than discipline every day. To the I personality, dedication can be fun, discipline, not so much, and anyone who pushes them to be more disciplined might be successful in the short term, but will be disappointed in the long term because discipline doesn’t last for the I personality.
Inspired people want to be just that, Inspired. That’s how they get energized. Let’s use weight loss as an example. For the Inspired person, unless they enjoy exercise, they’re not going to do it. If it’s boring to them, forget it, and if they don’t see results fairly quickly, they’ll lose interest. The same goes for a diet. They are not going to be the ones to drink a green smoothie every day unless they absolutely love them, and even then, they’ll want to mix it up now and then because they thrive on variety and find desperation in deprivation.
These are the people who might lose 40 pounds with a new diet and not only gain that back but pack on even more because when the diet becomes boring, it also becomes unsustainable and when you deprive yourself for a long time and then start eating it again, the weight comes back at a dizzying rate. Any idea how I know this? Yes, that’s me, and it’s such a frustrating journey, but I find much better success dedicating myself to a healthier lifestyle, not just for my own longevity, but for the health of my family as well.
For the I personality, it’s essential to find the fun factor. That’s where the magic is because they’re dedicated to joy. Make it fun, and the I personality will get it done, maybe in record time. Build in variety and the Inspired person’s dedication to the process will multiply and endure.
For the S personality, discipline can feel almost mean. In balance, they don’t want to abuse their bodies, and that’s how they can see several types of discipline and will avoid it like the plague, which is why dedication is much more their style.
Supportive personalities are already dedicated to family, friends, co-workers and more. They are the ones that will sign up for a 5K to help a friend, even if they hate running. They will buy season tickets to the symphony for their music loving child even if they’re not fond of classical music. They will sit through hours of sports practices, music lessons and more because they’re dedicated to their children’s success.
Dedication is their jam, so when a supportive person needs to level up, they need to find something they can dedicate themselves to so they can be successful.
If a S personality starts a business, you can be sure that they are doing that to help a specific kind of customer or client, or they’re doing it to help someone they love. I know this because I fall in this category. I can do so much more when I’m dedicated to doing it, at least in part, for someone else.
A quick story about that - it’s no secret that I struggled to get my home in order for quite some time, but when my youngest was born with extraordinary medical needs and needed his meds at specific times daily as well as a clean environment to minimize his exposure to germs and illness, I knew things had to change.
I had tried my very disciplined mom’s way of doing things, and I couldn’t do it, so I set out to find another way and through a series of events, I found women that did things very differently than my mom, and some of their techniques worked, but it wasn’t until I created my own system that I adapted to my lifestyle and now teach others to adapt to their lifestyle that it stuck.
Is my home pristine? Nope, but that wasn’t the goal. The goal was to have a system that worked, and it does. Occasionally, when I deal with seasonal depression, things backslide a bit, but when the air clears, I get right back on track because I have a plan that works for me and keeps me from getting overwhelmed.
I’ll be relaunching that system soon to help others that struggle and would like to have their homes in order without spending hours or whole weekends cleaning, so stay tuned for that.
Moving on to the C personality, they might be the ones who best embody both Dedication and Discipline because the truth is that the Cautious personality is most definitely dedicated to doing quality work in whatever they do, but for them, it takes discipline to be dedicated.
C people love to do the detail work, so while it might be a stretch of discipline for some people to pay attention to details, the Cautious personality does it both because they are dedicated to producing great details, and they have the discipline to go down the appropriate rabbit holes to get the data they need for producing those great details.
I have a couple of people I know that were work at home moms before the term existed. Both helped their husbands run their businesses, doing the books, booking appointments, etc. They were both dedicated mothers raising multiple children at the same time, and both within a short amount of time told me that they ran their vacuums every single day because they also had pets.
I was like, WHAT? You run your vacuum every single day? And the answer was that they sometimes skipped a weekend day if they were busy, but for the most part, yes, they vacuumed every day. I wasn’t sure if I should be impressed or horrified, and honestly, I was a little of both, but for them, running that vacuum was a task that signified to their family how dedicated they were to taking care of them whether the family appreciated it or not.
In one case, the husband very much appreciated it. In the other, the husband really could not have cared less, and he told his wife that if she was vacuuming daily, that was for her and not him because he really didn’t care. This man worked a job where he got very dirty every day, so having a spotless home was not a high priority for him. The other husband worked in white collar jobs, and the clean home was a help to him in his profession, so the discipline and dedication was different for each one of the women who were vacuuming but both were there.
So, do you know anyone that fits any one of the above? Maybe you feel like you’re a combination of one of more. If that’s the case, go to the Moving Toward Better homepage.
When you’re there, you can choose your path. You can quickly grab your Personality Assessment, schedule a Personalized Strategy Session, join our email community, or you can be one of the first to book one of the newly resurrected DISCovery calls. It’s a quick call to see what your needs are and how we can best serve you. Every one of them starts you on a road to self discovery that can change your life for the better, starting immediately. Sign up and find out for yourself. Love you all!
Show Notes
Dedication and Discipline may seem different, but when applied to the DISC personality types you might be surprised how some are more alike than you ever knew to help people succeed.
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