...andddd I'm back!!!

Source: www.paulmcveigh.co.uk

It's been two years. Two years since I wrote here. I feel a bit sad and all, but i'll spare you guys the emotional crinkum-crankum. I got motivated by one of the directors in my office, who is a wife and a mother. I recently stumbled upon her blog and was just blown away! Someone, who is easily multiple times busier than I am, still finds time to blog. She writes so well, and consistently so. And she even sings in church sef. Shame on you Jide. Shame!!! With all my excuse of being too busy to do the little things that also matter, here is someone who seemingly does it so effortlessly.

Truth is, my life did really get busier. Work went up a couple of notches, girlfriend (yes, I've got one of those now) also requires 'quality time' as a sign of love (such a herculean task for a loner like me), my dad had a serious 'talk' with me about my being out of touch (at least he stayed away from the subject of marriage in THAT conversation! Or wait...did he??). I'm not even good with birthdays of friends anymore...sending half-hearted sms'es/bbms to celebrants or skipping the birthday altogether (I was once a birthday rockstar! I literally call ALL my friends on their birthdays. it's a very smart and cheap way of speaking to every single friend once a year :D - now it seems I don't even care :( ). Too many balls are getting dropped and frankly it's unnerving. And then there's CandyCrush! That tiny sugary parasite eats whatever tiny droplets of time I have left.

So that's how I got talking with my friend Simone (let's call her Simone). In this talk, she went on and on about how I was so energetic and disciplined and how she wanted to be like me, etc, etc. For a moment, I thought she was texting the wrong person (lol!) But I have been friends with Simone for close to a decade, so it seems she knew what she was saying, no? Still, I was taken aback by her statements - here I was, complaining about my indiscipline, and on the side of town, someone wants to be like me. Hmm. I then looked at my life critically and realized that I am disciplined. At least to some good degree. While in school, i put a lot of discipline to my books, and my relationships. Now, the same level of discipline helps with my work, and a few relationships. But I'm thinking there should be a greater level of discipline I can aspire to. There's some level of personal and professional effectiveness that ensure that I juggle every aspect of my life efficiently and with grace, without dropping any ball. That, in my opinion, is what I need right now to perform at my peak (My office people would find that last phrase interesting).

So I have started a journey with Simone. A journey to a higher level of discipline and the ensuing effectiveness. We started by understanding ourselves (strengths, weakness and all that shit - of which, we discovered during one of our exercises that one of my inherent weaknesses was indiscipline! Lool! I looked at Simone and said 'Ha! You see!!!'). Anyways, now we understand how to leverage our strengths and improve on our weaknesses. We're at the point where we make plans for the next 1, 3, 5, 10, 15 and 20 years! We define the most important part of our lives and think up what and how we want it to be in the future. Its a bit scary, but we're closing our eyes and doing it anyway (blind faith?). I'm guessing that's where discipline stems from - the temerity to pen down our goals and the tenacity to stick with them no matter what. I have always been good at that first part, I need God's help on the second one.

Writing this piece made me happy. Perhaps that's what discipline does to you at the end of the day - You feel fulfilled that you made a promise to yourself, and you kept it. And in turn, it gives you the right impetus to make and keep another promise to yourself, and another, and another. Talk about a virtuous cycle!

So here's to a long life of made and kept promises.

Source: http://renkocafe.nl/oefen-2/discipline.html