Devotion Over Discipline

Fresco in the Basilica of Santa Maria Novella showing
Saint Dominic with a discipline in his hand, kneeling before a crucifix. 
In the gym, some treat the barbell as a whip while their eyes are fixed on an icon looking down on them from behind a glass screen rather than plaster.

The words we use matter. When we speak, we tell others who we are. Words communicate our perception of the world and determine our actions within it. Our words, spoken and thought, make us. Therefore, we should be mindful of the words we use, as mindless speech precedes unintended outcomes.

Before continuing, stop and assess both words. I’ve italicized key words and phrases for consideration.

From Merriam-Webster:

Devotion. Noun.

1: as in love.

2: as in dedication. Adherence to something to which one is bound by a pledge or duty.

Discipline. Noun.

1a: control gained by enforcing obedience or order.

 b: behavior in accordance with rules: orderly conduct.

 c: self-control

2: punishment

3: an activity that one engages in regularly to train or improve oneself

Before continuing, know that I don’t take issue with the word discipline in general, merely its use in the fitness realm. This is because, as the definition of discipline states, the primary meaning is negative (enforcement, punishment), whereas devotion means love. It is okay to not enjoy training, to not love exercise, to dread being under the bar, but speaking of workouts in negative tones means that in the long run, it will be harder, perhaps impossible, to see it as an act of (self) love, risking the practice of being fit as one of abnegation instead of achievement.

This is no way to speak of a lifelong commitment. One must fall in love with the process, the struggle, not because it is hard or hurts, but because devotion produces self-realization through adherence to our physicality to which we are inherently bound. While duty may seem negative, consider if that is true when the act means loving who you are and who you are becoming

Contrast that with obedience to rules, often in fitness, constructed by avowed disciplinarians; then, self-control is punishment. Only in the third order does the definition of discipline mean what the modern-day influencer miscommunicates. They use discipline as first obedience to them, their rules, their order, because from their perspective, it is how they improved, and so, if you have the discipline to follow them, then you earn the right to self-control. However, such outlooks fall short of what love can achieve, forever living in the shadows of that higher aim.

Pledging our efforts to our betterment is an act of self-control that self-flagellating disciplinarians will only know once they separate training from existing as enforcement, as punishment, as the superficial sacrifice published online by which they gain the devotion of others; those who watch, like, and share posts, for the attention from and worship of today’s disciplinarian who receives love from their audience instead of as an intrinsic quality of their activity, that is, the process by which their self-realization could be achieved, rather than by needlessly indirect though paradoxically immediate means—social media’s pitfall—too dark a place to exist as a wellspring of enlightened and uplifting information, thus negativity pervades. Therefore, discipline’s endless rungs, a ladder out of and to nothing, for eventually it becomes the goal, because in permanent exhaustion, the height once sought is abandoned, that someone once strived for: your greatest self.

Let this be an encouragement to devotion and, at the same time, a warning against discipline. Not because one is right and the other wrong in all cases, but because, in this case, that of self-improvement, the best outlook is a positive one. One associated with love, not enforcement. Dedication, not punishment. Devote yourself to training, and training will become easy. Not in the sense that your effort will reduce, no, it will increase, and for that reason, your lifts will improve, and so too will you as you are drawn upward, toward love, the highest aim, experienced only through devotion. 

This post is an addendum to 1,000 Days.