EverEveryone desires freedom.
When I was young, I once thought that freedom meant being unrestrained: I could sleep as late as I wanted, I could eat whatever I wanted, and I could avoid doing things I didn't want to do. My time was completely under my own control.
But as I grew older, I increasingly realized that perhaps our understanding of "freedom" was actually the opposite.
True freedom is not doing whatever you want, but having the ability to decide what to do and the ability to control what not to do.
And this ability largely comes from self-discipline.
The hardest part of self-discipline is giving up the comfort of the present for an unseen future.
I used to envy my elder brother for his effortless and graceful gait when walking.
Later, I realized that that seemingly effortless grace was not achieved by chance; it was the result of his daily practice of running 8 kilometers.
At that time, I only saw the result but didn't truly understand the repetitive daily efforts behind it.
It wasn't until 2017 that I also began to change myself.
I used to like staying in bed. Sleeping a little longer in the morning was such a comfortable thing.
But I started forcing myself to get up, put on my shoes, and go out.
At first, it was just a quick walk, and then I gradually tried slow running.
Looking back now, these few sentences are easy to write, but the process of going through that is not easy at all.
Because exercise doesn't give you immediate rewards.
Today, if you walk for an hour, you won't suddenly become healthy the next day; if you persist for a week, the person in the mirror may not show any obvious changes.
But staying in bed for one more hour is immediately comfortable.
So, every morning when you don't want to get up, you are actually facing the same choice:
Do I want the comfort of the present, or a future that is still out of sight?
This might be the hardest part of self-discipline.
It requires us to repeatedly give up immediate gratification and believe in a result that has not yet emerged.
The hardest time for self-discipline is when it hasn't become a habit yet.
Fortunately, when something is persisted in for long enough, it will change.
Now, going for a morning workout for me has become very natural, just like eating and sleeping every day.
I no longer need to have a fierce mental struggle every morning.
Yoga is the same.
I have been practicing yoga for decades. At first, all I needed was persistence; later, it gradually became a habit, and then it seemed to become a part of my body.
Now, if I don't do it for a while, I feel uncomfortable physically.
This has made me gradually understand:
The things that are truly persisted in, often no longer require "persisting".
The most painful stage of self-discipline is when a good habit hasn't been established.
During that stage, you make efforts but don't see the result immediately; the old habit is still pulling you, and the new habit hasn't formed yet, so every day requires the consumption of willpower.
But once you cross this stage, things that originally required willpower to complete will gradually become a natural way of life.
At this time, the cost of self-discipline becomes lower and lower, while the rewards it gives keep accumulating.
Now, when I call some friends, sometimes I hear them talk about pain in this part and discomfort in that part. Whenever this happens, I cherish the fact that I can still move my body relatively easily.
Of course, it's not saying that exercise can avoid all health problems. Everyone's physical condition, age, and health status are different.
But at least for me, persisting in exercise and yoga over the years has allowed me to still enjoy the relaxation brought by physical activity today.
Sometimes I feel very lucky.
However, upon careful consideration, this "luck" actually also encompasses the cumulative results of oneself over the years.
The freedom that one enjoys today comes from those mornings in the past when one clearly did not want to get up but eventually got up and went out.
Is it really "fate"? Or is there something wrong with our choices?
We are accustomed to attributing many of the outcomes in life to a single sentence:
"This is fate."
I used to think this statement made sense.
There are indeed some things that we cannot explain or control.
We cannot choose our birth, nor can we control the era, the environment, diseases, accidents, and many sudden changes.
But one day, I suddenly changed my perspective on this issue:
What if we don't attribute the results to fate for the moment, but instead look back at the choices we have made in the past?
This idea gave me a sudden awakening feeling.
Are some outcomes not entirely "fate", but rather have already been buried in countless past choices?
- When there is a problem with the body, apart from age and uncontrollable factors, is there any influence from long-term living habits?
- I always feel there is no time, apart from being busy with work, is there a problem with the allocation of one's own time?
- A book that has not been finished for several years - is it really due to lack of time, or have you given your time to other things?
- When life does not bring the changes we expect, have we truly taken continuous actions to change?
Because in my opinion, once everything is attributed to "fate", thinking can easily stop.
You will naturally think it is an arrangement from heaven and lose your attention and efforts on the part that can be controlled.
Fate seems unchangeable.
But choices can.
A single choice may be insignificant, but if the same choice is repeated for a year, ten years, or several decades, it will eventually leave a mark.
Many of our current states may be the result of the accumulation of countless small choices in the past.
The changes in life might start from something as insignificant as "half a steamed bun".
When I was in school, I had a good appetite and once my weight exceeded the normal range.
To lose weight, I began to set a daily limit for my staple food intake: no more than two ounces per meal, no more than six ounces for the whole day, and I also gave up snacks.
Up to this day, I still clearly remember a scene in the school cafeteria.
In the cafeteria's display window, there were one after another freshly cooked white steamed buns, white and plump, steaming hot, like little pillows. Each bun weighed four ounces.
When male students came to get their meals, they usually picked up a whole large steamed bun and left.
When it was our turn, who only needed two ounces, the cafeteria lady picked up a four-ounce long steamed bun and cut it in half with one swift motion - one bun became two halves, each exactly two ounces.
I took one of the halves.
That scene still remains in my memory to this day.
Now thinking about it, perhaps it was from those seemingly insignificant "halves" that I first learned to draw a boundary for my desires.
It wasn't "try to eat less today".
It was simply:
This meal is two ounces.
Looking back now, I realize that I unintentionally did something very important at that time:
Turning a vague desire into a measurable and executable action.
"Want to lose weight" is just a desire.
"Only eat half a four-ounce steamed bun for this meal" is the action.
A day may not change much.
But when the same choice is repeated day after day, it gradually changes not only the weight but also a person's habits.
Later, I gradually developed the habit of not overeating and have maintained it until today.
Decades have passed, and the steaming hot white steamed buns in the school cafeteria, I still remember them.
Perhaps the things that truly change us in life are often not earth-shattering decisions.
It might be that knife at the cafeteria window many years ago, and the half steamed bun you reached out to take.
True effective self-discipline is to turn important things into habits.
Many goals fail to be achieved not because we don't really want them, but because the goals are too vague.
"I want to exercise."
"I want to lose weight."
"I want to read more books."
These are just wishes, not actions.
What truly changes life is to turn wishes into specific actions.
For example, I arrange for physical examinations and dental cleanings every year.
When one thing is done for many years in a row, it becomes a part of one's life routine.
At that time every year, I naturally think: Should I have a physical examination this year? Should I have a dental cleaning this year?
There is no need for others to remind me.
It has become a part of life.
The same goes for reading.
We can buy many books and tell ourselves when we buy them: "I must read them when I have time."
But if we don't set aside time for this book, after a year, it is likely to still be lying there untouched.
Because "I'll do it later" often means never doing it at all.
So, if you really decide to read a book, you should give yourself a plan:
When will you finish reading it?
How much will you read each day?
What time will you read each day?
True effective learning is not merely about constantly acquiring more knowledge, but rather about understanding why one is learning, what one is learning, and how to turn what has been learned into action.
Only in this way can "I want to read" transform from a wish into a truly executable action.
- Only when a wish is specificized can it become an action;
- only when an action is repeated continuously can it become a habit.
The significance of habits lies in that they eventually reduce our reliance on willpower.
True good self-discipline is not to insist on holding on for life, but to gradually establish a set of one's own life order, allowing those truly important things to occur naturally.
In the past, there was no time; now, there is no quiet mind.
Regarding reading, I have another profound feeling.
When I was working, I was very busy.
Every day, I had to meet many people and handle many matters.
What this person said, that person did, one event made me angry, and another event made me excited.
At the end of the day, it seemed that only my body had been busy for the whole day, while my mind had never truly been quiet.
Those disorganized pieces of information continued to remain in my mind.
You were still thinking about what happened during the day, still recalling what someone said, and still experiencing the emotions brought about by those events.
At that time, I often felt that I couldn't find a truly quiet moment to read.
Later, life changed, and I finally had more time of my own.
Logically speaking, now I should be able to read many books in peace.
But gradually, I discovered:
Having time doesn't mean having attention.
What disturbed me in the past was work, people, and the daily matters that had to be dealt with.
What disturbs us today has become something else - overwhelming information.
Short videos, self-media, news, hot topics, push notifications...
When I open my phone, I originally intended to look at it for just a few minutes.
One piece of information leads you to another, a video has another video behind it.
An hour passes, and it seems that I have learned a lot.
But when I put down the phone, it's hard for me to say that I really learned something.
More importantly, the brain was once again filled up.
It was then that I realized:
In the past, I didn't have quiet time; now, I have time, but I may not have a quiet mind.
What reading truly requires is not just time.
It needs silence, concentration, and allowing a thought to stay in the mind for a sufficient length of time.
If the brain is constantly interrupted, stimulated, and filled with various pieces of information, even if a book is placed in front of you, you may not really be able to read it.
So I increasingly feel:
Self-discipline doesn't just mean forcing yourself to do something; it also means consciously deciding what doesn't enter your life.
Blocking out noise is itself a form of self-discipline.
In the past, there was no time; now, there is no quiet mind.
Looking back at the path I have taken, I increasingly understand why self-discipline always seemed painful at the beginning.
Because humans naturally prefer immediate comfort.
- Sleeping an extra hour brings immediate comfort.
- Eating something you like brings immediate happiness.
- Watching short videos brings immediate stimulation.
However, the rewards brought by activities like exercising, reading, learning, saving, and health management often don't become apparent until much later.
Self-discipline is actually making choices like these over and over again, and being willing to believe in that future that is still out of sight for now.
At the beginning, you need to force yourself.
Then, the behavior starts to repeat.
Repetition turns into a habit.
Habit leads to accumulation.
Accumulation gradually turns into ability.
And ability ultimately gives you more and more choices in life.
So now, if I were to re-understand the statement "The more self-disciplined you are, the more free you are", I would give it a different answer from before:
Freedom is not being without anyone to control you, but having the ability to manage your own life.
Self-discipline is not locking yourself in a cage.
On the contrary, the rules we actively establish for ourselves today are for the day when we no longer get bound by the rules imposed on us by life.
Your choices today shape who you will be tomorrow.
Your self-discipline today determines how many choices you will have tomorrow.
And the true freedom of an individual might begin with the ability to have more and more choices over their own life.