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Each day we make many choices and every choice we make brings with it consequences, either good or bad. For every choice we make we are demonstrating discipline or a lack of discipline. What is great about this is that they are our choices, and they are our responsibility.

Whether we are an adult or a child we have the ability to choose courses of action that will matter to our health, knowledge and success. The rewards for eating healthy, brushing our teeth, studying our lessons, practicing skills, setting and achieving goals, saving money, or telling the truth are seen both short term and long term.

What is interesting about discipline is that the practice is not always seen in immediate rewards. Is that not what can make it more difficult for children to learn? In their world immediate satisfaction is more desireable, because it is difficult for them to understand what ‘long term rewards’ mean. In regard then to teaching the character quality of discipline – what we want to start with is teaching how long term rewards benefit us.

Here is a physical example of long term rewards. This past spring in our classes we started a long term project of being able to do 25 pullups. No one in the class was able to achieve that on the first day. However after 8 weeks about half of the class was able to achieve that goal with consistent 3 day a week practice. This same principle applies to other aspects of our life too. What examples do you have of being rewarded by patient disciplined efforts?

There are two kinds of discipline. One is external and the other is internal. While both are an important part of our lives, most would agree that helping ourselves and our children to develop internal discipline is what leads to the most success in our life. To start this series of discussions off we must first distinguish between the two types of discipline.

If you ask any child if their parents have ever discplined them – they understand it to mean being punished. But their is a big difference between discipline and punishment. When we have any kind of external discipline, we are learning a new way of thinking or looking at a behavior. We may be asked to do something as a result of our own behavior that did not fit with the expectation of the other party. That other party may be a teacher, parent, employer or other person. Learning and acting in accordance within the expected norms of the group we are associated with could be considered ‘external discipline’.

Internal discipline is different in that it is a expectation that we have for ourselves. This is going to be different for every person as all of us have our own values and needs. For instance if we are a person who values order and certainty, our internal discipline may give us a rule that we will follow no matter what that says everything has its place and we keep all of our things in a specific order. If we value our health we may give ourselves rules that demand that we eat healthy, exercise and rest properly. We will discipline ourselves to be sure we fill those needs.

While everyone is going to have different values and needs, there are social norms that say to us that certain actions demonstrate internal discipline like working hard, eating healthy, exercising, etc…, while others demonstrate a lack of discipline like procrastination, laziness, putting entertainment ahead of chores. So what rules do you have that are important to you, that you would like to see your children imitate?

Each month we define and discuss a word of character development and life skill with all of our students.