Top voices on discipline: Paul Graham, James Clear, Oliver Burkeman, Ryan Holiday and 17 others.
Our reading of what a group of claims have in common, one level above a korrent: a korrent is our reading of what somebody said, a view is our reading of what several korrents share. The claims are printed under it, so the sentence can be checked against them.
Nobody is filed under a view — claims are. A person is named here because a dated claim of theirs sits under it, and somebody whose claims sit under two views appears under both.
Tobias LütkeRyan HolidayGeorge SaundersSteven PressfieldNick CaveEric RiesBryan JohnsonJames ClearPavel DurovLex FridmanDavid Heinemeier HanssonAndrew Chen
Dillon MulroyMasud HusainJames ClearRahul VohraDavid Heinemeier HanssonOliver BurkemanLuca LamparielloHillel Wayne
A viewour reading
Their wordsI think doing the same thing with the mind is totally possible and affirmations are the easiest way to do it
Their wordsIt takes discipline. The discipline to figure out what you actually want your life to look like. The discipline to turn down cool, lucrative opportunities.
Their wordsWrite something, in any old mood – feeling great about it or terrible, doesn’t matter.
Their wordsIt doesn’t matter what creative field you’re in. Keep showing up day after day, and the game of numbers will work in your favor.
Their wordsI also have an affinity with artists who treat their craft as a job and are not dependent on the vagaries of inspiration — because I am one of them. Like most people with a job, we just go to work.
Their wordsharder is easier is a principle that says if you're willing to do the work upfront to commit to quality, to design, to ethics, to integrity, to safety, whatever the thing, I don't want to tell you what your values are, you tell me what they are. If you're willing to be principled in your decision-making, you will get these unexpected rewards.
Their wordsHabits and not expensive, exotic therapies.
Their wordsSo one of the core lessons of atomic habits is that every action you take is like a vote for the type of person you wish to become. So, when you show up at the gym today, you are casting a vote for being the type of person who doesn't miss workouts. When you sit down and make one sales call, you are casting a vote for being a salesperson. When you write one sentence, you are casting a vote for being a writer. And no, doing one push-up does not transform your body, but it does cast a vote for that identity.
Where this was said
Watch from 0:01:34 plays hereTheir wordsIntensity makes for a good story. You know, it's like, oh, I went to a silent meditation retreat for a week, you know, or I um I ran a marathon. Um you know, we launched this product faster than any other had been launched or what, you know, intensity makes for a good story, but consistency makes progress.
Where this was said
Watch from 1:54:46 plays hereTheir wordsI think the main muscle you can exercise is this muscle, the muscle of self-discipline. Not your biceps or your pecs or anything else. Because if you get to train that one, everything else just comes by itself.
Their wordsYeah, I think overabundance paralyzes motivation and willpower. It's extremely harmful, particularly for young boys, to grow up in an environment where they can be proud, not of their own achievements, but of their father's achievements or their father's wealth.
Their wordsIf you’re stuck in a depressive cycle, even when you really, really, really, really don’t want to do anything, to do something. Try to make progress because the good feeling comes on the end of that. The whole point is to do first and then feel, not feel and then do.
Their wordsHaving the grit to stick with the effort when the going gets hard is a key trait of successful people.
Their wordsCreativity is perishable, just like inspiration. It has to be discharged regularly or it will spoil
Their wordsThe frequency of creating helps you build the muscle for more later.
A viewour reading
Their wordshaving the humility to give up on good bets turned bad might be just as important
Their wordsThe persistent are attached to the goal. The obstinate are attached to their ideas about how to reach it.
Their wordsThe reason the persistent and the obstinate seem similar is that they're both hard to stop. But they're hard to stop in different senses. The persistent are like boats whose engines can't be throttled back. The obstinate are like boats whose rudders can't be turned.
Their wordsBut resilience is not the same as obstinacy. Resilience means setbacks can't change your morale, not that they can't change your mind. Indeed, persistence often requires that one change one's mind.
Their wordsFive distinct qualities — energy, imagination, resilience, good judgement, and focus on a goal — combine to produce a phenomenon that seems a bit like obstinacy in the sense that it causes you not to give up.
Their wordsI think the thing that most people get wrong after they’ve decided to start a company is work on things they think the market wants. Not being passionate about any idea but thinking, okay, look, this is what will get me venture funding. This is what will get me revenue or customers. That’s what will get me venture funding. If you work from that perspective, I think you’ll give up beyond the point because it’s very hard to work towards something that was not truly important to you.
A viewour reading
Their wordsmy take has always been that "discipline doesn't scale" across teams and eng orgs and is a huge reason to use effect
Their wordsit was only about 15 years ago I started beginning to be aware that there may be a an important biology underlying motivation and when that biology goes wrong, it can lead to loss of motivation and even pathological apathy.
Their wordsYou can either increase the reward or change it in some way in terms of something that's meaningful for the person or you change the effort required to accomplish maybe part of the task or perhaps start you know just initiate the task and often starting can be a huge motivational pull.
Their wordsYou want to you want to be able to walk into the rooms that you're in each day, and the good habit is the path of least resistance. It's the easiest thing to do. And a lot of the time you walk into rooms and it's the distractions that are easier to do and you feel like you're swimming upstream and trying to fight your environment to make a change happen.
Where this was said
Watch from 0:15:19 plays hereTheir wordsBecause if it's not fun, if it's not engaging or interesting, if it doesn't feel good, you're not going to stick with it when it gets tough. I mean, this is probably one of the great lessons for life, which is if you're having fun, then then you're dangerous, right? Then you're hard to compete with. You don't want to you don't want to go up against the person who's having a good time doing it because if it feels like a hassle or a chore, that's the person who gives up when it gets difficult.
Where this was said
Watch from 1:17:34 plays hereTheir wordsAnd that's the problem with rewards is they just massively undermine intrinsic motivation. And that's why gamification doesn't work. And when gamification does work, it's because the underlying experience was already designed like a game.
Their wordsDrained by the lack of momentum on moving things forward, not from an intrinsic incapacity for motivation
Their wordsyou don’t get dragged away against your will. You surrender willingly.
Their wordsThis is why most anti-distraction hacks – web-blocking apps, noise-canceling headphones, personal rules – never seem to work very well.
Their wordsyou almost certainly can't consistently do the kind of work that demands serious mental focus for more than about three or four hours a day
Their wordsIn general, people will stick with the learning strategy that they like best, not the one that everyone says is best.
Their wordsRather, the best way to reduce the volume and severity of mistakes is to adjust the system itself.
Their wordsOne brand of idiots will claim that pushing yourself is a bad thing, that great things only come without force. (Have they known any genuinely productive people?) Another brand of idiots will sell you on the necessity of constant discipline, of grinding until your last breath. (At some point they will do ayahuasca and have a psychedelic influencer arc.) Clearly neither group of people is describing reality.
Matched by wording, not yet read into a view. The archive grows on its own, so this is where new claims wait for somebody to read them.
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