Importance of Rules
Posted: Friday, April 01, 2011
by Sulagna Dasgupta
Love in India
Have you ever wondered why there are so many rules in the world?
Rules like-you should sleep at night and stay up during the day?
Rules like-you should take four meals a day, one each in the morning, afternoon, evening and night?
Rules like-the two sleeves of your shirt should be of the same length?
You’re saying, “But surely these don’t fall in the category of rules? These just describe the way life is!”
You’ll say, “Because rules are shackles. A rule is something that I have to make myself follow. It’s something that doesn’t come to me naturally. And basically, it’s something I’d have been better off without. Waking up in the morning and eating four times a day are things I want to do, not things which bind me in any way.”
Exactly. If someone puts you in an island with not one other human being around (think “Cast Away”), you’ll strive to maintain the same rhythm of life, even though you’ll have no reason to.
So what are rules after all? According to www.dictionary.com a rule is “a principle or regulation governing conduct, action, procedure, arrangement, etc.” So waking up in the morning is also a rule, right? But you follow these “rules” without knowing, and then there are rules which you hate because you “have to” follow them-like going to work at the same time every day!
And then there’s the third kind of rules-the ones you make for yourself. Like, “I’ll stop smoking.” Or “I’ll run for half an hour every day.” These, as we all know, are the most difficult-and the most important-to follow. So how can we make the third kind of rules into the first kind of rules? How can we set personal rules so that they cease to be something we have to follow, and become parts of our life which are just there-without us being conscious about them?
The key to self-discipline is desire. Desire to make something happen. We give the first colors of reality to our desires when we set personal goals. Self-discipline is something which is essential to a sustained journey towards a concrete goal.
The only reason for us being unable to maintain our own rules is the natural human tendency to fall prey to instant gratification. Think of any of the instances when you failed to follow a rule you’d set for yourself-it was because you fell for easy instead of right. Think of the last time you hit “snooze” on your alarm clock-choosing to sleep for one more hour-it was because sleep gave you instant gratification and hence was the easier alternative.
But once you have a goal and a time-line attached to it, the whole picture changes dramatically. Every day becomes one of the numerous (may be 182, may be 365, may even be 1825, or even 3650) mini-steps towards your goal. So every morning you’re all charged up-greedy for the satisfaction that moving one step forwards will give you! And it’s only this desire which can become the force which can push the scales to tilt towards Right from Easy.
May be you’re thinking, “But you know what? I have this goal of waking up at 6 every morning. Currently I wake up at around 8 and every day I set the alarm at 6, but every day I switch it off when it rings and go back to sleep, only to wake up at 8 once again. So there you are. I have a clear goal, and believe me I really want to achieve it. But why am I failing again and again? What is the crucial factor that I lack? What is it that’s holding the scales back to Easy every time I try??”
That brings us to the next important factor concerning goal-setting and self-discipline. Being overwhelmed with your task. If your immediate goal, i.e. your daily goal, seems too big to you, you’ll never be able to be motivated enough to achieve it. Even if you’re able for the first few days, you’ll soon lose steam. More importantly, these small failures will start eating into your confidence little by little. At one point of time you’ll start believing that you can’t fulfill the task you’ve set for yourself. From that point onwards you’ll start failing not because you don’t have the motivation, but because you already believe that that’s exactly what you’re going to do!
The only way to maintain self-discipline and stick to your goals is to make your daily goals as tiny as possible. If you want to wake up early, advance your alarm timing by five minutes every day. Yes, no more than five minutes! If you want to finish reading a book, set yourself the goal of reading just two pages every day. If you want to increase your daily exercise time from half an hour to one hour, increase it by five minutes every day.
And then stick to it. Make sure that no matter what happens in the world, these tiny tasks are going to be completed on a daily basis. The small daily delights of being able to keep your promises to yourself will build confidence and consistency in you and will prepare the ground for greater successes. When you’ve been able to maintain a self-imposed rule for a week, you’ll already feel amazingly more confident to be able to take on more!
That’s what I think. What do you think? Use the “Leave a Comment” option to help me and others learn more about setting and maintaining personal rules.
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