by Randal Matheny

Discipline can be learned, even when our parents didn't teach and discipline us. Consider that God brings discipline into our lives, if we are willing to learn from the experiences he brings to us (see Hebrews 12).

Here are some principles to encourage our discipline, along with some book references to whet our reading appetite.

1. See loss as gain. Judith Viorst wrote Necessary Losses, and though she lacks a biblical basis and fails to discover the true gains of the concept of loss, she gets started on the right track. The Bible has the best rule here: what you surrender to the Lord will be credited to your account. Start with losing your own life (Matthew 16:24-26). I have Evelyn Christenson's Gaining through Losing on my desk right now; it's next on my reading list.

2. Have a plan. Establish the final goal, where you want to arrive. And trace out the steps necessary to reach it. See yourself down the road, five, ten, twenty years from now. Visualize yourself as being, living, and enjoying the New You. Figure out how to get there. For practical suggestions, check out books like Reader's Digest's Organize Yourself.

3. Find a model and be a monkey. Imitate those who are doing successfully what you want to do. This is one of Anthony Robbins's big suggestions in Awaken the Giant Within. But definitely not original with him. The Bible present Jesus as the perfect model (see, for example, Philippians 2 and 1 Peter 3), and a host of other good people as well. Paul often offers himself as worthy of imitation. Check out these few words:

"Friends, I beg you, become as I am, for I also have become as you are" (Galatians 4:12, NRSV).

"Keep on doing the things that you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you" (Philippians 4:9).

"Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ" (1 Corinthians 11:1).

4. Write it down. Get a notebook and jot down those dreams, goals, objectives, and positive steps. Also identify and put to the pen those limiting falsehoods that hold you back. Telling Yourself the Truth is one of the great principles of changing your life, say authors William Backus and Marie Chapian. And the writing part is a big principle of David Burns's Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy.

5. Keep it simple, stupid. I've been disappointed with most of his books, but his best one was one of the least popular (wonder why?): Simplicity, by Richard Foster. Complicated plans run greater chance of failure. Military strategists know the simple plan brings success.

6. Start today. "Today is the day of salvation." No time like the present, don't we say? Actually, there is no time BUT the present. In his second book, The Feeling Good Handbook Dr. Burns works on helping to overcome procrastination.

Discipline is the key to transforming our lives. And not only ours, but of others around us as well. This fruit of the Spirit is produced by the Lord and grows in those of us who cooperate as he works in our lives.