Discipline

I've been mulling some things around and it came to me, today, that I lack discipline.  That is, I lack impulse control.  Not just in my approach to my horsemanship but in almost every aspect of my life.  I live in a state of perpetual damage control.  Always trying to get the house tidied up, always struggling to get my weight under control, always floundering for direction and progress with my horses, always racing against a forgotten deadline at work.

It's not healthy and it's not fun.  And I don't want to be like this anymore.

Recently the Parelli Central Blog featured a guest post by Dachia Arritola.  In addition to her website, Dachia writes a blog and I skipped on over and started reading.  I was particularly struck by an entry titled How do you become something you aren't?  At the end of the post, Dachia writes the following:

The point to all this is that while it is important to ask the question "how did I get here," it is more important to move to the next question, "now what?"

I find myself at the now what? stage.  I know things need to change but what path do I take?

And maybe the path I choose is not so important as actually making the choice and doing something.  In choosing, I am doing and in doing I am going somewhere that's not here.  If the path is wrong or if I discover a better way, I can change my mind.  But I've got to start somewhere.

And while all this is rolling around my mind, a link from Dachia's website caught my eye and took me to this site.  And on this site I found the following quote:

Discipline: Few things enable our horses to say yes to us like our ability to say no to ourselves.

Wow! I love it when the universe conspires for my benefit.