“We must all suffer one of two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret. The difference is discipline weighs ounces while regret weighs tons.” Jim Rohn

I read the above quote years ago about choice, but had no idea what it meant to be disciplined or how to do it. I confused discipline with trying hard, so I did that instead. 

Since I chose discipline as my word of the year for 2021, I committed to taking steps in that direction like reading my Bible daily and getting up early four days a week to write. 

That was all fine and good, but I still resisted doing discipline God’s way, which meant giving up doing life my way.

His discipline looks like getting up every single day and choosing Him. 

I still get out of bed a lot of mornings with my agenda in mind. The difference now is that if I choose trying hard over Him, I feel shaky. I probably felt that way before, but I pushed through it. I know better now, so I slow down and do the only thing that really helps, which is asking for His help. 

“Help me, Jesus.” 

• Choice

This verse from II Chronicles 7:14 (NIV) has been posted all over social media for more than a year in reference to helping and healing our country. It applies to our individual lives as well. 

If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.

In fact, when God helps and heals our country and us, it’ll happen because we individually and daily choose the pain of discipline. 

Because we choose Him. 

As crazy as it sounds, I went so far as trying hard to outwit God by suffering on my own. I found something to suffer over in every situation in hopes that He’d leave me alone – not exactly what He had in mind.

Here are God’s instructions from II Chronicles about He wants us to do it: 

• Humble ourselves and pray – I talk to God instead of trying hard to do my life on my own. 
• Seek His face – I ask Him what He wants from me and I do it.
• Turn from our wicked ways – I ask Him to forgive me for the ways I’ve gotten off track and I get on His track for my life. 

If I had never suffered, I would have never chosen Him nor His discipline. And I would have never been happy. He knows that’s true for all of us.

In This Together, 
Kim

FYI: I’m blogging my book titled On The Other Side of Trying Hard: Healing, Happiness, and Holiness. Because the blog posts will eventually be an entire manuscript instead of stand-alone stories, some posts may leave you hanging. I hope you’ll hang in here with us anyway ‘cause a happy ending is coming. Each blog post title includes the chapter title first. The phrase in parentheses is one subheading within the chapter. I’d love to hear your reflections, questions, and suggestions. I’m over-the-top grateful you’re here.