Why Men Hate Discipline

In this episode, I pull back the curtain on the parts of discipline nobody ever talks about — the hidden pieces that actually decide who you become as a man. Most guys think discipline is just waking up early, grinding, eating clean, or forcing yourself through routines… but that’s surface-level. That’s the Instagram version. What I get into here is the real deal — the belief systems, the shame loops, the distractions, the lies we tell ourselves, and the split-second perspective shifts that change everything. I walk you through how I spent decades thinking I just “wasn’t disciplined,” and how one realization finally flipped the entire game for me and built the freedom I’d been chasing the wrong way.

If this episode hits you strikes you — if you hear your own patterns in my story — then you’re ready for the deeper work inside The Breakthrough Blueprint, my six-month transformation program designed to rebuild the man you are from the inside out. You can find everything you need at tonyjbova.com

Transcript

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And once I figured out that one secret, that's when everything shifted. The Tony Bova Show. Built by pain, designed for freedom. Before we get started, I'm your host, Tony, and I want to remind you that you are relentless by design. And for today's episode, we're going to talk about discipline in a unique perspective that not many are talking about. And it's my own way of figuring out through decades of struggling through it, where I uncovered some things that were a little bit hidden. Because I wanted to bring that to you in a way that hopefully could benefit your life. I wanted to dive into this particular subject because it's such an important thing to learn how to create it uniquely for yourself. Because it's not just about waking up early, working out, diet, not drinking, or being able to abstain from things. There are other components of discipline that nobody's talking about, basically a completely unfair advantage. And so that's why I wanted to be able to share these things with you at such a different level than maybe you've heard before. Because as we, you know, expand our perspectives on things, we change our belief systems and the values around that to align with the man that we are actually trying to become. Because here's the thing: most men believe discipline is doing the right thing when no one's looking. But that's actually not what discipline is. Discipline is when you have the choice to be able to pick your freedoms because you've built something up and eaten so much shit over time that you've built this layer of skin around yourself that says, I don't care if you think I'm disciplined or not. I know who I am at the end of it all. I was never really a disciplined person. I struggled throughout my entire life with dyslexia, ADHD, being disorganized, a mess, always a late for like everything, and really struggling to finish all different kinds of projects. So when I would hear people talk about discipline, I was like, oh, you know, I would just say that that wasn't for me. And until I started to really understand what discipline actually was, what it actually would do for my life and how it actually aligned with who I am as an individual, that I wasn't just stealing discipline from other men that told me to wake up early, to work out every single day, to eat a particular diet. Now, I will say a lot of those things are very true for myself now. But when we start to dive into what is discipline for you, it doesn't really become this thing that I need to listen to everybody else, that I need to do what he said I needed to do simply because he's motivating me. True discipline comes from our internal, from our ability to correct our mindset along the way, where we start to ask ourselves questions when things get really hard, and then start to make the decisions where our outcomes are in alignment with who we want to become. Because I was very disciplined for many, many years. And when I climbed up to the top of the mountain and got to the outcome over about a decade period where I'd finally reached my dream job and had worked so diligently for so many years for it, and then all of a sudden my life fell apart. Because when I had finally gotten to the top of the mountain, I realized I'd been building my discipline on something that I actually didn't want, didn't align with me. And as we, you know, kind of deconstruct the belief systems that we were given as kids, as we deconstruct the things that we thought we were supposed to become, the money we were supposed to thought we were supposed to make, or who we were we thought we were meant to be. And we start to go through the core of those things and we start to unravel the belief system where we start to go into the rooted subconscious pieces that continue to show up as patterns. This is where I see a lot of guys, maybe you get stuck where they keep hitting these different cycles over and over again where they they don't understand why they can't not do that any longer. Sometimes it's just not your fault because you just didn't know the way. Sometimes it's just that one second split perspective shift. And all of a sudden you get it. All of a sudden you recognize that it wasn't as hard as it needed to be because you were making it actually more difficult. But at the end of it all, you were distracted. You were trying to pick up new ideas that you thought were going to be the thing that got you the quick success. And then another idea came and you got distracted by that. Or you just couldn't get up out of bed in the morning. And you said, Well, I'm not disciplined, and you started to believe that limit, that limiting belief that kind of shows up over and over again, and then it turned it into a perpetual cycle of shame. Because every time you didn't wake up at 5:30 in the morning, then the next day it got even harder. Because you continued to judge yourself through that process. Where now it just became even more difficult to wake up at 5:30 in the morning. Instead of figuring out what are the values around it, the belief systems around that that are actually at the core of who I am as a man, because I know you've done a lot of stuff already. I know you've worked on yourself, you've built up an awareness, you continue to uh reach out for that next thing to grow yourself, develop yourself, invest in yourself. But then every time something comes up, you're like, damn, what the hell, man? Why did that why did that happen? This problem came into my life, and then I don't know what to do about that. Because now it feels like everything is drained out of me because this one thing showed up. Maybe it was in my relationship. I know you might be struggling, either not having enough sex, or maybe you're stuck in that cycle where you're with that woman where you can't get enough of it, but she totally like ruins your life. Those are the things that start to deteriorate us as men. We start to believe that you know you're not a man. You don't have what it takes, you're not enough. You start to live in those belief systems, and they start to run through you like a disease with shame and guilt, where you beat yourself up over and over again. Because the only critic that actually matters is you. You see, most men are worried about whatever everybody else is going to think about them. But at the end of the day, I know that you actually only care about what you think about you. And the discipline isn't for anybody else other than you. It isn't to prove to anybody that, wow, look how fit I am, or how much money I have in the bank. Because when you finally achieve those things, you start to recognize like it's all fake. It really doesn't mean that much. I don't feel connected to my kids. I don't feel connected to the woman I committed to, or I can't find the woman I want to be with. Because we start running down in these belief systems that keep holding us up from actually building and creating the discipline that should just be showing up for you. You see, discipline is first built in the unique belief system that was meant for you. It's what determines how you create and show up in your life. Discipline is being able to say no to the shiny things that show up so that you can say yes to the glowing thing that's in the distant future. When we start to break it down into these simplistic, easy, one-step processes where we start to run with something consistently. You see, I I didn't realize that how I changed my diet. How that would allow me to drop 60 pounds and be able to keep it off through injuries and different surgeries. Where it's so natural at this point that I love eating. I love what I eat, and it's so simple. Most people look at me and they they judge me. I remember I would walk into the office with literally a a Tupperware of ground beef, some hot sauce and salt. And the looks I would get and the criticism, because everybody else was each eating a sandwich or chips. But for me, I didn't give a shit. I didn't care. See, I would I would do it consistently, and I would take the ridicule and I would lean into it and I would make fun of myself in the process. And you know what happened? You know, so the funny thing is that over time many other people started to ask me what I was doing. They wanted to start having that show up in their own life. And some of them did. And they started to change what they eat it just simply because I wasn't worried about what people thought of me when I came into the office and what I had for lunch, and knew I was gonna get criticized in the process. You see, the only person where discipline really matters is you. That's where respect is built. There's too many guys running around believing they just deserve respect, that it just should be handed to them because they're a man. But the reality is that respect is earned, and you have to earn it for yourself first. You see, that's why the discipline needs to align with your beliefs, and not somebody else's, not mine, not some other influencer, not somebody else's podcast, but your own. Your own unique belief system that you build your values on and that you are able to develop so that it feels good for you. You don't have to be David Goggins. You don't have to be Bedros Kullian. You have to be you. And once I figured out that one secret, that's when everything shifted. Thanks so much for listening to my podcast. I really appreciate you staying in through the whole first episode. It's a fresh podcast. Please hit that subscribe button if you felt like it was really beneficial to you. And remember, you're built by pain, designed for freedom. Peace.