Learning the Art of Discipline as a Homemaker

on July 22, 2014 by Jami Balmet 0 comments

Self-discipline is one of the biggest things I’ve struggled with as a homemaker. I start off motivated with a brilliant idea that I’m going to start reading my Bible for an hour a day, spend at least that praying, and reading other Gospel-Centered books. The result? I end up burnt out and behind from day one and my new amazing self-discipline quickly turns into feelings of failure. Again.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. Discipline is an important part of a Believer’s life and must first start with CHRIST. But then what? How do you start working new routines into your day? How can you be more disciplined in different areas of your life when you fail so miserably at it day after day? That’s what we are going to dive into today!

Discipline is an important part of a Believer's life and must first start with CHRIST. But then what? How do you start working new routines into your day?

Welcome to the next part of our online book study of Say Goodbye to Survival Mode. It’s not too late to jump in and join the fun! You can read the introduction and see the full schedule of topics for the next 10 weeks. Or jump in with today’s discussion!

Gaining Control of Your Home

Throughout this book study, we have been focusing on learning how to say goodbye to survival mode and to say hello to a well ordered home. If you want to gain back control over your home and finally feel in control – then this study is for you! The heart of this study is what we are talking about today: Cultivating self-discipline.

There are many habits in your life that benefit from strong self-discipline: exercise, cleaning, laundry, cooking, keeping on top of the dishes, faithfully instructing your kids, hospitality, and more! But like we talked about last week, in an effort to seek great self-discipline, your journey must first begin at the feet of Jesus.

Today we are going to be taking a look at the very first discipline you need to work on cultivating: Daily prayer and Bible reading. After you have formed a strong discipline and habit of daily doing this, you can move on to the other areas of your life that you need more discipline in such as exercising or eating healthy. You can take these principles here in this post and apply them to any habit that you want to become more disciplined in.

First Thing in the Morning

I’m not a morning person. I never have been and I doubt that I ever will be. In college, I did all my homework at night, after work and classes because my brain thinks better then than early in the morning. So for a long time I kept trying to develop the habit of doing my Bible reading at night. It just made more sense for me. I saw other people talking about the benefits of rising early – such as Erin from The Humbled Homemaker and Kat Lee from Inspired to Action – and I just thought “Well that’s good for them, but that’s not my personality. There’s no way I can get up even earlier to read my Bible”.

But honestly, it was just too hard. There was always something that came up that would prevent me from consistently reading my Bible every night. I’ve learned (and Crystal talks about in the book) that you should do the most important things first each day. How can I guarantee that I won’t be too tired after a long day and that I actually have the time to read? By building this into my morning routine. First thing!

Self-discipline is one of the biggest things I've struggled with as a homemaker. But it's so important for accomplishing important things in life and in your home!

My Bible reading is the very first thing that happens in my mornings (after coffee of course). I don’t do the dishes. I don’t check my blog comments. I don’t hop on Facebook. I sit down, open my Bible, pray, and read my scripture for that day. Since I’ve been doing this, my Bible reading has been the most consistent of my life!

Discipline Takes Sacrifice

In order to say YES to a daily habit like Bible reading, it means you are going to have to say NO to something else. This might mean that you need to cut out scrolling through Facebook in the morning. Or maybe it means cooking breakfast one day a week and storing it in the freezer for easy access (like freezer waffles, breakfast burritos, or an egg casserole).

Learning to be disciplined takes sacrifice and it usually feels really hard to cut out something enjoyable like vegging out to watch TV. But I’m so motivated because I know if I do sacrifice that time, and cook breakfast for the next day and get the kitchen really clean, I will be so thankful the next day. But if I don’t, and watch TV, I know I will regret it the following day when I could have had a clean kitchen and breakfast done.

I love this encouragement from the book:

“Don’t let the thought of working out four times a week for the next six months overwhelm you. Don’t let the seeming impossibility for you to limit or eliminate your Facebook or TV time stress you out. Don’t let the thought of saving for your children’s college fund make you want to give up. Instead of looking at your goal as a whole, focus on one small thing you can do today, this week, or this month to make some headway. I promise you won’t feel so defeated!

“Remember, big progress beings with small changes. It’s easy to want to overhaul your life overnight, but if you want to see success throughout the long term, do yourself a favor and start with little steps.

“Small steps might seem minuscule and microscopic. You might feel as though you’re hardly getting anywhere. But keep going. Don’t give up. Press forward. When you do, I promise you’ll start to reap the fruits of your efforts. Someday soon you’ll look back and realize that all of those tiny, seemingly insignificant changes added up to greater success than you ever dreamed was possible.” ~ Crystal Paine, page 96 – 97

Challenge for this week

Later this week we will be diving into another chapter and we will be turning to a new focus: finances! So I want you to catch up to where we are here and make sure you go through these exercises. Go back through, start at the intro, and do each weekly challenge (such as creating a personal priorities list) and then come back here so we can forge ahead.

This week’s challenge: Read chapter four of Say Goodbye to Survival Mode and start working (TODAY) on developing your consistent Bible reading time. Once you’ve given that a few weeks to really solidify into a daily routine, start on the next thing you want to make a daily habit (such an exercise).

Maximize Your Mornings

One of my favorite bloggers, Kat Lee from Inspired to Action, talks a lot about using your mornings well and strategies for getting up early (and going to bed early)! She actually has a free eBook (which is fantastic) called Maximize Your Mornings which gives strategies and tips for doing this! Download it for FREE HERE!

Join Me For a Challenge!

In celebration of the new year and getting things into better routines and schedules, I will be going through a MYM challenge for anyone who wants to follow along. Get all the details & join in here!

Crystal’s grace-filled and simple approach to forming daily routines and rituals is a breath of fresh air. It doesn’t have to take a huge amount of time to transform your homemaking – in fact, if you can commit just 10 minutes a day, you can see a HUGE improvement in your homemaking. Check out the course today!

P.S. Crystal offers a 100% money back guarantee in case the course isn’t what you expected or wasn’t helpful. Now you literally have no reason not to go check it out!

Get instant free access to my Finding Joy in Your Home video course.