Everyone has a different idea of what success looks like.
For some, it's being the best they can be in their chosen career paths and making a certain amount of money by a certain period of time. And for others, it means raising happy and healthy kids and/or being a good partner to their significant others. Regardless of your idea of success, there is one ingredient we all need to have in order to achieve it: self-discipline.
But what does self-discipline even look like? Overall, it's the ability to make sound, rational decisions on a daily basis while having an abundant amount of self-control. Those with self-discipline are often the very same ones who have achieved a greater amount of success and are often the happiest. Think about the Oprahs and the Diddys of the world. One thing they all have in common is the mastery of self-discipline: the ability to motivate themselves despite circumstances that are out of their control.
Another true success story is Lupita Nyong'o. The 35-year-old actress didn't get to where she is by accident. The Black Panther star recently sat down with Net-A-Porter to discuss her career, her methods of self-discipline, and how she approaches life.
Self-discipline is a learned behavior.
Even if you come from a disciplined environment, the moment you become free to make your own decisions about life is the very moment self-discipline needs to come into play. It's easy to wild out and lose your focus entirely. Nyong'o says that although she came from a very structured environment growing up, once she entered college at Hampshire University, all of that went out of the window. She says she had to learn how to depend on herself for motivation because no one there was going to do that for her. She says of her experience:
"Hampshire was very generous. But I was apprehensive about the experience. It's a place where you have to design your own major. You just made it up. I didn't like it. I came from a lot of structure, and I didn't understand this thing of doing whatever you wanted. But what I learned was invaluable: to depend on myself, to self-generate and self-motivate. I learned self-discipline because it wasn't being imposed on me."
Self-discipline includes taking time to figure yourself out.
In life, many of us fall victim to the expectations of others. Whether we are seeking the approval of our parents or our friends, we can sometimes lose the very essence of who we are trying to please others. This can force us into a life that isn't truly aligned with our purpose, and, ultimately, can lead to a lot of misery and regret. In order to avoid that, it's imperative to actually take the time to sit down with yourself to understand who you truly are and what matters the most to YOU and only YOU.
Nyong'o reveals that at the age of 24, she experienced a sort of quarter-life crisis. In an excerpt from the interview, she said:
"'I didn't know what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, so I went home to sit down with myself and figure things out. I remembered that I had a home, and people who loved me.'"
It wasn't until she forced herself to step away and truly evaluate herself that she discovered her life's calling: becoming an actress.
Self-discipline requires the ability to say "no" to things.
"No" is the most powerful and most universally understood word in any language. When we are focused too much on the expectations of others, it's easy to fall into a pattern of people-pleasing. But when you begin to step into your purpose, the ability to say "no" is what separates those who achieve their goals from the ones that simply let life happen to them. Saying "no" is the ultimate form of taking control of your life.
For the Mexican-born Kenyan, Nyong'o said that despite the patriarchal environment of her youth, she learned the ability to say "no" from watching the power her mom wielded with the word:
"I come from a very patriarchal world, but not within my family. My dad listened to my mom. My mom held her own. She had the power to say 'no' to things, and I saw her hold that power."
Self-discipline is about controlling your mind and impulses.
Self-control is a major component in self-discipline. We certainly have free will in this life, but free will should not come at the expense of controlling your impulses. They often say stress is derived from a lack of control, but when you are able to quiet the mind, you are able to begin to control your thoughts and your reactions to those thoughts and feelings. There are many different avenues one can take to master your mind and impulses, but for Nyong'o, working out on almost a daily basis and practicing meditation has been almost a saving grace. She attended a 10-day silent Vipassana meditation retreat and continues to meditate daily.
"I learned so much in there. It blew my mind. All you are doing is learning this technique of meditation. It was the hardest 10 days of my life. It was also the most restful 10 days...It makes all the difference...Stress is what makes me an insomniac. And I'm a stress-buster, man."
Self-discipline comes from within and being present in the now.
One sure way to misery is depending on the approval of others for our happiness. The opinion of others is fleeting, it is the opinion you have of yourself that will take you the farthest. As an international superstar, you might think Nyong'o is fueled by being in the public eye and the love of those she doesn't even see. However, the actress is not motivated by the limelight and the adoration of her fans. Rather, it's the day-to-day, in real life connections that fuel her.
"You'd be surprised. I think there's a separation between the public and the private. In the arena where I'm being desired, I'm absent. Most of the time, I'm actually not there...The only thing that matters is the private – seeing someone eye-to-eye. Desire from afar is just news."
The ability to self-reflect, to learn how to self-motivate, to master the use of the word "no" and to always remain in the present moment isn't easy, but it certainly is worth it in the end. But like most things, practice makes perfect. Once you decide to focus on self-discipline, watch the world change right in front of you.
To read more of Lupita Nyong'o's interview, click here.
Featured image by Getty Images
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Skylar sees things differently. At the time, she was shooting content on her iPhone. Temi came into the picture with a new perspective, an understanding of tech, and, eventually, a camera. “He doesn't give himself enough credit,” Skylar says. “He wasn't just my tripod. He wasn't just standing behind the camera and going ‘click.’ He was giving advice. He was giving me insight to how I could look at things from a different perspective. And I was like, 'Oh, he’s an artist.' I think it was maybe a heartbeat of that kind of energy of like, ‘Baby, can you take this picture?’ And it turned so quickly into, we're partners. We can work together in a way where we're advancing each other's creative thinking.”
The pair often says they’re two sides of the same coin. Skylar is an Aquarius. She attended art school, paints, and loves poetry. She’s more than happy to let the couple’s management firm and agency, Kensington Grey, handle their admin work. And, she loves to sleep in. Temi, on the other hand, wakes up early. He’s a Virgo. He loves a to-do list and regularly checks in on the couple’s brand partnerships spreadsheet to make sure everything is on track.
Because his storytelling was steeped in his love of technology, he didn’t always think of himself as a creative person. “Where I [am] the dreamer who wants to pluck things out of the sky and spend all day with my head in the clouds, Temi [is] so good at grounding me and helping me figure out how to make things make sense on paper. We just work together in such a complimentary way,” Skylar says.
It’s been more than six years since Brooklyn-based couple Temi and Skylar started dating, and nearly four since they cemented their working relationship. On TikTok and Instagram, the couple’s travel, fashion, and home content regularly rack up hundreds of thousands of views. They’ve worked with brands such as Coach, Aesop, Away, and Liquid IV, bringing their vibrant perspectives to every campaign they execute. Still, nearly two years since both Temi and Skylar committed to full-time content creation and creative directing, the couple says their romantic connection remains their priority.
“We told each other we would much rather go back to full-time jobs and preserve our relationship than to be full-time freelancers, barely getting a night's rest [and] barely kissing each other because we're so busy shooting,” Skylar says.
Working from home can make it hard to separate work from personal life for any entrepreneur. It can be even more challenging when your business partner is also your lover. Temi and Skylar had already used couples therapy as a tool to help them effectively communicate with one another. When they ran into challenges while working together, their therapist helped them set physical boundaries to help combat the issues.
"We told each other we would much rather go back to full-time jobs and preserve our relationship than to be full-time freelancers, barely getting a night's rest [and] barely kissing each other because we're so busy shooting."
“It actually took us doing very specific physical things to create boundaries between work and play in our relationship,” Skylar says. “So, for instance, we will only have conversations about work when we're out of bed or we're at the table or in the office. Initially, when we started, we had to light a candle to say that, 'Okay, this is a space where we're connecting, we’re not talking about work.' We needed really hard boundaries at the top. And then it became a little bit more organic.”
The boundaries have been crucial to implement, especially because the couple began working together so naturally. When the pair first met, Skylar was NY-based a social strategist for BuzzFeed and was using content creation to drive business to her lingerie company. She was shooting her own content. Temi was working for Microsoft in D.C. He’d recently traded in his DJing equipment for a camera. “I've always loved taking pictures,” he says. “Even when I was a kid, my African mother would wake me up at 3:00 a.m. [during a] party, and be like, 'Come take the family picture.'”
Growing up, Temi says he watched his parents support each other and be the true definition of partners. He knew he wanted the same for his own relationship. But, the couple also wanted to make sure they were being financially responsible. The pair didn’t quit their traditional jobs until they’d saved up two years' worth of their cost of living. And, Temi received his Master of Business Administration from New York University with the knowledge that it could either help him advance in his corporate career or be applicable to his business with Skylar.
Temi and SkylarCj Hart @hartbreakToday, they say their working relationship is more of a “quiet dance.” They still implement some of the boundaries they learned in therapy, but they also lean into their natural strengths and deep love for one another. When we speak, Temi has planned a date for the couple to see Princess Mononoke in 4K IMAX and added it to their Notion so they can factor it into their busy schedules. “I fully plan to date for the rest of my life,” he says.
Skylar says the couple doesn’t just wait for date nights to check in with one another, though. This often happens in the mornings, after Temi has made her peppermint tea and poured himself a cup of coffee. When they ask each other how they slept, she says, it’s not just a “nicety.” It’s a genuine question meant to foster connection.
“A lot of it happens during the day in the midst of work. We'll stop and we'll hug. Or we’ll slow dance in the kitchen,” she says. “Sometimes it's hard to set a whole date night when you have 7,000 things going on. So, we must grasp these moments and check in when we can. And I think it's become so organic to us that I actually didn't even realize how often we do it. But all day long, we're like, 'Are you good? I felt like your energy shifted,' because we're best friends, we just know. We just feel it happen.”
What’s better than being in love? Building wealth while doing it. Watch Making Cents here for real stories of couples who make money moves together.
Featured image by Cj Hart @hartbreak