About a year ago, a thought struck me, and I haven't really been able to shake it or come the terms with its sense.

And that thought is this. What if self-discipline is simply developing addictions that are good for you?

Like, what's the difference?

If I feel compelled to run every day

to keep myself happy, and if not running every day

makes me noticeably unhappy,

how is that, psychologically speaking, any different from needing to have a drink every day to be happy?

This idea really hit home for me the past few years with my health transformation.

For example, I used to have terrible eating habits.

Many of these poor eating habits resembled a kind of addiction.

If you put a dessert in front of me after dinner,

I literally did not know how to stop the spoon from entering my mouth.

Even if I was in pain, I couldn't stop eating it. If I ordered one drink,

it was a given that drinks two, three, and four would soon follow. It was simply unconscious.

To not order them was extremely uncomfortable and slightly upsetting.

Now initially when I started to undo these habits I did what everybody does.

I brute forced it. I created a plan and basically tortured myself until I stuck to it.

But as time went on, what I noticed was that it didn't really work.

At least, not in the long run.

What I slowly realized is that eventually I had to train my body to become addicted to the things that were good for it.

If I don't eat plenty of vegetables and whole foods now, I start missing them.

I start feeling worse for not eating them.

...