One of the most overlooked reasons why people fail to reach their goals and live a disciplined life is distractions.
Distractions come in all shapes, forms, and sizes. They can look like your family, your job, your favorite video game, your weekend wine, your hobbies, or even a harmless TV show. These distractions don’t always show up as chaos. They often look like rest, leisure, or even productivity.
But here’s the truth: most distractions are invited into your life. They didn’t barge in. You opened the door and welcomed them, thinking they would serve you. But they end up robbing you instead.
Let me be real.
After a long week, I used to feel like I deserved a glass of wine and a few hours of gaming. It seemed harmless. People would even affirm me for it. “That’s balance. That’s healthy.” And maybe it would be, if I wasn’t in debt, if I wasn’t trying to improve my health, if I wasn’t studying for a certification to level up my income, or if I wasn’t chasing a faster 5K or trying to discipline my mind and body for the mission God gave me.
The lie is that this moment of freedom is rest. But it’s not. It’s retreat. And there’s a difference.
Real freedom is having full access to your life’s resources: your time, money, energy, and health. It’s being able to direct those resources toward the goals God put in your heart. When we hand those resources over to indulgence, we’re not being free. We’re becoming trapped.
We’re building a prison and calling it peace.
This is why I say the ideal of freedom can be tricky. If you’re regularly giving your best hours and energy to something that doesn’t serve your calling, you’re not free. You’re bound. Bound by comfort. Bound by escapism. Bound by the false relief of distraction.
And that false relief always comes at a cost.
If I’m trying to improve my VO2 max, the last thing I should be doing is putting smoke in my lungs. If I’m preparing for a certification in AWS to improve my income, I don’t have three hours every Friday to give away to a video game. And if I’m a man of God, which I am, I need to steward my life better than that.
I already know people will push back. Somebody once commented on this blog and said I live too strictly, too structured. But here’s what they may not know:
I’m a Christian. A real one.
I’ve read the Bible cover to cover twice in the last two years, and I’m rereading it again now. What I see throughout the Word is instruction. God gives us direct guidance on how to live. He tells us how to spend our time. He shows us how to manage money. He instructs us on how to care for our bodies, how to work, how to rest, and how to resist the pull of the flesh.
Scripture teaches us that working, also called toiling, is part of our assignment. In Ecclesiastes, it says our reward for our work is to enjoy food, drink, and our spouse. There’s no shame in working hard. There’s no shame in living with structure. That’s the path of a disciplined life.
Anything outside of God’s instruction is distraction. And distraction leads to disobedience.
So when someone tells me I should loosen up or not take life so seriously, my response is simple. I care more about what God thinks than what you think.
God has already given me time. He’s given me energy. He’s given me health. And whether I’m working at full capacity or dealing with limitations, I’m still accountable for what I do with what I have.
That’s why I speak about distraction with so much urgency. I’ve seen what it does. When we overindulge in the things we think are harmless, such as alcohol, weed, sex, video games, scrolling, sleeping in, over-socializing, we start losing access to the very resources we need to build the life God is calling us to.
Eventually, we become addicts.
Addiction doesn’t just mean substance abuse. It means overindulgence in anything that steals your discipline. It’s when something meant to be a gift becomes a god. And once that happens, you’re no longer free. You’re trapped. Your flesh starts making the decisions, not your spirit. And when your flesh is in charge, discipline doesn’t stand a chance.
God didn’t create you to waste. He created you to build. To create. To serve. To improve. To multiply.
So suffer well. Fast from indulgence. Get up. Go work out. Go build something. Go study. Go lead. Go love people. Go make an impact.
Because every time you choose distraction over discipline, you rob yourself, and the world, of what God put you here to do.
Want to live a more disciplined life?
Start taking inventory. Track how you’re spending your time, money, energy, and health. Ask yourself this:
Are these things being used to serve my calling, or to distract me from it?
Let’s stop pretending indulgence is peace. Real peace comes from living on purpose.
Let’s stay sharp. Let’s stay disciplined.
Let’s keep building.
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