Video summary
Steven Bartlett introduces a profound perspective on consistency and achievement, drawing from a quote by Mark Manson regarding the essential question of what pain one is willing to endure in life. The core argument posits that nothing worthwhile comes without discomfort; therefore, individuals should orient themselves toward the struggles they are prepared for rather than merely seeking pleasure. This mindset shift reveals that true enjoyment often stems not just from the activity itself but from identifying which specific pains or difficulties a person is ready to swallow. Bartlett illustrates this with his own life as an example of "grind," noting that while he loves speaking on his show and traveling, tasks like writing notes at three in the morning during delayed flights are painful yet necessary for success because they align with what others cannot do. To explain how discipline functions consistently across different areas of life, Bartlett presents a specific framework known as the "discipline equation." This formula suggests that discipline equals the subjective importance of a goal plus the psychological enjoyment derived from pursuing it minus the psychological cost or friction associated with that pursuit. He applies this logic to mundane tasks like taking out the bins at 7 AM; while there is little joy and high physical effort, the consequence of not doing so—a fine and an overflowing bin—makes the importance factor sufficiently high to ensure compliance. Similarly, his dedication to gym attendance during the pandemic was driven by a realization that health is the foundational table upon which all other loves sit, significantly increasing the "Y" value in his equation despite occasional social friction at crowded gyms. The discussion extends into the critical role of time and mortality as catalysts for discipline, framing life as a roulette game where every waking moment offers twenty-four chips to be allocated toward various outcomes after eight hours are spent sleeping. Bartlett argues that traditional time management techniques often fail because they ignore this underlying scarcity; without genuine discipline, no amount of scheduling works. He emphasizes that the most important question is how one allocates these daily "chips" in alignment with their values before life's wheel spins again. This perspective reframes discipline not as a separate skill but as the fundamental mechanism for ensuring actions match core priorities, whether it involves investing time in fitness or dedicating years to mastering a craft like DJing or comedy. Practical application of this theory is demonstrated through Bartlett's "life hack" regarding environment and friction reduction. He explains that simply moving his DJ equipment from the floor to the kitchen counter transformed his practice habits by making the act of starting almost involuntary; if he went into the kitchen, he would immediately press a button on an infrared socket setup to start practicing for hours. This mirrors how creators can remove barriers to entry, such as keeping recording gear visible and accessible, so that friction remains low enough that even minor fluctuations in motivation do not derail progress. However, he acknowledges limits to this approach, citing his own struggle with meditation where the "why" behind the practice was insufficiently strong to overcome the inherent difficulty, proving that sometimes a deeper sense of purpose or pain is required to sustain discipline when environmental cues alone are inadequate. Ultimately, Bartlett concludes that whether an individual is driven by love and encouragement or dragged by shame and insecurity does not matter on the surface; what matters is the strength of their underlying "why." He shares his own history as a shy child from a poor family in a wealthy area, noting that deep-seated shame drove him to become obsessed with proving himself. This aligns with Mark Manson's assertion that people are often driven by pain rather than pleasure, and Bartlett suggests that understanding the discipline equation allows one to influence their behavior even when facing writer's block or other obstacles. By interrogating each component of the equation—importance, enjoyment, and friction—one can identify where they might need more "pain" or a stronger reason to maintain consistency in any endeavor.
Read the full video transcript
I gotta show you this so Mark Manson put
this quote up a few months ago and I've
not been able to stop thinking about it
the most important question to ask is
what pain do you want in your life what
are you willing to struggle for
anything worthwhile is going to require
some degree of pain and struggle so if
you're oriented toward the pain and the
struggle you're probably going to be
more aligned with what you're capable of
accomplishing rather than if you just
Orient toward the pleasures
so good because we say find the thing
which you enjoy the most but really what
you're finding is what is the pain
you're prepared to swallow the most
nothing worthwhile is going to come
without discomfort you know even for me
and you love doing the show loved
speaking to all these interesting people
get to fly around the world and all but
I would be lying if I said I love
writing show notes or doing research in
Guatemala airport at three in the
morning because I'm on a delayed flight
and I've got a flight I've got an
episode tomorrow like it's grind it's
grind that I care about and it's grind
that I can do that other people couldn't
do but it's not not grind right this
goes to the discipline equation yes yes
yes you might be I'm familiar with let's
hit it hit it because that really
embodies now Mark Manson quite about the
pain you're willing to encounter I was
trying to figure out why there's some
areas in my life where I'm disciplined
and other areas of my life where I seem
to lack discipline kind of what I was
saying earlier about being a dualistic
type of individual and I came up with
this discipline equation that I'd love
to interrogate with you because I've not
thrown at enough people to know that if
it's if it's true or not so discipline
equals
um
the importance of the goal plus let's
just say the importance of the goal to
you so the subjective importance of the
goal how much does that goal matter to
you plus the psychological enjoyment you
get in the pursuit of the goal right so
as you pursue the goal how
psychologically enjoy enjoyable and
reinforcing and you know is that for you
minus
the psychological cost of the pursuit of
the goal so I can I'll run you through
some examples Simon simck said to me
well Steve I take the bins out at 7am in
the morning yesterday
um I didn't want to do that but I did it
it's like okay let's run that through
the framework what would happen if you
didn't take the bins out that and that
sort of underpins and defines the
importance of that goal well he'd get a
fine and then hit up have an overflowing
bin out the front of his house so the Y
is high the psychological enjoyment of
pursuing taking the bins out is very low
right and the friction of getting out of
bed at 7am is high but thankfully the Y
is so strong that regardless of the fact
that the pursuit the enjoyment of the
pursuit is low and the friction is high
the behavior still occurs going to the
gym learning to DJ in all areas of my
life I can run it through that equation
and go okay so in the pandemic the
reason I've been going to the gym for
three years straight now is because my y
searched the the perception of the
importance of that goal searched I saw
how our existing Health correlates to
our health outcomes and I realized for
the first time in my life this clear
thought that I couldn't unshake that my
health is my first Foundation it is this
table that everything I love and care
about sits upon so that has to be
my number one priority reflected in my
schedule so that that changed that went
up the psychological pursuit of going to
the gym is kind of enjoyable there's a
bit of a dopamine release there and it's
fun to do that feels good for my
self-esteem and the friction associated
with it is low unless
unless I go to a gym where people know
me and I spend the whole time talking
then what I what happens if I'm put in
that situation so I don't go to gym
the discipline equation changes
so part of the reason I made a big
investment in a company called until is
because I can have somewhere I can work
out and focus on the workout genuinely
in fact that's one of the things that
actually changed my relationship with
the gym and nearly threw me off the
Habit yep was that psychological cost so
how do you how does that sit with you it
does you've got the discipline equation
death time and discipline yeah what's
the Death part so like
when I started writing that particular
chapter in my book to understand
discipline you have to understand the
scarcity of time because you know so I I
started because I was going to write a
chapter about time management people
want to know how to manage their time
and as I went through the hundreds of
available time management techniques I
realized the promoted technique the time
blocking all this one two three four the
ABC the reason why there's so many time
management techniques is because none of
them work unless you have this
underlying thing called discipline it's
the same in The Fad diet industry that
industry will always churn out new
things because there's an underlying
issue which is discipline so it's kind
of a mirage industry so the chapter
pivoted and started focusing on
discipline well the next thing was time
um why is time important random numbers
if you're how old are you now 35 okay so
you have if you reach the average age of
an American you have just over 17 000
days left to live
and I think all of that goes to show
that
time is the currency we're playing with
in every moment of Our Lives it's a
center point of our influence I talk
about the roulette table of my life it's
a frame I think through where we wake up
in the morning with these 24 chips if
you spend eight hours sleeping you wake
up with six 16 chips left and how you
place those chips on this roulette table
that sits in front of us just before the
wheel spins every day determines all of
our outcomes in our lives so I've chosen
now to put to allocate two chips to this
little piece here called Fitness the
roulette table spins and I get my
returns as I went down that chapter
I realized that in the context of time
and death
um and time management the most
important question to answer the
fundamental is discipline how can I
allocate more of these chips to the
things that are in line with my values
what is this the thing called discipline
come from if it underpins everything we
do it even underpins what you just said
there with Fred again and that Mark
Manson quote the reason why Fred again
is doing that is because his discipline
equation isn't is in is in line if for
whatever reason you just tipped any part
of that equation you could knock him off
that discipline yeah with with Jimmy
Carr and with all these people that go
do that decade of dedication to become
Masters in their craft if you look to
their discipline equation you'll see
moments where the friction came up and
they fell off or they got writer's block
or whatever it might be called in their
context
um and then so you can influence your
discipline if you understand that
equation
when my DJ equipment was on the floor of
my spare room I did not gonna use it the
minute I put it on my kitchen counter
and had it one button away from being
able to practice at any given moment
yeah put it right in front of it same
thing for any Creator if you're starting
to do a YouTube channel and this is this
is a life hack here you remember you
might have had this in your house when
you were younger
radio uh infrared socket Turner honors
it's like a single remote it's like 10
bucks on Amazon and you leave the wall
socket on at all times and you run it
through one of these additional sockets
and then you plug your into that
thing yeah and it's like 10 bucks right
on Amazon my entire Studio at home is
run through one of these so I go in and
I just press one two three four and
everything comes on because when I was
first starting out it was super
effortful for me to set up the camera
and I'm gonna do the thing and I'm
already trying to learn to do YouTube
and it's terrifying and I'm looking into
this black lens and it stares back at me
precisely DJ kit can't be on the floor
if you want me to practice as much as
possible oh make get it in the way put
it in the way of things right it's
almost harder for me to DJ than it is
for me to to to avoid it this it was on
my kitchen counter so I would sometimes
be going into the kitchen to eat
something and just oh and press the
button I'm off four hours later I've
just done a four hour DJ practice Yeah
if you think about give me something in
your life your disciplined out and we'll
run it through the equation something
you've shown great discipline at
recording the podcast recording the
podcast does it really matter to you yes
is there psychological enjoyment from
the pursuit yes is the friction High
what's what's the level of friction
um four out of ten four out of ten but
if we added up the first part of the
equation how much does it matter to you
at 10 and how much oh how much what's
the psychological enjoyment of the
pursuit nine so I'd say we're about 19
take away four and because it's positive
the behavior will occur you can do that
as a minus four right the behavior will
occur if at any point the friction gets
really high and for whatever reason if
the pursuit of it or the why behind your
you know this objective meaning behind
it falls the behavior will not occur
I've heard you do this with your
meditation practice yeah which is why
you're not meditating yeah exactly yeah
my why isn't strong enough I don't I
don't I haven't quite had the the
evidence of it as well sometimes we need
a little bit more pain right it's a
robusting way to to frame it I guess if
Alex was sat here he would say
we might say
a lot of people are driven by pain
rather than pleasure
right 100
and that's the Y part the chip on your
shoulder accounts for so much it can
account for so much right
um you know somebody who had a really
bad period of mental health they
suffered with anxiety attacks and it
lost them something or somebody scorned
them and they go oh okay and then they
decide to commit themselves to mental
health and improving the texture of
their own mind that's coming from a
place of wanting to prove other people
wrong whether someone is driven or
dragged is impossible to tell on the
surface and I've sat in my podcast over
and over again and asked people are you
driven are you being dragged by
something when I say dragged I mean some
kid on the playground at seven years old
told you you're a scumbag and you'll
never be anything and you're poor and
then that's dragged you that insecurity
and that shame has dragged you to
entrepreneurship into becoming a
millionaire driven is what you know Gary
vaynerchuk describes to me where he says
his mother loved him so much and she
encouraged him so much that he had that
drive to kind of like prove her right
whatever force it is it comes down to
why which is the start of the equation
and even in my case super sh tons of
Shame as a kid the only black kid in an
all-white area pretty much the poorest
family in our street definitely
dilapidated house in the context of a
wonderful area deep shame and insecurity
about not being enough drove me like
you've like I was an obsessed hungry dog
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